Epstein, Epstein, Epstein Means Far More To The MAGAt Crowd Than Russia, Russia, Russia Ever Did

How Satisfying Is It Seeing Señor TACO Hoist On This Petard?

Democrats Ro Khanna and Marc Veasey have, respectively, an amendment and a resolution trying to force a vote on releasing the FBI Epstein files. Neither will ever come to the floor of the House. In fact, Khanna’s failed in the Rules Committee late Monday night, all Republicans but fringe nut Ralph Norman (R-SC) voting to shit-can it. CNN reported yesterday that half the country is dissatisfied with the way the Trump White House has handled the Epstein scandal— including 40% of Republicans; only 3% of Americans say they’re satisfied with how the Trump regime is handling this scandal.

And meanwhile several conservative sources are following Trump’s command to stop talking about Epstein. “Fox News didn't mention Epstein at all yesterday until a panel discussion in Bret Baier's 6 p.m. hour. Questions about the administration’s handling of the files were totally absent from primetime, a stark contrast from last week… Charlie Kirk asked the audience to choose between Dan Bongino and Pam Bondi. (They chose Bongino.) Come Monday, after receiving a phone call from Trump, he backed off. ‘I’m done talking about Epstein for the time being,’ Kirk said on his podcast. ‘I’m going to trust my friends in the administration.’ Other prominent MAGA media influencers, including TikToker Chaya Raichik, who received one of Bondi's Epstein binders, have also made a hard pivot away— instead posting relentlessly about Joe Biden's use of an autopen.”

Monday, the Financial Times published a short essay by Lauren Fedor explaining why the Epstein case is roiling the MAGA movement. The scandal is threatening to rip open one of the deepest rifts yet in Trump’s movement— exposing fissures that even he, with all his bluster and command over his base, may not be able to paper over this time. Talking out of his ass as always, Señor TACO had promised the full release of Epstein-related files, a pledge that resonated with the QAnon conspiratorial paranoia he himself helped cultivate. But now, his administration has released a memo dismissing the existence of a “client list” and reinforcing the official suicide narrative. That move has enraged the very people who once saw him as the singular force willing to challenge the elite pedophile cabals of their fever dreams.

This has lit a match under Trump’s own house. Prominent loyalists like Laura Loomer, Steve Bannon, Dan Bongino and Kash Patel are openly feuding with Attorney General Pam Bondi, who is now being blamed for whitewashing Epstein’s crimes and shielding the powerful. Megyn Kelly is calling Bondi “the villain in this story.” Bongino is reportedly on the verge of quitting. And Bannon is framing Epstein as a Pandora’s box that Trump’s team has now tried to slam shut— but doing a bad job at it. What started as a fringe theory is now a full-blown intra-MAGA civil war, with Trump caught between his own appointees and the mob of believers his political grasping helped unleash.

Trump, true to form, has circled the wagons around Bondi, dismissing the uproar as a distraction— “Are people still talking about this guy? This creep?”—while trying to minimize the fallout. But the base isn’t buying it. They want the promised reckoning. They want heads on pikes. And they’re starting to turn on him for failing to deliver. This isn’t just a scandal; it’s a loyalty test gone awry, and it’s one that threatens to splinter the coalition that carried Trump to power and sustains him.

If the MAGA faithful start to believe that Trump is covering for the very elites he promised to expose— not to mention himself— the damage could be irreversible. At the very least, it’s already weakening the aura of infallibility he depends on. The Epstein case, long treated as right-wing folklore, is now acting as a kind of stress test for the entire MAGA narrative— and what’s becoming clear is that even Trump can’t contain the monster he helped create. Fox is blacking it out, but the whole thing is very much alive anyway… and the GOP is in disarray over it.

Politico reported this morning that internal Democratic polling shows that around 70% of voters, including nearly 60% of Trump voters, believe “law enforcement is withholding information about powerful people connected to” Jeffrey Epstein.

Trump continued freaking out over his Epstein mess today. Take the time to read this blast he just posted on Truth Social, calling Republicans “weaklings”— MAGA Mike, presumably— and insisting the whole Epstein mess— which has been so core to QAnon and MAGA— is a Democratic Party “scam” and disinformation operation or something insane like that.

As Judd Legum noted, also on Monday, the MAGA and QAnon movements are intertwined and believe that “top Democrats are secretly involved in a Satanic pedophile ring…  [and that] Trump is leading a secret effort to bring down the evil cabal. For years, Trump has encouraged QAnon and reinforced their beliefs. Now, it's backfiring, ensnaring Trump in a controversy about his administration's handling of information related to a real pedophile, Jeffrey Epstein. The people who believed Trump was their savior are now accusing the president and his administration of perpetrating a coverup. The issue appears to be one of the first to create a genuine rift between Trump and his MAGA base.”

Trump leaned into the interest in Epstein among QAnon and others on the far right. In February, the White House invited 15 right-wing influencers to meet with Trump, Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel, and Vice President JD Vance. Among the invitees were those who directly promoted QAnon, including conservative activist Scott Pressler and others who are highly influential voices among QAnon devotees. The group was provided with binders labeled "The Epstein Files: Phase 1."

Most of the information in the binders, which was later released publicly, was not new, and it did not implicate those beyond Epstein. But the inclusion of the words "Phase 1" on the binder underscored that more information would follow.

Bondi set those expectations during a February 21, 2025, interview on Fox News. "Will the DOJ [Department of Justice] release the list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients?" Bondi asked rhetorically. “It’s sitting on my desk right now to review. That's been a directive by President Trump."

