Federal judge rejects DOJ application to unseal Maxwell grand jury records.
So, unless trump ignore the law-
- no magic “files”
Well, there’s still the DOJ Epstein client list that the AG said she had on her desk a month ago.
I’m sure she’ll release it in two weeks or so.
The grand jury documents are a limited set of materials that were designed specifically to prosecute Epstein and only Epstein, and specifically for the crimes that he was being charged with. We’d generally expect them to exclude most of anything that wasn’t directly relevant.
So if there were other people who arguably could have been prosecuted, but weren’t going to be, then that wouldn’t be found in the grand jury materials. If Epstein was blackmailing people, but he wasn’t going to be charged for doing so, then there’d be nothing about that.
The grand jury documents fall well below magic status, to simple red herring. Personally, I couldn’t give a rat’s ass about them.
“A member of the public, appreciating that the Maxwell grand jury materials do not contribute anything to public knowledge, might conclude that the Government’s motion for their unsealing was aimed not at ‘transparency’ but at diversion—aimed not at full disclosure but at the illusion of such,” he wrote.
Well, sane members of the public might conclude that. A lot of MAGA will fall for it. Alas, he tried.
Oof!
Yeah, it’s nice to read that. But these little backhand slaps are all we can muster in the USA in terms of opposition to the Trump Steamroller.
But still nice to hear.
Yes, they are a tiny fraction of the actual “Epstein Files.”
Of course the MAGA faithful don’t realize that.
So, then- what is in the “actual files”? How many documents? Where are they kept?
Well, we know that it took at least a thousand FBI agents with Sharpies to black Trump’s name out of whatever files exist, so make of that what you will. Take a moment to imagine if Hillary Clinton had 1,000 FBI agents working on scrubbing her emails of specific references that make her look bad.
They were on Pam Bondi’s desk not that long ago but who knows where they might be now. Check the fireplace. Or under the new Rose Garden patio. If no luck, try the bathrooms at Mar-a-Lago although you might have to climb over several boxes marked “Top Secret” first.
(Not aimed at @DrDeth in particular) I don’t know why people give Trump so much benefit of the doubt when it comes to Epstein. We know Trump is a shameless pervert who held beauty pageants so he could ogle the topless girls (literally; not 18 yet) backstage. We know Trump enjoys sexually assaulting women and brags about it. But when it comes to his close friendship with a pedophile that Trump was trafficking girls to (as Trump has recently acknowledged, talking about Epstein “stealing” his underage spa employees) we now somehow suppose that Trump never shared his mutual perversions with this guy? Epstein had to tell Trump “this one’s not for you!” about a particular girl and that is supposed to mean anything other than Trump thinking she was there for his sexual pleasure whether she liked it or not? The world’s most famous pedophile had to tell his fellow pervert to settle down! Let me repeat for emphasis: the dude with an island dedicated to rape had to tell Donald Trump to slow his roll. Jesus ever-loving Christ.
I will say that “enigmas” as some clever code for “gamines” doesn’t work for me (gamines are boyish and Trump is too insecure about his sexuality to admit his attraction to girls/women who look like anything like men) but that love letter from Trump to Epstein was creepy enough even without some special pedos-only code for girls.
In any case, as I have said before, this information will inevitably leak and Trump’s ham-fisted, cack-handed attempts at a cover-up will only make things worse. Not for Trump; he can just die and get away relatively cleanly. But for Elon Musk, who bragged about how he’s going to be around for 40 more years? Yeah, you might want to put some more effort in on that rocket to Mars, dude. And save a seat for Pam Bondi and all the other lackeys. It’s going to be a crowded flight.
I doubt the Epstein files matter at this point. No way they would release the originals. Even Trumps administration has someone capable enough to make up believable forgeries.
If Trump is not in them, I won’t believe it. If he is MAGA won’t believe it. It’s a total stalemate.
The point of the Epstein files is that Trump is refusing to order them to be released, which makes him look guilty. It’s a bit of leverage that makes MAGA ‘think’ (for a certain definition of ‘think’).
Does this mean they’re still being audited?
Forgeries do best under light scrutiny. Few documents in history will be scrutinized as heavily, and by as many skeptical eyes, as any released Epstein files.
And Trump and Bondi and the MAGAS will just say no they aren’t, what are ya gonna do about it.
I do have to wonder why more women (girls then) have not come forward. That’s the only thing that gives me pause.
Trump goes after people who make jokes about him on television. He’s coming after the Washington Commanders because he wants them to change the team’s name back to what it was. I can think of a great many reason more women aren’t coming forward. Look what happened to Stormy Daniels for claiming she had a sexual encounter with Trump.
It’s weird, because although Republicans were content to accept Barr’s lies about the Mueller report, there do seem to be Republicans who want to know what’s actually in The Epstein Files.
Are any of those True Believers that think that it will consist mainly of Democrats?
I would bet so. They seem to be of the more conspiracy favoring branch of Republicans. The basement pizza ones.
I’d also note that they would need to match public information:
There’s basically no way to release everything and not have Trump look like he was knowingly best buds with a pedo, since we know that material does exist that it would have to do just exactly that. Any lack of such a thing is, effectively, evidence of a failure to release everything.