Seriosly, why?
Legal Eagle just released a video about “the real Epstein files”. The main point they covered in the video is victim impact. The victims could be threatened and harassed because of the info.
Another point not covered is that criminal case info is typically not disclosed. Releasing a list of accused perpetrators (i.e. pedophiles/child rapists) encourages vigilante justice. It also interferes with any ongoing investigations, which should (at least in theory) still be ongoing.
I don’t want Trump to release the case info. I want his DOJ to announce charges against people like Les Wexner, based on that info. And I want it to not just be his political enemies and bullshit lies.
Virginia Giuffre would argue otherwise. BTW, she just died. By “suicide”. After being struck with a bus at 110km/h, which would’ve killed most. (Fun fact, police didn’t want to send help to the accident scene).
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/virginia-giuffre-father-death-cause-b2743303.html
Fucking hell. I didn’t even know that.
Dig into the bus crash more. It was minor, but Giuffre then checked herself into the hospital and made pretty bizarre claims about her health. Then she went home and killed herself shortly after.
There was nothing nefarious about the crash, and it revealed she was having mental health issues.
That’s correct. Her husband also had a restraining order against her, for him and their children, due to her psychosis. After being released from the hospital, she showed up at his door, begging to see the children. He declined due to her excited state, and recommended she go home and rest. She killed herself that night.
It’s a horribly tragic story of a woman who bore way too much trauma for one lifetime, but it really isn’t suspicious once you read the details.
Yes a 110 km/h is minor. I’m permantly disabled just from 60 km/h. Hey but you do you
Speed alone doesn’t establish severity. A friend of mine had an accident at 200km/h and walked with a few scratches.
It was 75 km/h and the bus clipped the car. It wasn’t a full-on collision. The driver of the car was uninjured. The bus driver didn’t even know the car had a passenger until the driver told him the next day.
I very much get the first point. Victims need to be protected at all costs. Even if it means the public doesn’t get to know things.
To the second point, the way Trump handled it felt very much like “case closed, nothing to see here”. This does not feel like justice is going to be served.
Did they cover the part about how Biden’s DOJ had absolutely no fucking excuse to take that long to prosecute?
We can’t seem like we are making it political because he’s running for office or some bullshit was always the excuse.
Yet they waited 3.5 years until right after he won the Republican nomination to bother charging him and that was just for the Jan 6th bullshit let alone the Epstein stuff.
He should have been tossed in jail by February for insurrection. The whole hand wringing about ‘appearances’ excuse is why we can’t hold anyone in power accountable.
Yeah the sycophants are always quick to make up a million excuses why Democrats can’t ever accomplish anything they talk about, while simultaneously pretending they’re “fighting fascism” by supporting this farce.
There probably just isn’t the kind of direct evidence people imagine. You can’t prosecute people just for associating with a creep.
I specifically mentioned Les Wexner for a reason. While the public information includes an absolute ton of red flags, and it’s very likely that he bought child prostitutes, it doesn’t reach the level proof beyond a reasonable doubt. IOW, it’s unlikely to reach a conviction in court.
These people are also rich enough to drag out a court case for decades, even longer than the government. As such, they aren’t likely to take a plea agreement that’s more than a slap on the wrist and without admitting anything serious.
Okay, fine. Then if there was never going to be a prosecution, then there was no impediment to the Biden admin releasing the files.
So, which is it: did the Biden administration fuck up by slow-walking the prosecution, or did the Biden administration fuck up by failing to release the files even when it had no intention of prosecuting? Those are the only options!
Because it could hurt rich people and both parties are on the side of rich people.
This is the actual answer, cutting right through the smoke and mirrors and bullshit. Anyone who had the displeasure of reading through the flight logs that were available in their entirety online almost a year ago and probably still are: saw just what names pop up, often multiple times. This is the most bipartisan issue there ever was, so NOBODY in power wants to touch it.
Because a bunch of them are also child rapists
…or they’re friends with child rapists, or owe favors to child rapists. Those three are the only answers that make sense.
That is the more likely true explanation. All of these rich and powerful people know each other, owe favors to each other, have dirt on each other etc. That makes them less likely to put anyone in their circle in danger.
Yup.
Clintons were very good friends with Biden but also trump.
Neoliberals poisoned the party so much that during Epstein’s hey day the letter by a name didn’t matter, trump himself was a big donor to the Dem party back then.
