Epstein, Trump & the MAGA Meltdown — Sorting Fact from Fiction

26:34Obviously, releasing videotape in a hallway in the jail with three minutes edited out isn't going to cut it as required, reported. So first you, Julie, would talk about this because this is really, this sort of turbocharged everything, how he died in custody. Well, the reason why this has created such a conspiracy is because so many things don't make sense about it. And the government hasn't seen fit to explain any of the things that don't add up. I mean, you have Epstein was on allegedly on suicide watch to begin with. So they take him out of suicide watch. They're supposed to put him in a cell with a cellmate.

27:11And the cellmate is mysteriously gone. So that whole situation seems odd. They need to leave him alone. Then they give him mattresses to sleep in on the floor, and the other inmates in the wing said, we weren't allowed to sleep on the floor, yet Epstein got two mattresses to allow him to sleep on the floor. He got blankets, the cellmate said, we never got blankets. We weren't allowed to have blankets, okay? He had this sleep apnea machine with all these wires. So you would think that's a perfect recipe if someone is suicidal to use wires somehow. So you have that situation. Then you have guards who were either asleep or perusing the internet, paying attention at the time, lied on their reports, didn't do the checks they were supposed to do.

27:58Then you have virtually every camera in that whole area didn't work. They worked on real time, but they did not record. Only one in that whole area recorded, and that was not in the wing that shows his jail. after he's found, instead of treating it like a potential crime scene or suspicious death, which, trust me, these people are told, here's the protocol when you find somebody. You know, this isn't the first time people have tried to commit suicide or hung themselves in these jails. So there's a protocol you follow. They didn't follow any of those protocol. They take them out. They, who knows what they did to the crime scene.

28:38Then they are saying, well, we can't find the video. So, oh, by the way, the first time they put him in with a beefy ex-cop that murdered four people. The whole thing just reeks of, you know, what were they thinking, you know? Right, either incompetence or planned chaos, essentially. Yeah, it's almost planned. They don't release the autopsy. The autopsy is still not public. Let's stress that. The autopsy, which they could release, has never been released. And his brother believes he was murdered. His brother hired a very renowned forensic pathologist who was at the autopsy, Dr. Michael Bodden.

29:17And Michael Bodden says that after the autopsy, the examiner, the medical examiner that conducted it, agreed that it was not a suicide initially. Then all of a sudden they come up with the fact that it was a suicide. So these are all the reasons why I'm skeptical. And I think a lot of people are skeptical. Right. Which leads into MAGA conspiracy theories. Where are they right now, Donnie, with all this information? Which is all factual, what Julie is saying. Absolutely. And look, again, you don't have to be in MAGA, right? I mean, you know, I think that the quote-unquote rational pushback on all of these questions is a lot of people will say, well, you know, a lot of this stuff looks terribly suspicious, but then we forget about how incompetent a lot of institutions are or guards are or cameras and all that.

30:09However, I will say that, and I think this is where we don't do ourselves any favors in media, in that sort of within establishment media, and people, my colleagues don't like when I say that, I think, but there is this sort of reverence, right, a trust for institutions. And a lot of that comes because you rely, you have sources within these institutions, whether it's government, whether it's intelligence agencies, whatever. And I think if you look back on those sort of early days of the reporting on this, very kind of quickly, we sort of snap into saying, this is the authorities say he killed himself and we close.

30:51And that kind of reminds me a little bit of the attitude back in 2020 about the COVID lab leak theory, where, of course, there was a lot of conspiracy theorists pushing all sort of crazy stuff. But, you know, people kind of fell into that trap where just because Trump said it or just because Alex Jones said it or just therefore it must be wrong. And I do think like as an industry, we need to be able to linger a bit longer. I mean, government institutions lie all the time. I mean, like the Iraq war, everything, whatever you want to pick yourself. So I think firstly, it is just like we as an industry, and if we want to regain people's trust, we need to be comfortable saying, okay, this is what the authorities are saying, but as Julie outlined, here's all the questions.

