The big news today is, of course, the Epstein files release, but not in the way you think:
--Not only did the DOJ fail to release everything by the deadline and then completely redact most of what they DID release (including all 119 pages of the grand jury testimony), they also PROVED BEYOND A SHADOW OF A DOUBT that there’s an active cover up going on.
--Exhibit #1--550 pages of the released documents have been completely redacted, and they didn’t release the two most awaited documents: the 64-count indictment in the original Epstein case and the report by the investigators that led to that indictment.
--Exhibit #2--There are no references to Trump anywhere in the written documents released so far, even though Bondi said he was in the files and Susie Wiles admitted in her interview last week that he was "all over the files." Instead the released stuff had lots of photos of Bill Clinton, who Susie had also admitted never went to the island and wasn’t really involved with Epstein at all. (I’ll discuss whether that’s true later, but it’s obvious that they chose things for this first dump that DIDN’T include Trump and DID include Clinton.)
--Exhibit #3--The law ordering the release of the files said that only the names, faces, and identifying information of the victims were to be redacted and that those of the perpetrators were NOT to be redacted. In spite of that, the DOJ redacted all the men’s faces in the photos, too, except for a chosen few like Clinton, Michael Jackson, and Pope John Paul . The Daily Mail just published video of a DOJ official who admitted that all Republicans were omitted from the files. (Note: The DOJ claimed that one reason for the redactions they made was ongoing investigations, but Bondi announced an investigation into Clinton last month, so by those guidelines, he should be redacted, too.)
--Exhibit #4--They released a photo of Epstein’s credenza with a bunch of framed photos on it, including one we’ve already seen of Trump and Melania with Epstein and one (prominently displayed) of Clinton. But the photo accidentally included an open drawer full of photos of Trump, including one on top that showed Trump with at least five under-aged girls (faces redacted) two of them in bikinis. This morning that photo had been REMOVED from the database, and people attempting to access it were met with an error code message and the words, "Access denied." (Clearly a case of,"Oops, we didn’t mean to include anything that incriminated Trump.)
--Exhibit #5: This one’s probably the worst of all, and clear evidence that this is not only a cover-up, but a frame-up. There’s a photo included of Clinton with Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, and several children with their faces blacked out. Damning, right? No, because the photo is one taken years ago at a public fundraiser in DC and has nothing at all to do with Epstein. The children are Diana Ross’s children, but by blacking out their faces, it makes people think they are under-aged victims who Clinton was photographed with.
--Deputy AG Todd Blanche said in a statement that there has been "no effort" to redact Trump’s name from the release of the Epstein files. (And he has a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.)
In spite of their best efforts, some stuff has come out:
--They blacked out all the names on a list of the victims, but it revealed that there were 254 girls on the list. (And these were just the girls Epstein would call to come over and service someone, not the girls living there or on the island.)
--They forgot to black out a trial deposition in which a 14-year-old victim testified that she had been taken to Mar-a-lago by Epstein to meet Trump. The transcript says, "Epstein elbowed Trump playfully, asking him, referring to Doe, ‘This is a good one, right?’ Trump smiled and nodded in agreement. They both chuckled, and Doe felt uncomfortable, but at the time was too young to know why."
--There’s yet another photo (one was already released by the Epstein estate) that shows the giant check for $22,5000 signed by Trump for "a fully depreciated woman." The "woman" in question, an underage girl with her face redacted, is in this photo.
--Epstein got a phone message from an unidentified individual in 2004 that said simply, "I have a female for him," at the same time that Trump had called him repeatedly.
--One of the victims, Marina Lacerda, who was abused from the age of 14 on, said a lot of the redacted names were of powerful men who were being protected.
--Former Prince Andrew is in even more trouble (if that’s possible) because the tranche of photos includes one of him lying across the laps of five girls with their faces redacted.
--Also accidentally caught in the net was the director of Melania’s new movie, Brett Ratner, who is shown in a photo with Jean-Luc Brunel. Trump pressured Hollywood to have Ratner direct a new "Rush Hour" movie as well as the Melania movie after he was banned from Hollywood for sexual misconduct allegations, including from one woman who accused him of forcing her to perform oral sex on him. Brunel owned a modeling agency, was heavily connected with Epstein, and was found hanged in prison right before his trial. Just like Epstein.
As for Clinton, he is obviously not a bystander who had a completely innocent relationship with Epstein:
--He is in one photograph taken with him in a swimming pool with a naked Ghislaine Maxwell and a redacted underage girl. In another photo, he is sitting with an underage girl on his lap (face of the girl also redacted.) In other, he and Epstein are in matching shirts.