Neither Biden or trump could release just the names of people they don’t like, because they’d snitch on the people they liked and then you’re on the hook for protecting the ones you liked.
Someone like AOC is the only shot at a president that would actually release it. We need more politicians who have a loyalty to voters over a party.
Party leadership changes, and we got a rare window right now the party won’t block someone like AOC. We can’t count on that being true in 2032 if she doesn’t feel ready in 2028.
Ready or not, it’s time.
Someone like AOC is the only shot at a president that would actually release it.
You act like Bernie doesn’t exist. I’m 100% confident that he’s not assosiated with that hot mess in any way.
The OP said “with a shot at [presidency]”.
C’mon now. Old elderly white men who could die any minute is what this country has exclusively elected since 2016.
If anything he has a better chance than AOC at being president, simply for having white hair, wrinkles, and a penis.
That’s my thinking, US citizens are prisoners of the immorality of the richest regardless of their political contributions. Trump has masterfully exploited this with the “devide and empire” maxime.
Note how normal people have no issues saying that Democrats may be (or likely are) in the Epstein files, but MAGAs are like “The files are a hoax but if they exist he is not in them but if he’s in them it’s just a juvenile mistake, who cares”
A lot of their donors as well.
I think it’s important to remember that Biden was, perhaps more than any president in my lifetime (and I’m an old man), an institutionalist. He was a senator for just about forever, then the VP for 8 years. He was 78 years old when he became president. He is an old school liberal Catholic, a very nearly extinct person in the Catholic and Christian spheres.
I think he saw his presidency as a repudiation of right wing reactionary politics. His election, in his mind, was in large part a call to what he saw as the original intent and purpose of the executive branch. To put it plainly, he saw himself as elected because America rejected the politicization of government under Trump. Included under that umbrella of beliefs about the purpose of the executive was the unalienable requirement that the executive not direct the FBI to investigate the opposing political party. Remember, Joe Biden was a senator when Nixon resigned. He was there when Nixon was using the executive branch to attack Democrats.
Biden appointed Garland to the DOJ. Garland’s record was perfectly fine and appeared well suited to the role, but his biggest strengths (in Biden’s mind) was his nonpartisanship and his conservative view of government. By conservative I mean staying within the lines of what the DOJ should be doing, a cautious view of the use of DOJ power. Again, this was done in reaction to Trump and his… let’s call it “expansive” view of government power. In Biden’s mind, he was righting the ship.
And Garland was exactly as advertised, to a maddening degree. He was cautious to the point of being timid. He refused to throw the weight of the DOJ into investigations with political implications without reaching an imaginary bar of fairness that just isn’t realistic. You saw it in the Jan 6th investigations. You saw it in the Kushner deals (and all of the Trump family deals which are obviously dirty). You saw it in Garland’s unwillingness to take on wildly politicized federal prosecutor offices because doing so would be political interference (in his mind). You saw it when Robert Hur took unprofessionalism and partisanship to the absolute extreme when attacking Biden under the guise of a special counsel appointment and Garland did nothing because instiutionalism in his mind meant not interfering with the process.
And you saw it in the Epstein case.
Garland did everything by the book to an absurd degree that ended up paralyzing justice. Biden didn’t touch Garland or any of it because he believes doing so was itself an injustice, even if Garland was wrong to handle it the way he did. In Biden’s mind, the president should not have the power to demand the DOJ take action in a specific case like the Epstein case, especially if there’s political implications.
TL;DR- Biden was the wrong guy for the job.
depends on what you think the job was
keep the status quo? sure, right guy
blow the terroristic american right wing apart so it’ll be another half century before it reforms? wrong guy
I agree with you 100%.
I think a more accurate TL;DR is that Garland was the wrong guy for the job, but the Biden thing is more broadly true, too.
If one had a fetish for masochistic torture of nuance, then yea, you hit the nail on the head.
THIS level of political nuance qualifies as torture? He boiled it down for us into TWO men’s decisions and delivered it in like 300 words.
Yeah, we’re cooked.
Because you don’t publish details of investigation. You publish indictments once investigation is done. That’s essentially weaponization of DOJ.
Republicans were promising to release (and suggesting Democrats are on it). Now as they have the power, they refuse. Claim the files don’t exist then that they are fake, then they are boring.
At this point it is very clear that trump is in them.
The give reason must be procedual, but the real reason is that the Epstein files undoubtedly also contain the names of democrats or democratic backers. They were more than happy doing nothing with those files.
