Epstein Files | WSJ releases 50th bday letter from Trump to Epstein
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Well i am for one shocked that his awful supporters have gotten back in line.
Some of President Donald Trump’s aides and closest allies breathed a sigh of relief Friday as the MAGA base, once sharply divided over the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, rallied to the president’s defense and trained their ire on a common enemy: the media.
The Wall Street Journal’s report alleging Trump sent a lewd birthday letter to Epstein offered the administration and the president’s supporters a chance to shift the narrative to more comfortable ground where Trump is the victim and the so-called elites are the target. And they believe it gives credence to the president’s argument earlier this week that the Epstein story has been a “witchhunt” that plays into Democrats’ hands.
Some of President Donald Trump’s aides and closest allies breathed a sigh of relief Friday as the MAGA base, once sharply divided over the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, rallied to the president’s defense and trained their ire on a common enemy: the media.
The Wall Street Journal’s report alleging Trump sent a lewd birthday letter to Epstein offered the administration and the president’s supporters a chance to shift the narrative to more comfortable ground where Trump is the victim and the so-called elites are the target. And they believe it gives credence to the president’s argument earlier this week that the Epstein story has been a “witchhunt” that plays into Democrats’ hands.
CFordUNC
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Nah, that article is just about the losers like Laura Loomer and the other paid right wing social media influencers, most of whom have been proven to be paid shills on the payroll of the Kremlin, resuming their position down on the knee pads. There was never any doubt that those people would fall swiftly in line considering they all get the same exact marching orders and same exact talking points.
The real tell is in the “rank and file” MAGA base, which you can also see on social media, flood the replies to Trump’s posts by the tens of thousands. The vast majority of the aforementioned paid social media shills aren’t true believers in the whole QAnon/Deep State/pedophile ring thing- they just get paid to pretend to be. Much of the rank and file MAGAts, though, are true believers. And they’re the ones who can potentially cause catastrophic electoral consequences for the GOP in 2026 and 2028.
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Sooooo, the whole reason people want to see it, they’ll remove?
Their plan is to flood the zone with disinformation and reams of bullshit, just like Trump did in 1.0 with his financial “disclosures” and Bondi did with “Epstein Files, Phase 1”.
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Peggy Noonan had some good observations about this rift:
Gaslighting Q-MAGA to see their own carefully cultivated Epstein obsession as the fanaticism of the “radical left” … or isolated themselves among the “troublemakers” of the right.
MAGA’s Epstein Fault Line
Some Trump supporters look at the refusal to release the files and see a failure to drain the swamp.
—> https://www.wsj.com/opinion/magas-e...6?st=v37YBh&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink“…
Mr. Trump has never spoken of his supporters the way he did this week, with disrespect and baiting insults. On Wednesday on Truth Social, he called the Epstein uproar a Democratic Party “scam” and said “my PAST supporters have bought into this ‘bulls—’ hook, line, and sinker.”
Those demanding the government produce all files in the Epstein investigation are ungrateful and don’t deserve him: “I have had more success in 6 months than perhaps any President in our Country’s history. . . . Let these weaklings continue forward and do the Democrats work, don’t even think about talking of our incredible and unprecedented success, because I don’t want their support anymore!”
Earlier Mr. Trump told reporters, “I don’t understand why the Jeffrey Epstein case would be of interest to anybody.” “I think, really, only pretty bad people, including fake news, wanna keep something like that going.” In the Oval Office on Wednesday he said he’d “lost a lot of faith in certain people.”
This isn’t how political figures speak in public of their most loyal public supporters. Even Richard Nixon at the end of the Watergate scandal didn’t speak of Republicans who bolted from him with the disdain Trump shows.
… The Epstein case is the third time in a month that parts of Mr. Trump’s base have sharply disagreed with him. In bombing Iran and restoring aid to Ukraine Mr. Trump offended those of an isolationist bent; in announcing no further action on the Epstein case he offended those of a conspiracist bent; and current and future spending cuts are likely to rouse opposition from populists and nationalists. Mr Trump is skating a close line.
There are surely some calculations as to personal ambition in some of the pushback. Those of his base who are the most professionally and publicly invested in the Trump project know that in a few years he is gone. They wish to continue their careers beyond that cutoff date. So they are out-Trumping Trump to show their bona fides and outlast him. They are presenting themselves as his distilled essence.
… The breach will ease with time. It won’t be a break because too many have too much to lose. But it won’t fully heal. Things will be different going forward.
Each side saw something they hadn’t known before: They can break apart….”