--But the thing is, the Democrats don’t care. If he’s a pedophile, they’re perfectly willing to throw him into outer darkness. It’s not the weapon against Democrats the Republicans think it is.
--Angel Urena: "The White house hasn’t been hiding these files for months only to drop them late on a Friday to protect Bill Clinton. This is about what comes next...what they’ll try and hide forever. So they can release as many 20+ year old photos as they want,but this isn’t about Bill Clinton. Never has been, never will be."
Nobody, and I mean, nobody, is buying what the DOJ is selling:
--Palmer Report: "There is no possible way that any courts will agree this 100% redacted Jeffrey Epstein grand jury transcript has met the requirements of the law. But this is how the Trump regime gets away with things, right? Do the wrong thing and then tie it up in court. Except what they’re forgetting is that this storyline is also playing out in the court of public opinion. This fully redacted grand jury transcript just looks so, so bad for Trump. No matter what excuse his babysitters give for redacting the entire thing, the media and the public are going to assume that it’s really because Trump is in the transcript. Otherwise, why do this? And so now Donald Trump’s Jeffrey Epstein scandal is somehow even bigger, even uglier, even more forcefully back in the headlines than before."
--Miami Herald reporter Julie Brown, who’s been on the case from the beginning; "They didn’t even release the victim interviews...it’s clear the DOJ is not only thumbing its nose at the public’s demand for transparency and accountability, it is not taking the crimes committed against children seriously."
--Joe Walsh: "The only explanation for why Trump is willing to take such a huge political hit keeping these Epstein files hidden is because he knows what’s in those files about him is really, really, really, really bad. That’s the only explanation for this massive Trump-led coverup."
--Bill Kristol: "The Epstein Blackout is really something."
--David Ramirez: "Trump just made the Epstein files into a midterm issue."
--kurious: "Nothing says ‘guilty’ as loudly as refusing to release files showing the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--and blacking out anything that might incriminate oneself or one’s rich powerful friends and associates.
--Debby33: "It’s so laughable that they think this will work, even just as a tactic to buy time. All they’ve done is light a fuse on a political bomb that will explode in January.
--Ron Filipkowski--First, Trump and Bondi pledged to release the files. Then Bondi gave ridiculous binders to ridiculous people. Then Trump/Bondi said no more files. Then Johnson refused to swear in Grijalva for months to block the bill. When it finally becomes law, they release less than 1%."
--Sources at the White House are betting Americans will tune out the story as it drags on.
--Douglas Dunlap: "We will get the files, period. The DOJ is playing with fire. There will be a second strike. Epstein."
To try and distract from the Epstein news, Trump did another rally:
--This one was in North Carolina in what looked like a high school gym, and even then it wasn’t filled. Reporters referred to the "scrawny turnout" and the "puny attendance" and said that after an hour of Trump’s speaking, people began leaving, including the ones directly behind him. He spoke for 90 minutes and afterward claimed a massive turnout and crowds of people waiting to get in. (Neither was true.)
--Trump: "I was the hunted. I had these animals trying to attack me."
--Trump: "The world is bigger than the US...in terms of people."
--Ron Filipkowski: "A little known fact is that it also happens to be bigger in terms of land mass."
--Trump: "I took cognitive tests. By the way, not easy. The first question is like what is this and they show a lion, giraffe, fish, and a hippo and they say which is the giraffe." (Note: That’s not the first question and they ask you to name the animals. His not remembering the test correctly is telling in itself.)
--But the best part of the speech was when Trump started talking about...Melania’s underpants. Trump: "They went into my wife’s closet, it sounds a little strange. They looked at her drawers. You have draw then you have draw. They looked at both. Her undergarments--always nice, sometimes referred to as panties--are folded perfect, wrapped. They’re like so perfect. I think that she steams them, makes sure they’re just sitting." (Steams them???)
This weekend is the Turning Points USA convention, and it’s off to a roaring start:
--First off the bat, the grieving widow (this time dressed in glitter from head to toe) endorsed JD Vance for President in 2028, reigniting all the rumors about her and JD and Usha, who still isn’t wearing her wedding ring.
--Then Ben Shapiro got on stage and trashed Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, Nick Fuentes, and a bunch of others, calling them grifters and charlatans. He also trashed Steve Bannon, calling him a "PR flack" for Jeffrey Epstein.
--Then Tucker Carlson got up and trashed Ben Shapiro as well as Candace Owens, who thinks Charlie Kirk was murdered by Israeli spies.