So, no hiring hackers to actually change votes to Biden/Harris votes, but anything short of that? I dunno, if that were their standard they would have released the Epstein stuff. My real guess is that some Democratic politicians are also on the list. Even if it’s only a couple, they might have figured running against a convicted felon gave them such good odds there was no need to throw any of their own under the bus. And apparently none of them said, “Well but what if he hires hackers to change votes to Trump votes?”
Musk and Eaton had the means to change votes, not sure what your first statement is about.
I’m convinced that Trump won because his team changed Harris votes to Trump votes, plain and simple. The differences between their totals were statistically anomalous compared to all the downballot candidates, the variations were just below thresholds that would have triggered automatic recounts, and these anomalies were present in the 7 swing states only. Those facts alone should justify formal audits, which I hope will happen. But it all kind of depends on the fate of the one lawsuit filed so far.
Then we are in agreement on that. It’s just weird how you lead in on your first sentence.
Well specifically, it is still an ongoing investigation, so nobody has a “complete set of files to release.”
In February Pam Bondi said she had the first phase of files in her office, made a big public announcement about having requested all remaining files, and said she was waiting on them to be delivered. She even wrote a letter to Kash Patel about it and publicly released the letter.
Then when she read whatever was in that second half of files that got delivered to her, she suddenly wasn’t so eager to release it.
Even more than knowing what is in there about Trump, I would be most interested to know what banks knowingly financed what Epstein was doing. I would guess any bipartisan fears about information in there that could “destroy the country,” is more likely related to banks and corporations that are considered “too big to fail,” rather than any super scandalous information about individuals.
She released that first phase to MAGA influencers and made a big show out of it. She was asked about releasing the Epstein list and she said it’s on her desk along with mlk and jfk files and would release it
First, Bill Clinton is almost certainly all over them, and older Democrats still think of the Clintons as the epitome of Democratic success. Some of the old guard is still trying to push focus away from the Epstien files. Just two days ago, Nancy Pelosi was calling the Epstien files a distraction, which is a bat-shit crazy thing to say about evidence that could prove that your opponent was involved in a pedophile ring.
Second, Epstien probably has some sort of ties to the intelligence community. I don’t know that I believe all these stories about him being a secret Mossad asset, but I think its very possible that the someone in the CIA was using him. Alex Acosta, who prosecuted Epstien in 2008, claimed that he was told to back off because he, “belonged to intelligence,” and they’re clearly withholding a lot of information, there’s definitely something they don’t want people to know. Anyway, since 9/11, the Democrats and Republicans have had basically the same position on the intelligence community (essentially, abject deference), so if the CIA says that it would be a national security risk to release the files, the Democrats aren’t going to release the files.
They were sealed until Jan 2024 as part of Maxwells appeal process.
That gives a year, not a valid reason.
The investigation was still ongoing, which Trump ended. And the DOJ is supposed to operate independently from the president.
which trump ended …a year later.
There’s no excuse.
?? Yes which Trump ended. Investigation was ongoing which meant info couldn’t be released, Trump ended it. What aren’t you getting?
Well, assuming “They were sealed until Jan 2024” is true, then from that point forward they could have been released but weren’t.
The investigation was still ongoing so they couldn’t have. There was thousands of people involved. It didn’t stop until Trump stopped it the other week.
And why would “investigation is still ongoing” stop them from releasing it? My opinion: either a convenient excuse, or yet another self-own from the Democratic Party.
They chose not to release it, despite being under no true obligation.
Are you stupid?
Here is Christine Pelosi, daughter of Nancy Pelosi, saying “It is quite likely that some of our faves are implicated.” Democrats and their billionaire owners are just as implicated by this as Republicans.
https://xcancel.com/sfpelosi/status/1147657745253855233?lang=en
If you have ‘faves’ you are a weirdo .
100% agree with this sentiment
I think one reason is that democrats wanted to do things by the book, and they didn’t want to be accused of tampering with the 2024 election, more than trump already did.
That’s a decidedly generous interpretation of events
Reminder, when you don’t do things by the book, the perp wins in court on technicalities or wins on appeal. For example, see Harvey Weinstein.
They did.
- Epstein black book & story on it.
- From USA v. Maxwell, Epstein flight logs & story on it.
- From Giuffre v. Dershowitz, case documents & story on unsealing those.
- The DOJ website lists some of those & others.
