Epstein, Nothingburger

I can’t believe I’m writing another piece on this. I apologise; the story seems worth following even though I think it is stupid.

In a big reversal, Trump has called on Republicans in the House of Representatives to back H.R. 4405, a discharge petition known as the Epstein Files Transparency Act. Should this bill pass both houses of Congress, it will compel Trump’s own Department of Justice to release “the Epstein files.” This is shorthand for a substantial body of DOJ and FBI investigative materials extending perhaps to 100,000 or more pages, including a large body of victim and witness interviews and procedural documents like search warrants and evidence logs. Other items, like the fruits of wiretaps and related surveillance, grand jury materials and seized videos and photos, either cannot be released at all or will only ever emerge in heavily redacted form.

The important point here is that we will never have anything like a full disclosure of all the stuff that the U.S. government has collected in connection to Epstein’s crimes. Thus those who remain convinced of the Blackmail Paedo Cult Theory of politics will always have a great obscure void to which they can appeal. Obviously it was a grave tactical error on the part of Trump and especially his administration to lean into the Epstein mythos, because nothing they release can ever satisfy rivals and enemies. Everybody knows this, and it explains Trump’s often tone-deaf impatience on all matters Epsteinian. It is also an error that I find largely exculpatory, because neither Trump nor anybody associated with him would’ve made promises about Epstein in the first place if they had anything serious to hide.

The problem with that portion of the “Epstein files” that can be released, is not that it promises to sink Trump’s presidency. It is much more mundane: