In short
Two-part political episode. First, James Carville analyzes the U.S. midterms and a Massachusetts Senate primary: Ed Markey vs. younger moderate Seth Moulton, arguing the contest is generational and driven by Democrats’ desire to win. He also criticizes Trump’s low approval (about 32%), high gas prices (over $4 daily), and economic effects on working people, and argues Democrats should focus on “slow the train down” rather than only attacking Trump. Second, the show turns to legal controversy: DOJ handling of Jelaine Maxwell after Epstein, including a lenient prison transfer, a leaked jailhouse interview by Deputy AG Todd Blanche, and FOIA redactions in the transfer application. It also covers a USPS whistleblower memo alleging chaotic efforts to interfere with mail ballots despite court blocks.
Guests
James Carville (top Democratic strategist). Jason Leopold (Bloomberg senior investigative reporter, FOIA Files). Joyce Vance (former federal prosecutor).
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOPolitical Landscape: Senate Race Insights
0:00 to 0:26
Discussion on the dynamics of the U.S. Senate primary in Massachusetts.
“Welcome to Omaha, where work and play meet.”
Political Landscape: Senate Race Insights
0:58 to 4:05
Discussion on the dynamics of the U.S. Senate primary in Massachusetts.
“What's happening out there on the ground, especially for Democrats, is this U.S.”
Generational Divide in Politics
4:06 to 6:21
Exploration of generational shifts within the Democratic Party and candidate preferences.
“And we've set aside time with you because let me tell you something, James.”
Economic Concerns: Trump and Corporate Profits
6:22 to 12:20
Analysis of Trump's approval ratings and the economic implications for working-class Americans.
“As you know, they say 87 percent of statistics are made up.”
The Role of AI and Data Centers in the Future
12:21 to 13:32
Discourse on the growing influence of AI and data centers on the job market and society.
“Yeah, I think that makes sense to what you said.”
The Role of AI and Data Centers in the Future
13:33 to 14:09
Discourse on the growing influence of AI and data centers on the job market and society.
“Okay, I need to tell you about something.”
Midterms and Democratic Strategy
15:05 to 20:09
James Carville discusses the Democratic strategy for the upcoming midterms.
“We're back with James Carville, another primary day in America.”
Epstein Case and Trump DOJ
20:09 to 24:25
Ari Melber details the Trump administration's handling of the Epstein case.
“Now, the Trump DOJ gave her very lenient treatment, orchestrating this unusual transfer for her to this more comfortable minimum security prison.”
Investigative Reporting on Maxwell's Transfer
24:25 to 28:00
Jason Leopold discusses the implications of the redacted documents on Maxwell's transfer.
“I've told viewers before we need investigative reporters and journalists like yourself who actually take the time to do this work and the government tries to exhaust or tire you out or stonewall you.”
Investigating Epstein Document Redactions
28:00 to 33:00
Discussion on the implications of redactions in government documents relating to Epstein.
“I mean, but this goes to everything that's in that one page document.”
Show all 13 chapters
Whistleblower's Warning on Mail Ballots
33:00 to 38:20
Analysis of a whistleblower's claims about potential interference with mail voting.
“a whistleblower on the attack on mail ballots.”
Concerns Over Voting Suppression in Texas
38:20 to 41:40
Discussion on recent voter suppression efforts in Texas and their implications.
“So to your point, we now have at least two competing threads.”
Texas Polling Site Reductions and Voter Suppression
42:00 to 43:50
Learn about the significant cuts to polling sites in Texas and their implications for voter turnout.
“One Democrat says it's basic voter suppression.”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00Welcome to Omaha, where work and play meet. Where productivity meets the after party. Where downtown convention space and hotels are within walking distance of 90 restaurants, pubs, and unique shops. Where locally made morning lattes meet 5 o 'clock craft cocktails. And where colleagues meet to explore the waterfront views in our 72-acre downtown urban oasis. And where in 2028, a modern street park will take you to even more entertainment options. Go to visitomaha.com slash meetings to learn more. Ever notice how life's best stories don't happen in your living room? They happen on the open road, out on the water, or parked under the stars.