31:42Right, half a dozen things, and Julie didn't even get to the videotape, right? Exactly. And look, to be fair, I think a lot of my colleagues do do that, but just the general overall when you see the headlines, et cetera. And then look, when it comes to the MAGA side of things, I mean, the incredible thing with the time we're living in is you've got Kash Patel and Dan Bongino as head of the FBI and deputy director of the FBI. For folks who maybe don't know their background as much, they were both basically influencers for the past couple of years on social media. Both of whom really heavily, you know, leaning into the idea that Epstein didn't kill himself.

32:21What happens as soon as they get in? They immediately start sounding like the establishment government institutions that have been saying all along, nothing to see here, move on. Now, is that because that's true? Or is that because now they are also part of the deep state? And that's what makes this tricky. We'll be back in a minute.

32:53Kara Swisher:Kara here. The other day, I saw a picture of Minnesota Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve courtside. She was wearing a t-shirt that read, trans kids belong. I think this was an epic move, and I have so much respect for that. Go Cheryl. This week, Cheryl is on Megan Rapinoe's new podcast, Why Are You Like This? Megan asked Cheryl why her t-shirts are more than just a fashion statement. There's just so many things that we could really champion for women and other marginalized groups. And I just heard from so many people what it meant to them. And so we've continued that. The conversation with Megan gets into why Cheryl is the WNBA GOAT, from being one of the first openly gay coaches in the WNBA to standing with her players during Black Lives Matter.

33:38Kara Swisher:She also recently became the winningest coach in WNBA history. You should check it out. Why Are You Like This? wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube. Elon Musk and a lot of other very smart people think we're all going to have robots at our house any day now. But when you look at where the tech is today and how far it has to go, you might reach a different conclusion. This idea that humanoid robots are coming to live in our house and I went and explored that is just not true. That's Joanna Stern, the tech journalist who spent a year outsourcing her life to AI and robots. That's on Channels, the show about tech and media and what happens when they collide, wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts.

34:21The main focus right now, of course, finally has been on Donald Trump and his relationship to Epstein. Let's talk about that a little bit. There are pictures, videos, and direct quotes showing Trump didn't just spend time with Epstein. He knew Epstein was attracted to young women. Trump said so himself. Elon Musk has asked on Twitter, quote, how can people be expected to have faith in Trump won't release the Epstein files. This is after he deleted that tweet saying Trump is in the Epstein files, which apparently he now, even though Trump had denied it, has been told he was. So what can we definitively say about his knowledge of Epstein's behavior, what allegations deserve to be looked into, and what seem like unfounded accusations to you?

34:59Well, I don't think that, you know, Trump perhaps thinks that he did anything wrong. or back when this happened, it was, let's be clear, it was before Epstein got even questioned about being with underage girls. So I think to some degree, I think there was a feeling, this was well before the Me Too movement, that maybe there wasn't anything really wrong with this. You know, they're paying young girls to have sex with them. And I think there was a culture back then that maybe they thought that that was okay. It was never okay, but I think people looked the other way when it was happening. And also in Europe, which is where Epstein also moved in European circles, there was really nothing illegal about it in parts of Europe.

35:45So I think that that was then. And then as the years progressed, of course, it became more caboo in some ways with the rise of women saying this isn't okay and how you're taking advantage. And we became more aware of the fact that this wasn't just she's having sex with this older man. This is, you're manipulating this girl. In Epstein's case, he didn't just say, I want to pay you for sex. It was this euphemism, give me a massage. And they thought, you know, he was going to help them because he promised to help them with their careers, their college, pay for their college, et cetera, et cetera.

36:30So it was a manipulation, and that's what crossed the line. And it's hard to say how much Trump was really knowledgeable about how Epstein operated or whether Trump was doing the same thing. We really don't know. This has been very interesting. So, I mean, over the past month, I think July 7th is when DOJ put out that statement, basically saying, nothing to see here, let's all move on. Right, which infuriated them. Massively. A couple of weekends ago was the, it was a turning point USA say, the Charlie Kirk event down in Florida. That was the weekend where things really started bubbling up. That's when you had Tucker Carlson, Megyn Kelly, all these people on stage at this big conservative MAGA.

37:11And Elon had sort of started this, right? Started like, let's look into it again when he was having his falling out. Oh, absolutely. Yes. Yeah. So that's all playing out online. Then you literally have on stage at this sort of MAGA conference, people saying, no, this is not good enough. Then Trump got angry. I mean, that post, I've never really seen a post like that from Trump where he's basically calling his base idiots there a couple of weeks ago, that guys and gals or boys and gals post, whatever it was. And then the best thing that could happen for Trump, I think, was that Wall Street Journal story.