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This whole request to the courts to release the grand jury testimony is complete, total, and utter nonsense. Any release would be so gutted by redactions as to be meaningless. Information on who Epstein was blackmailing because he had videos of them engaging in sex with under-age females is not going to be in the grand jury testimony. The information that would refute or confirm that Epstein was blackmailing people are the videos and any notes Epstein had that catalogued about those videos. Neither the videos nor Epstein's notes on his blackmail are going to be in the grand jury testimony. What St. Donald of Mar-a-Lago is asking to be released has the same relevance to St. Donald's own culpability as the long-suppressed files on the Teapot Dome Scandal.
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“… An odd thing about MAGA and Epstein is that from the beginning, from his arrest in 2019, when Mr. Trump was president, photos and videos of Trump and Epstein laughing, posing together, at parties, have been all over.Peggy Noonan had some good observations about this rift:
MAGA’s Epstein Fault Line
Some Trump supporters look at the refusal to release the files and see a failure to drain the swamp.
“…
Mr. Trump has never spoken of his supporters the way he did this week, with disrespect and baiting insults. On Wednesday on Truth Social, he called the Epstein uproar a Democratic Party “scam” and said “my PAST supporters have bought into this ‘bulls—’ hook, line, and sinker.”
Those demanding the government produce all files in the Epstein investigation are ungrateful and don’t deserve him: “I have had more success in 6 months than perhaps any President in our Country’s history. . . . Let these weaklings continue forward and do the Democrats work, don’t even think about talking of our incredible and unprecedented success, because I don’t want their support anymore!”
Earlier Mr. Trump told reporters, “I don’t understand why the Jeffrey Epstein case would be of interest to anybody.” “I think, really, only pretty bad people, including fake news, wanna keep something like that going.” In the Oval Office on Wednesday he said he’d “lost a lot of faith in certain people.”
This isn’t how political figures speak in public of their most loyal public supporters. Even Richard Nixon at the end of the Watergate scandal didn’t speak of Republicans who bolted from him with the disdain Trump shows.
… The Epstein case is the third time in a month that parts of Mr. Trump’s base have sharply disagreed with him. In bombing Iran and restoring aid to Ukraine Mr. Trump offended those of an isolationist bent; in announcing no further action on the Epstein case he offended those of a conspiracist bent; and current and future spending cuts are likely to rouse opposition from populists and nationalists. Mr Trump is skating a close line.
There are surely some calculations as to personal ambition in some of the pushback. Those of his base who are the most professionally and publicly invested in the Trump project know that in a few years he is gone. They wish to continue their careers beyond that cutoff date. So they are out-Trumping Trump to show their bona fides and outlast him. They are presenting themselves as his distilled essence.
… The breach will ease with time. It won’t be a break because too many have too much to lose. But it won’t fully heal. Things will be different going forward.
Each side saw something they hadn’t known before: They can break apart….”
This doesn’t appear to have bothered his supporters in the past. It does now. Why not then?
Trump supporters are angry now because they imagined that when Donald Trump drained the swamp, the dry bones of old conspiracies would be thrust from the mud and exposed on its caked surface. But that hasn’t happened in the Epstein case. Mr. Trump’s not exposing the story is Mr. Trump’s not draining the swamp. That is a big moment in the history of MAGA.…”
——
This is an interesting version of the Evangelical embrace of Trump not as a man of God but has a blunt force tool of God. In a world of wicked men, Trump is God’s wicked man (now spared by divine providence) to do battle against other wicked men for a righteous result.
Q-MAGA has twisted itself into pretzels for years with conspiracy fan fiction about how for decades Trump has been secretly working to unmask the Deep State Elites as monstrous pedophiles to be publicly humiliated and executed. But maybe a lot of them just see him as their wicked man on the inside of the pedo-industrial complex who would bring it down.
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The courts will get blamed and trump will soar again
superrific
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I'm not sure I understand your point here. Is this explaining why MAGA land is finally turning on Trump or why they aren't turning on Trump more?
Is your subtext here that they have been seeing them as THEIR wicked man, and now that he's not doing what they wanted, they are beginning to think that maybe he's just a wicked man full stop?
superrific
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The whole Epstein saga seems pretty comprehensible to me. Predictable even. I will dramatize.
Man: Hey baby, let's get married.
Woman: I'd say yes but you have to stop spending so much time working out at the YMCA. We'll move in together and get a home gym!
Man: Let's do it. [celebrations!]
Few years later:
Wife: Babe, you're still spending so much time at the Y. I thought you were going to stop.
Man: I have to level with you. I didn't want to tell you before because it would be too upsetting, but there is gay sex happening at the Y.
Wife: I knew that.
Man: It's way worse than think. There are raucous sex parties where guys are fucking everyone, without names or protection. It's gross.
Wife: You need to expose this behavior!
