WSJ header for story that forced Trump's hand
"Now Trump is telling us the courts can decide on releasing
the Epstein information. The same courts he tells us are part of the deep state
and he ignores on almost every other occasion." - NY Times comment
The first ever felon president, Donald J. Trump, has finally called for the release of additional documents related to the investigation of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. This followed the bombshell publication of an article in The Wall Street Journal , yesterday about a "bawdy" letter bearing Trump’s name that was included in a 2003 birthday album for the disgraced child sex predator and financier Epstein.
The MAGA winds have howled furiously over the past week, demanding release of the Epstein files - with MAGA star boy Alex Jones even bawling openly about being betrayed by not getting those files. Which AG Pam Bondi had admitted were "on her desk" in a FOX News interview. Now, following publication of the Trump -Epstein bromance in The Journal, with excerpts of a letter Dotard sent to Epstein for his 50th birthday back in 2003 - we know such files really exist. How? Because The Journal admitted the letter was part of a "compendium" of material out there, including a special "brown birthday album" from co-perpetrator Ghislane Maxwell.
Last night on ALL In, MSNBC host Chris Hayes led with the WSJ blockbuster story discussing its context with Brandy Zadrozny and former Obama AG Eric Holder. E.g.
WSJ: Trump birthday note to Epstein says, 'May every day be another wonderful secret' | Watch
Ms. Zadrozny noted that she's been following the MAGA cult for some time, and despite the WSJ breakthrough piece many dismiss it as a "hoax" or a "nothing burger." However, that didn't stop former Trump buddy boy and white supremacist Nick Fuentes from blowing a gasket last night and railing against the "fat Potus" e.g.
Ex-Trump Supporter Rages at ‘Fat’ POTUS Over Epstein Drama: ‘F**k You!’
So it's not yet clear how this latest episode will fully play out in MAGA-land or what fraction will buy into Trump's lies , i.e. it was all a Democratic concoction or plan to blame Epstein's debased acts on him. (Of course, only a certified moron would believe such horse pockey - or accept Trump bimbo mouthpiece Karolyn Leavitt's admonition to "trust Trump." Right. Trust the most compulsive liar in American history.)
In any case, Trump would have had to know the Rupert Murdoch-owned WSJ wouldn't just fire from the hip and had to have all the legal 'ducks' in a row. So either the orange fungus is congenitally stupid or suffering from severe dementia when he made his threats about suing the WSJ.
Trying to not give in - Trump in a Thursday night social-media post- said he had directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to “produce any and all pertinent Grand Jury testimony, subject to Court approval!” Bondi wrote on X that she was ready to ask a court Friday to unseal the grand jury transcripts. But let's not fool ourselves that this is nothing more than a deflection, a feint. Dotard, Bondi & Company would have had to know in advance that Grand Jury testimony is subject to extreme privacy protections with only narrow exceptions. As Mimi Rocah, former Westchester NY DA has noted, it is unheard of for the DOJ to even be involved in promoting this. More than likely she offered that it provides Trump with an escape hatch, so he can always blame the court if it falls through. "See, I did all I could for ya, but the Judge let us down, guys!"
The truth, as Lawrence O'Donnell pointed out last night, is that there is vastly more material (e.g. Epstein flight logs, his brown 'birthday album', FBI 302 notes, videos, photos, client list etc.) than the grand jury transcripts - which Trump and Bondi have to know the courts aren't likely to release. Why? Because if Epstein co-defendant Ghislane Maxwell (now serving a 20 yr. sentence) wants a re-trial, she will need to have access to that testimony, those transcripts.
Bondi, a Trump loyalist who had been accused by far-right
influencers of abetting an Epstein cover-up, quickly responded with her own
social media post on X, vowing to comply: “President Trump — we are ready to
move the court tomorrow to unseal the grand jury transcripts,” she wrote. Likely aware - even as she wrote her post- the court will not comply. What would really make a difference is the WSJ releasing the entire, unexpurgated 'bawdy' Trump letter to Epstein - which JD Vance has actually dared The Journal to do.
According to The Daily Beast:
"Donald Trump has ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi to unseal
all of the Jeffrey Epstein-related grand jury transcripts in a frantic Truth
Social post, hours after The Wall Street Journal revealed
the president was pen pals with the accused sex trafficker.
“Based on the ridiculous amount of publicity given to Jeffrey
Epstein, I have asked Attorney General Pam Bondi to produce any and all
pertinent Grand Jury testimony, subject to Court approval,” Trump posted. “This
SCAM, perpetuated by the Democrats, should end, right now!”
But let's get one thing clear amidst Trump's barrage of lies: the Dems had nothing to do with it! It had been Trump, Bondi and other MAGAs like Dan Bongino and Kash Patel who had pumped this Epstein files stuff for years- trying to tie it to a nefarious "Deep State." (Run by the Dems of course) .