37:45It was the Doodles story. Because that immediately, just like clockwork, immediately got everybody behind him again. I agree. I thought that story was a nothing. I really do. So what did he send him a kind of bawdy? It was his birthday. It was before he was arrested. What am I missing? Am I missing something here about why that was so - Right, for people who don't know, it was a birthday card. For his 50th birthday, it included a drawing of a naked woman that said, may every day be another wonderful secret. I think they were trying to show how close he was to Epstein. It was a beginning story, that to me.

38:23Yeah, look, I mean, there was some creepy stuff in there, if you read it, or it certainly can be read as creepy. You know, I was actually just speaking to some of the sort of the Breitbarts and the Bannon outlets of the world yesterday at the White House. I mean, a lot of in that space just think the whole thing is entirely concocted, right? They think the Wall Street Journal made up the story and all that. So that has really gotten sort of the base back around Trump. Now he has put out this stuff about Obama and Russia, which we see so far where there's no smoking gun there. But that's creating a bit of a distraction.

38:56And also he's, you know, all these things about we're going to go to talk to Maxwell in prison and things. So that's keeping them, you know, happy for now, I think. But I think what we've seen with this, the MAGA base and this Trump second term is that they're not afraid to call him out and sort of blow Trump up. So, you know, I don't, if there's not more developments in this substantial by the end of the summer, I think we're going to start hearing a lot more about this. So I don't think this is going away one way or the other. So we're recording this on Thursday and yesterday the journal published another report saying the Attorney General Pambani told Trump his name is in the Epstein files.

39:34they would be. Obviously, Trump is suing the Wall Street Journal. So every episode, we get an expert to send us a question. Let's hear one for both of you. My name is Robbie Kaplan. I am probably best known as the lawyer for the great E. Jean Carroll, who won two jury trials against Donald Trump for sexual assault and defamation. I have two questions. First, is it almost impossible for Trump to be able to prove defamation per se, since one, it has long been known that he was friends with Jeffrey Epstein. And two, there is nothing inherently defamatory about sending a body birthday greeting to a friend.

40:08And isn't it also impossible for Trump to show any reputational damage here, since his bad behavior toward women has already been well-established by the Access Hollywood tape, his remarks on the Howard Stern show, and last but not least, the two unanimous jury verdicts in the E. Jean Carroll trials. So it's funny to hear a legal expert ask to non-lawyers, I will cough on his defamation, but she's getting to an important paradox. Trump is a powerful member of the elite. He hung out with Epstein. He has many credible allegations of sexual misconduct against him. Somehow he's persuaded millions that he's the one who's going to pull back the curtain on the cabal of pedophiles who's run the world.

40:44So talk about that paradox, first Julie, then Donnie, and answer Robbie's question. Well, it surprises me, quite frankly, that we're still not understanding, or I guess it's not being brought up enough, how much Trump has been accused of sexual improprieties at the very least, and in Gene Carroll's situation with sexual assault. It surprises me that the MAGA community hasn't made the connection that he has in his history of treating women, you know, even his own words, the way that he has used, you know, grabbed them by the you-know-what, that he hasn't always treated women with respect. So I think that the MAGA movement just seems to put that aside as that doesn't mean anything and sort of has compartmentalized this whole Epstein thing as something separate, when in fact they do have a line between them, because it does show that he theoretically was in the same camp and that he didn't have, you know, he didn't always have the best morals, I think, when it came to young women.

41:50The other thing I want to point out, though, that when I was trying to pinpoint how friendly he was with Epstein or whether he was involved, is that Trump's type was not, when you think of the women that he's been with, a number of people pointed out to me at the time, look, these aren't the kind of types that Trump goes for. Donnie? And yeah, with the disclaimer, I'm not a lawyer. Thank goodness. But, yeah, I mean, I think this is quite interesting in that, you know, Trump has obviously sued a lot of people, especially recently. And when it comes to, you know, a lot of it looks more like shakedowns when it comes to 60 Minutes and CBS, Paramount, all that sort of stuff.