--Today Steve Bannon mocked Ben Shapiro’s speech and accused him of being fundamentally opposed to President Trump and the MAGA movement. "Let’s face it, Ben Shapiro is the farthest thing from MAGA. He’s a hard core never-Trumper."
--Then two MAGA influencers got into it, with one grabbing the phone out of the other one’s hand and throwing it at him and then the two of them engaging in a slap fight. It’s all on video.
--WineRev: "The more they fight..."
In Trump Destroying Washington, DC news:
--Trump didn’t waste any time. One day after his hand-picked board "voted" to put his name on the Kennedy Center, it was up there.
--In Kennedy Center news, a DC resident commented, "We should all be shocked that a convicted felon, a thug, and by all means a grifter has just stuck his name on top of a national monument."
--Several people noted that the Kennedy Center is now called The Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy MEMORIAL Center for the Performing Arts, and commented that the word "memorial" meant both people were dead.
--Peter Baker: "When Trump visited Mount Vernon in 2018, he couldn’t understand why George Washington didn’t name it after himself. ‘You’ve got to put your name on stuff or no one will remember you." (Oh, we’ll remember you, all right. Just not in the way you think.)
--Borowitz wants to rename Trump Tower the Joe Biden Trump Tower.
In Ukraine news:
--The "peace settlement," which turned out to be written by Russia and handed to the Americans seems to have gone nowhere, and Trump seems to have forgotten all about it, at least for the moment.
--A major gas pipeline, "Central Asia--Center," has blown up in the Volgograd region. The pipeline is used to import up to 12 billion cubic meters of gas annually from Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The explosion has halted gas transportation through the pipeline indefinitely. Russia claims it was an accident.
--Ukraine struck two Russian MIG fighters while they were on the ground at an airfield in Russian-occupied Crimea. One of the aircraft was on the runway with full ammo and was ready for a combat flight. It was completely destroyed. The other was damaged. The control tower was also damaged.
--Ukraine struck a Russian patrol ship in the Caspian Sea with drones.
--Last night it struck a Russian tanker in Rostov, and it sank today.
--The top general linked to the Salisbury poisonings. General Andrey Averyanov, has been killed in an attack by Ukraine on a Russian ship.
--The Russian general who reported to Putin about the capture of the city of Kupiansk (it wasn’t really captured and has since been liberated by Ukrainian forces) has vanished.
In other news:
--The Trump administration is urging white males to report any instances of workplace discrimination.
--30 immigrants have died in ICE custody since Trump took office.
--Yesterday Trump suddenly announced two more holidays for federal employees--Christmas Eve and Boxing Day--even though he had previously railed that there were too many federal holidays and he wanted to get rid of Juneteenth. This could be a major problem if the post office is included in the holiday this year because packages sent with the understanding that the post office would be open might not arrive. (He is really desperate to make people like him, but I’m not sure this will help.)
In good news:
--The State of Illinois just made it legal to sue ICE agents for $10,000 per unlawful arrest. (One thing this will do is to force the DOJ to reveal the identities of their masked agents.)
--The value of Trump’s meme coin dropped from $175 to $5.
--Pope Leo XIV has appointed another outspoken, pro-immigration bishop--to the Diocese of Palm Beach, Florida. Right there in Mar-a-lago territory.
In Christmas news:
--"The Carol of the Bells" (you know the one--"Ring, Christmas bells, merrily ring") is an ancient Ukrainian carol called "Schedryk" and one of Ukraine’s most beloved Christmas songs. It was arranged by Mykola Leontovych in 1916 from an ancient chant. Another Ukrainian, Peter Wilhousky, wrote the English-language lyrics in 1936, and the song has been performed all over the world.
--I vividly remember my eighth-grade Christmas concert where we sang "The Carol of the Bells" from the back of the darkened auditorium to begin the concert. We were each holding a candle (I shudder now to think of the fire danger from all those rambunctious junior high kids wearing highly flammable choir robes) and the first voices echoing through the darkness and then being joined by the boys with their "ding...dong...ding...dong." It’s one of my loveliest Christmas memories.
--This year it was performed by a Ukrainian choir at a bombed power plant in Kyiv as a message to the world, highlighting both the scale of destruction to Ukraine’s energy facilities and the resilience of those working to keep the electricity and heat on during the war.
Best comment of the day, from Nick25: "At this point it would just be a reasonable assumption to assume that Trump is on every redacted sentence, paragraph, and page until his DOJ proves otherwise."
Keep calm and carry on,
Connie Willis