Not long ago, everyone was calling claims of secret, unreleased documents a right-wing conspiracy theory. Why popular opinion on that has turned from fringe to accepted is a mystery.
They apparently had video (obviously doctored and they couldn’t even hide that) after saying for years that all of the cameras malfunctioned. That video was released very recently so that leads me to believe there’s more stuff that never got released.
Why didn’t Republicans under Trump’s first term release them? See reply by @Nollij@sopuli.xyz
Sample coverage from back then: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/07/09/trump-not-a-fan-of-jeffrey-epstein-accused-sex-trafficker.html
Sorry to answer with other questions, but as a foreigner I have to. Do investigations like this can just be published by the POTUS? In my country, it would be the sole decision of the AG, and they would probably won’t publish anything because it could end up damaging the investigation. Or so they’d say.
It’s really baffling the power of the current POTUS, having all the power of the state in his hands. To me, he just telling Pamela Bondi what to do in such a delicate matter feels just wrong, as in lacking the due seriousness on the matter, utterly sloppy and populist in a bad manner.
One of the recurring themes I keep coming back to in all this is that the US has a uniquely bad situation with regard to its Constitution. We worship it as an infallible and complete guide to running a democratic republic, but really it’s extremely old, extremely vague, and depends on goodwill and sensible interpretation to function. We have neither the explicit understanding that everything is old AF and cobbled together and dependent upon custom and moderating tyrannical sensibilities like the British, nor the unwieldy but straightforward comprehensiveness of EU treaties and certain other lengthy modern written constitutions.
To me, him just telling Pamela Bondi what to do in such a delicate matter feels just wrong, as in lacking the due seriousness on the matter, utterly sloppy and populist in a bad manner.
This feeling you have is exactly how presidents of either party would have felt for the last 80-100 years. The idea of a largely independent Department of Justice was considered eminently sensible and moral and even to the realpolitik set it provided outer bounds of what was politically possible and so they would nudge and tug at the edges, but never blow right past it, lest they suffer Nixon’s fate. I think we make a mistake to say that Trump is stupid in a binary yes/no sense, but he is deeply uncurious about things that don’t interest him, like democratic norms, so when people tell him “The Constitution doesn’t actually say that,” his eyes gleam and he just does whatever he might get away with. And because we have a Supreme Court dominated by the idea that the US Constitution is more akin to a piece of computer code than a framework for sensible governance, they simply throw up their hands and say, “whelp, it didn’t SAY that the administration of justice should be handled with integrity, so guess we makin’ a fascism now.” Better vote them out, except oh wait the Constitution also doesn’t say you can’t fuck with the elections either.
One of my anxious worries lately is that at the end of this term, Trump will look at our term limits amendment and parse the verbiage with a simple literalism and Clarence Thomas et al will back him up. It says you can’t be elected president more than twice, so why not simply run for VP and then have your patsy resign five minutes after swearing in? After all, we’re mindless textualists now. We didn’t want an FDR type getting overly entrenched in the machinery of power, but we clearly meant to allow loopholes that are significantly less democratic!
the president of the US doesn’t have as much power as our current one thinks he has. It’s just that no one involved in the checks and balances procedure has the balls to stand up to him and say “no,” or they don’t have the power to do so in a way that would impact anything. And the ones that do decided just before the 2024 election that a sitting president can’t be charged with any illegal shit he did as president, so even the ones that CAN say no to him just get brushed off or outright told “fuck you”
They don’t have the power to say “No” because they probably have a big shitty laundry list of their own they want to hide.
I’m my country, it works be the sole decision of the AG
It works like that… but the problem is effectively we give the president the power to fire and replace the AG. So… in short, the AG is hand picked by the president and then approved by congress.
With a crazy president like this that effectively has 100% of his party members in congress intimidated to back every one of his picks, the AG is basically his hand picked employee.
Yes and no.
In the US the Judicial branch is responsible for the the courts and interpretation of the law / constitution, but the Executive branch is responsible for the execution / enforcement of the law. I think that in other parts of the world it is common for the AG to be part of the Judicial branch, but here they are part of the Executive branch.
As I understand it, there are parts of these investigations/prosecutions that the AG can release under their own authority (or by direction of the President) but other parts that are under seal and require authorization from the courts.
I think the real question is: why isn’t anyone on the FBI or whatever agency is responsible for that, willing to just throw that shit onto the internet?
They do on 4chan but no one believes them 🤷♂️
Just the people that own ten bridges in NYC.