42:32Even with X, with Twitter, right? He got a payout from Musk's X for things that Trump alleged happened before Musk bought it. But, you know, I think when it comes to actually going up against Murdoch, this is going to be interesting because Murdoch doesn't seem like that sort of guy who's going to want to bend, right? And it is part of a, you know, it's this broader thing when it comes to, well, can you really defame somebody as famous, as big a deal as the President of the United States? And I think this is one of these norms that we see Trump is changing across the board when it's going after news outlets or publishers.

43:10And even people who don't want to come, you know, wouldn't dare dream of themselves as Trumpian, sort of now leaning more into these libel suits. I mean, we just saw this week the Macron suing the right wing podcaster in the US, Candace Owens, for alleging that Brigitte Macron is a man. We saw Gavin Newsom going after Fox News recently. So this is all part of this sort of broader place where at a point before, you know, politicians were used to sort of everybody's throwing everything at them. So I just think that this whole new tactic is yet another norm that Trump is setting. That's a really good point.

43:49It's also dangerous because they're going to have to do discovery. So, you know, he opens the door to them deposing him and others who can reveal whether how close he was with Epstein. Yeah, it feels suicidal to me. I was like, whoa, this is you shouldn't be doing this. You know, I might withdraw it before. As we see with a lot of these lawsuits in this space, you know, because, I mean, there's a sort of cottage industry, especially in the right wing space of just suing. A lot of podcasters, influencers do it just to basically, you know, they hire a shoddy lawyer and they make money off just filing suits because they put up these big fundraisers.

44:30So, like, this is a whole, it's a whole thing of itself, yeah. It's a racket and it's a dangerous racket, yeah. So, I don't think Murdoch will settle, but who knows. Let's end by talking through some of the recent developments with the caveat that we're recording this on Thursday and by the time this interview is published on Monday, things might have changed. Yesterday, the House Oversight Committee issued a subpoena to Maxwell, and the committee also voted to subpoena the Department of Justice for the Epstein files, as well as President Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, James Comey, and Robert Mueller.

44:58The information gathered by the committee will get reviewed internally and not necessarily get released. Julie, I'd love to know what you expect the public to learn from these. Are you optimistic that they'll lead to the disclosure of meaningful information? Well, I think it's a big distraction. She's not going to reveal anything without a deal. What would be the point? She wants some kind of a deal. She wants to get out of jail. And, you know, if they do that, they're opening, as I mentioned earlier, a whole other can of worms with giving her some kind of a deal when she, in fact, was the mastermind.

45:27So to allow her to somehow benefit because they're trying to make themselves less, you know, to show that Trump wasn't involved. Or they're doing something about it. Yeah, or that they're doing something about it. If they really wanted to do something about it, then they should be, you know, looking at his money, for example, looking at counterintelligence, potential investigation into whether he was involved in intelligence. Look at some of the men who he was wiring money to. So doing it with such flourish, like I'm going to interview her, to me says that it's more about politics than it is about really getting to the truth.

46:12We'll be back in a minute.

46:19How is the MAGA universe going to take this? We've discussed how Trump supporters circle the wagons, obviously. Where do you see it going from here? The one thing about MAGA and that online space is just their remarkable persistence, right? That is why Trump is as popular as he is, because these people live and breed it every single day. This is a massive part of that movement, of that space. So it's just not going away. Every single day, there's two things you will always hear. The 2020 election is stolen and the Epstein file. Hence the attack on Barack Obama, but go ahead. Exactly, exactly. So that's how big it is.

47:00I think that's what, you know, sort of showed that Trump might not really grasp that as much with that really harsh post a few weeks ago. But there's no way this is going away. Well, he must because he started to attack Barack Obama rather than talk about cane syrup. Well, yes. I think now, I think the penny seemed to drop. The coke thing didn't work. The coke thing didn't work. Let's end by taking the 30 ,000-foot view. What does the Epstein saga tell us about America in 2025? And what are you focused on yourself on this case? I'm always focused on, A, the victims and how this affects them, and B, our criminal justice system and the failings of us.