Man: I am already working on it, in secret. Don't worry, I will get to the bottom of it. Er, something like that.
Wife: Remember early on in our relationship when you told me that you once had a big crush on that football player?
Man: It was a man-crush. Totally different.
Wife: Go get 'em
Few years later:
Man accidentally facetimes his wife from in a doctor's office.
"Sir, the results clearly show advanced syphilis. You need to tell the guys. Also, anal penetration requires more lube."
Man: Hey baby, let's get married.
Woman: I'd say yes but you have to stop spending so much time working out at the YMCA. We'll move in together and get a home gym!
Man: Let's do it. [celebrations!]
Few years later:
Wife: Babe, you're still spending so much time at the Y. I thought you were going to stop.
Man: I have to level with you. I didn't want to tell you before because it would be too upsetting, but there is gay sex happening at the Y.
Wife: I knew that.
Man: It's way worse than think. There are raucous sex parties where guys are fucking everyone, without names or protection. It's gross.
Wife: You need to expose this behavior!
Man: I am already working on it, in secret. Don't worry, I will get to the bottom of it. Er, something like that.
Wife: Remember early on in our relationship when you told me that you once had a big crush on that football player?
Man: It was a man-crush. Totally different.
Wife: Go get 'em
Few years later:
Man accidentally facetimes his wife from in a doctor's office.
"Sir, the results clearly show advanced syphilis. You need to tell the guys. Also, anal penetration requires more lube."
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tarheelbillie
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I have a dream of Constitution Avenue and a horse with an empty saddle. Gives me hope.
Tar1978Heel
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If the Man died in 2019 and the government has had the list since then why didn’t the Biden Administration get Trump…Things that make you say um…
superrific
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Because most of what you have in mind is illegal and the Biden administration followed the law. And they did get Trump, except for the interference of Cannon and depravity of the Supreme Court. They didn't "investigate" because they didn't have enough evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt and/or the statute of limitations had expired.
I mean, the birthday note is obviously incriminating, in my view as a voter. But in court it is nowhere near enough to get an indictment, let alone a conviction, and it might not even be admissible.
superrific
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To add to this point, and expand on my earlier point, here is a document about DOJ's guidelines for releasing information:
Much of DOJ’s work involves non-public, sensitive matters. Disseminating non-public, sensitive information about DOJ matters could violate federal laws, employee non-disclosure agreements, and individual privacy rights; put a witness or law enforcement officer in danger; jeopardize an investigation or case; prejudice the rights of a defendant; or unfairly damage the reputation of a person.
DOJ personnel should presume that non-public, sensitive information obtained in connection with work is protected from disclosure, except as needed to fulfill official duties of DOJ personnel, and as allowed by court order, statutory or regulatory prescription, or case law and rules governing criminal and civil discovery. Other than as necessary to fulfill DOJ official duties, disclosure of such information to anyone, including to family members, friends, or even colleagues, is prohibited and could lead to disciplinary action. Unauthorized disclosures of sensitive personal or proprietary information could lead to criminal prosecution or administrative action.
There is also a longstanding policy of not impugning a non-target of an investigation. This is an obvious anti-tyranny rule, to prevent the government from smearing a disfavored person by associating that person with criminal behavior in a way that the person can't rebut. When the government obtains a search warrant, for instance, it does so as pertaining to a person and usually a particular place, device, or other property. It is not an open-ended fishing expedition to gather innuendo and dirt on people who might associate with the target of the investigation. Of course, if they find incriminating information about others sufficient to justify a criminal investigation, they can open a new investigation. The Trump letter to Epstein probably does not rise to that level.
Garland is an ardent believer in this principle. As he said in his confirmation hearings (and unlike Pubs, he wasn't lying),
"The Justice Department's policies make clear that derogatory comments about subjects, targets, even people who have been indicted — except what's in the indictment — are not appropriate," Garland said at his confirmation hearing.
DOJ bets its future on how it handles the search of Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort
The Justice Department's actions are going to come under intense scrutiny, including from Trump's supporters in Congress.
www.nbcnews.com
Remember that Garland wouldn't even talk about the documents recovered at Mar-A-Lago or anything about that investigation.
heelinhell
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so Steve Bannon has 15 hours of footage interviewing Epstein before he committed "suicide" to plan for a documentary ?
www.rawstory.com
'Release it!' MSNBC host stunned by new report of treasure trove of Epstein video
Reacting to a report that Steve Bannon is reportedly sitting on hours of raw footage where he interviewed accused pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, a stunned and excited MSNBC host blurted "Release it!" on Saturday morning.Appearing on MSNBC's "The Weekend," NBC reporter Vaughan Hillyard filled in...
www.rawstory.com
kickazzz2000
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Dude is unhinged lol