On February 27, Bondi released a letter to Patel accusing the FBI of inappropriately withholding "thousands of pages of files" related to the Epstein investigation from the DOJ. She demanded the FBI turn over the material by 8 a.m. the following day.

Months passed, and no further information was released by Bondi.

On June 6, Elon Musk, following his public falling out with Trump, posted on Twitter that Trump was "in the Epstein files" and "[t]hat is the real reason they have not been made public."

Later that day, Trump released a statement from David Schoen, who represented Epstein for nine days before his death. "I can say authoritatively, unequivocally, and definitely that he had no information to hurt President Trump," Schoen said in a statement. "I specifically asked that!" After representing Epstein, Schoen went on to represent Trump during his impeachment trials.

… On July 6, the DOJ released an unsigned memo stating that, contrary to Bondi's claims on Fox News, there is “no incriminating ‘client list.’” The memo stated that there is "no credible evidence found that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals as part of his actions" and no “evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.” Notably, the memo also said there was evidence that Epstein had “harmed over one thousand victims,” significantly more than had been previously disclosed.

Since the release of the memo, prominent Trump supporters have turned on Bondi, accusing her of being involved in a coverup. Laura Loomer, the far-right pundit and influential Trump advisor, accused Bondi of “lying” and called for her to be fired. Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson accused Bondi of “covering up crimes, very serious crimes by their own description.” Former Trump White House advisor Steve Bannon said the DOJ memo would permanently alienate “10% of the MAGA movement” and cause Republicans to lose 40 seats in the House and the presidency. Several right-wing influencers invited to the White House in February, including Liz Wheeler and Rogan O’Handley, condemned Bondi.

Michael Flynn, a national security adviser in the first Trump administration who has used QAnon slogans, admonished Trump administration on Twitter. “If the administration doesn’t address the massive number of unanswered questions about Epstein, especially the ABUSE OF CHILDREN BY ELITES (it is very clear that abuse occurred), then moving forward on so many other monumental challenges our nation is facing becomes much harder,” Flynn wrote.

While much of the direct criticism was focused on Bondi, rather than Trump, it quickly became clear that Bondi was acting at Trump's direction. Asked about the controversy by a member of the media after a July 8 cabinet meeting, Trump said it was “unbelievable” that people are still talking about Epstein, who he called a “creep.” (In 2002, Trump said that he had known Epstein for “15 years,” calling him a “terrific guy” and noting that Epstein “likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”) He claimed the question about Epstein amounted to a “desecration” of the victims of the Texas floods.

When those comments failed to stem criticism of his administration's handling of the Epstein case, Trump took things to another level. In an extraordinary statement posted Saturday on Truth Social, Trump said that additional files about Epstein do exist but should be ignored because they were created by his political opponents.

… Trump encouraged his supporters to “not waste Time and Energy on Jeffrey Epstein, somebody that nobody cares about.”

At the same time, Dan Pfeiffer was enjoying the MAGA freakout over Epstein: “With great amusement, I’ve watched conspiracy theory-pushing podcasters spiral into existential crises, Trump’s biggest media allies turn on him, and Trump’s Truth Social posts trying to quell the furor get ratioed. Nick Fuentes, the neo-Nazi who dined with Trump and Kanye West at Mar-a-Lago, even declared that “MAGA is Dead.”

He wrote that his “initial reaction was pure schadenfreude — an enjoyable distraction from democracy circling the drain. I assumed the Epstein furor would be just another passing summer storm for Trump. Before long, his flunkies would fall back in line because that’s what flunkies do. Trump has survived criminal convictions, impeachments, and countless scandals that would have ended other political careers. Surely, he’d survive this one without much damage. Now, I’m not so sure. The Epstein scandal is unlike any Trump scandal before. It looks like the kind of scandal that has undone second-term presidents. I’m not saying MAGA is dead, but if he can’t quell the furor over the Epstein files, Trump could end up very damaged in ways that affect the midterms, the 2028 presidential election, and the long-term future of the movement.

“Too many online Democrats think of Trump supporters as a bunch of rubes, too uneducated or ignorant to see Trump as the snake-oil salesman he is. That notion is both elitist and wrong. Most Trump voters knew they were voting for someone who lies, cheats, lines his own pockets and can be a huge asshole. But for a variety of reasons, they voted for him anyway. Maybe he was better on an issue they cared about, like abortion. Or they thought the political system was so broken that they wanted someone who would set it on fire. Many believed Trump would fight for them in ways no other politician would. So when Trump gets caught lying to the media, breaking the law or using office for personal gain, it validates our view of him— but it’s not new information for Trump voters. We rage; they yawn. The Epstein scandal is the opposite. The Republican base is furious.”

Yesterday’s AP report emphasized that though Señor TACO’s strategy has been to downplay the whole kerfuffle, “that nothing-to-see-here approach doesn’t work for those who have learned from him that they must not give up until the government’s deepest, darkest secrets are exposed.” Some of his own followers have started calling him “‘out of touch’ and demanding transparency… Trump’s weekend post sought to divert attention by calling on supporters to focus instead on investigating Democrats and arresting criminals rather than ‘spending month after month looking at nothing but the same old, Radical Left inspired Documents on Jeffrey Epstein.’”

Loomer is demanding the appointment of a special counsel and the resignation of Bondi and claims that Bongino is “seriously thinking about resigning.”