47:39I mean, if the Justice Department had done its job way back in 2007, we wouldn't be sitting here right now. Jeffrey Epstein would not, nobody would probably even remember who he is at this point. It is because they allowed a wealthy man to manipulate them and to sabotage their case and to, they themselves sort of minimize the crime, the scope of his crimes. So by doing that, they sowed even more distrust in the Justice Department. And that was the key that I was trying to get across, because up until that time, we knew who Jeffrey Epstein was. There had been a lot of people who had done stories about him before my series, but no one had focused on how he got away with it.

48:26And I think a lot of people either know someone or they themselves have experienced injustice in the criminal justice system and distrust in the way we mentioned earlier about reports. It used to be a policeman would write a report and a journalist would really just say what was in the report. Now we have to question the accuracy of even official documents. And this case is also one of those cases that we had to question exactly what the official record was. And it turned out the official record essentially allowed a very powerful, wealthy, and connected man to get away with molesting hundreds of underage girls.

49:09Do you have any predictions of where you think this will go next? I think that the truth always does come out, but it might not be in our lifetime. I think it's going to take a long time. I think these people are very powerful. The women right now especially are very scared. They don't want to, like I see sometimes people tweeting, the women should just all testify before Congress. Yeah, you know, they've been, let's say they've been lied to, they've been sexually abused, their own lawyers in some cases took advantage of them. Their families sometimes took advantage of them. Yeah, they're going to raise their hands and say, I'm going to go before Congress.

49:45I'm going to tell you everything I know. It's sad, but they've been through so much that they're now at this point thinking, well, if the president of the United States is, this is their thinking, is covering up for Epstein, I'm not going out there on a limb and trying to say what happened to me because that's big. In fact, that's exactly what one of the victims told me. This is big. The president of the United States is essentially putting the lid on this case. Very good point. Donnie? I mean, I just think this underlines again for us, right, that there is just this, you know, I mean, trust in media institutions, trust in every institution is declining as at a low.

50:26I mean, I think this is a moment for media organizations as well to think about, OK, how do we need to improve how we tell these stories and really just be more upfront with our audiences about the things we do not know? and I think maybe if you look back at how Epstein was covered, particularly after how he died and everything else, that that might be something we need to lean more into. And we know, because formats like this, that people are willing to listen. They want to engage with something longer form. They don't need everything given to them in absolute bite-sized pieces all the time. So us, I think, as an industry, trying to figure that out to help regain trust.

51:03But, you know, I think right now we're in this space where there's a lot more people who are likely to trust anything they see on a random social media feed than they are from the DOJ, the media, or even the president at some point. And do you have any predictions what's going to come next? Oh, my God. What are you focused on? I've stopped. I've given up on predictions for a long time. Fair. I mean, I really think that Trump will try and make hay out of this whatever is going on with Obama. I mean, I think, you know, this is sort of setting the stage up for what we're going into. It's going to serve two purposes.

51:39One being potential deflection from Epstein, but also, of course, sort of setting the stage for going into a midterm year. So I think that is going to become all-consuming, whether people like it or not. And I think, again, back to the point of like how, you know, this is going to be one of these things that Gabbard is pushing stuff out there. Everything so far, there's not a there there. But I think we need to, as journalists, look at that every piece and still be willing to consider, okay, let's actually pursue what they're putting out here. We know what the truth is. But unless we're seen to be doing that and to be actually engaging in journalism rather than just saying, no, this is all a conspiracy theory, then I think that doesn't help regain anybody's trust, you know?

52:28That's a very fair point. At the same time, I think Epstein's a bigger bearing wall than the election thing. Yes, yeah. We'll see what happens. All right. Thank you both. I really appreciate it. And amazing work on both your parts. And Julie, of course, really did break this thing wide open many years ago, and people should have listened to her. Thank you, Julie. Thank you. Thanks, guys.

52:52On with Kara Swisher is produced by Christian Castro-Russell, Kateri Yoakum, Megan Burney, Alison Rogers, and Kaylin Lynch. Nishat Kerwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasts. special thanks to Skylar Mitchell our engineers are Rick Kwan and Fernando Arruda and our theme music is by Trackademics go wherever you listen to podcasts search for On With Kara Swisher and hit follow and don't forget to follow us on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube at On With Kara Swisher thanks for listening to On With Kara Swisher from Podium Media, New York Magazine the Vox Media Podcast Network and us we'll be back on Thursday with more

53:32Thank you.