"Why did you say you knew Jeffrey Epstein for fifteen years. Terrific guy"?
"Why did you say publicly he's fun to be with and likes beautiful women as much as I do - and many of them are on the younger side"?
"How many of the ones you saw were on the younger side, Mr. Trump?"
"How old were the ones on the younger side? Why did you say it?"
"What did you mean by 'wonderful secrets' in that birthday letter to Jeffrey Epstein.?"
In the end, I am betting that he pulls that fruitless, kneejerk response lawsuit when he realizes the costs to him for trying to go through with it. Namely what any and all truthful answers to the WSJ's depositions will expose.
See Also:
- And:
- Contributor: Trump's MAGA spell is broken. Even his base knows he is a lame duck - Los Angeles Times
Dear Mr President,
Well, it seems that there is unusual unanimity about the putative (and likely former) existence of the secret “Trump-And-Other-Celebrity-Reprobates-Screw-Teenage-Girls-At-Jeffrey-Epstein’s-Hideaway” video files. How could they have not existed?
After all, all of America has heard – from your own lips – about your predilection for “grabbing pussy” and your envious admiration of Epstein’s preference for beautiful girls “on the younger side”. And we have all read excerpts from the trial testimony in your 34-count conviction for “sexual abuse”. Who can doubt that when your pal Jeffrey offered you a freebee at his secret island retreat, you would accept? When have you ever turned down a freebee?
We can all see why, despite his many promises at his many trials to take the stand in his own defense, Donald Trump‘s lawyers would not allow it. The former reality TV host’s increasingly frantic efforts to talk his way out of the ballooning outrage over his flagrant cover-up of the Jeffrey Epstein case are backfiring, making him look like nothing more than a man who has a whole lot to hide.
After a decade in which his supporters have exhibited nothing but blind faith in him and his promises, Trump cannot believe they are now demanding that the Justice Department make public the voluminous documents and evidence about the deceased sex offender’s dealings. The president is unable to control his contempt for them. In the last couple of days, on his Truth Social platform and on camera, he’s called them “weaklings,” “stupid” and “foolish.”
To assume that the escalating right-wing meltdown over the Justice Department’s dismissal of the “Epstein files” affair will be a fatal blow to the MAGA cult is very tempting. But it’s probably best to resist that temptation, at least for the moment. Over the years, there have been so many instances that felt as if they had to be the beginning of the end, and they all ended up being false alarms. In each case, the country moved on and Donald Trump only grew stronger. Still, this one has a characteristic that we haven’t seen before: The calls are coming from inside the house.
On July 6, the Justice Department released an unsigned memorandum concluding there was no evidence that convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein kept a “client list” from which he blackmailed powerful figures in politics, finance and entertainment, or that he was murdered in prison, as so many on the right have come to believe. If Attorney General Pam Bondi, and perhaps Trump himself — who was pictured many times over the years in the company of Epstein and his paramour, Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving 20 years in federal prison for sex trafficking — thought this would draw a line under the whole affair, they were wrong. For a movement that was founded on conspiracy theories in which the powerful, especially those in government, protect themselves, the Justice Department’s memo has turned out to be a major problem.
On Saturday, Donald Trump tried to wave the MAGA base off the growing clamor to release the full case file of infamous sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, a close friend of Trump’s who evaded trial in 2019 by killing himself in jail. The president’s intervention seemed to reveal that he’s deeply worried there’s embarrassing or incriminating evidence about him in the Justice Department’s files. The furor, he insisted, is being driven by “selfish people” who are trying to hurt him. He said the files must be fabricated “by Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration.” Trump’s tirade made it impossible to escape the conclusion that he’s trying to dissuade his voters from believing any damning evidence that may come out.
What was also telling in this defensive screed is how perplexed Trump is over his base’s fixation on this case. He begs them to move on to other conspiracy theories, offering a full menu of alternatives, like JFK’s assassination, Hunter Biden’s laptop and, his personal favorite, the “Rigged and Stolen Election of 2020.” “Let’s keep it that way, and not waste Time and Energy on Jeffrey Epstein, somebody that nobody cares about,” he pleaded with his supporters, as if saying that no one cares about Epstein will somehow make it true.
For more than a week, the political movement he created has been convulsing with righteous fury over things he and his attorney general have been saying and doing — or rather, not doing — as it relates to the life and death of Jeffrey Epstein.
Mr. Trump keeps commanding his supporters to move on from their fixations over the disgraced financier and registered sex offender. But many of his supporters simply cannot swallow the anticlimactic conclusion that the Department of Justice put forth a week ago when it basically said there was nothing to see here, folks.
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