0:37At Progressive, they get that you want to focus on the experience, not worry about the what-ifs. That's why they offer quality insurance designed for your ride, whether that's a boat, RV, or motorcycle. Adventure with confidence. Visit Progressive.com and see how easy it is to protect your favorite way to get away. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Not available in D.C. Prices vary based on how you buy.
1:28What's happening out there on the ground, especially for Democrats, is this U.S. Senate primary. You have a big progressive. Ed Markey, you may remember, he's in the House for a long time. He's a big kind of green progressive senator there. And he's facing a challenge from a moderate, which is not the kind of primary script we've always heard. I'm going to ask Carville about it. But this is a younger moderate, Seth Moulton. And so it's one of these generational showdowns that we are seeing where it's not just ideology and it's not just the other things. We hear about identity politics here. It's all about really whether folks think that Markey's been a good, long liberal who deserves another shot or they want to turn to someone who's younger, even if he is basically technically running to Markey's right in the liberal state of Massachusetts.
2:13Now, broaden out and you have Trump crashing at 32 percent. That's also University of Massachusetts numbers there. But we've seen similar crashes around the country for Trump. In fact, when you look at the war, which grinds on, kind of showing Donald Trump's powerlessness to control events abroad or his foreign policy failure. But whatever you want to call it, America is united against it, 68 percent. High prices from groceries to gas, the national average across August here, was over four bucks every single day. That's the first time it's ever been that high, that consistently. AAA tracks those numbers.
2:47And as if that weren't enough, the president spent late summer period, revving up the Canada trade war, which is a setback for Republicans who had hoped that even though they don't think it's been a good news environment for them, they'd hope that the tariffs, which were largely neutralized by the Supreme Court, would have faded at least out of conversation. No such luck there. Overall, we've heard Republicans also generally lowering expectations, the RNC chair and the Speaker of the House at one point saying, hey, we usually lose, the incumbent party usually loses in this situation. Now you have the speaker kind of flipping his messaging saying, look, Republicans will defy history in the 63 days when the midterms are held.
3:29He said we're going to hold the House majority. The people recognize the historic stakes of this, and they really do understand it's a contrast election. The speaker adding, this is going to be a midterm, basically unlike any other, if you paraphrase what he meant. That's the Republican perspective. I want to bring in top Democratic strategist, James Carver. Welcome back, sir. Well, thank you. Delighted to be back. A pretty good political climate to be back in, too. Well, your party's been riding high. And let's start with, I think, what is the big spotlight on that Senate race. We'll get into Trump and his problems.
4:04As I mentioned, Republicans have been spinning all over the place. And we've set aside time with you because let me tell you something, James. I'll start with a compliment and then we'll get into it. You are so impactful that even the folks who don't love you say, oh, I got to watch him. I got mad about this. I didn't like that. But I watched all 15 minutes. Sorry. You know, so I always think, OK, you know, and we we take all kinds here. So with that in mind, you look at Massachusetts. Markey is a reliable liberal Democrat. I think he has generally good standing. Tell us about this primary or what it means that someone can run to his right in the center left of the Democratic Party in that state.
4:47Well, Ed is kind of old friend of mine. His wife, Susan Blumenthal, is an old old friend of mine. Molden is an outstanding young guy. There's no doubt about that. I mean, look, I think this is good when you got a kind of choice like this. That's good. I mean, people in Massachusetts are going to decide what they want to do. And no matter what they do, I think we're going to come out of this just fine. I think both of these both of these candidates are really outstanding. I mean, it's a generational divide much more than an ideological divide. And that's going to play itself out here during this cycle and the next cycle.
5:19But they're both top notch people. But if if Markey faces any trouble today and then we count the votes tonight, it's not that he's not in tune with Massachusetts and he beat a Kennedy challenger earlier in the primary. It would only be whether enough Democrats have gotten this memo that there is a desire for new blood. Speak on that before we turn to Trump's approval. You know, this is a new desire. The biggest desire is the desire to win. I think most Democrats, if you ask him, hey, do you think we should have a candidate be represented by the younger generation or you think somebody else? I just think there's a burning desire to win.
5:58Now, we think we can win better with a younger candidate. There will be for the younger candidate. But I don't think people – I don't think Democrats in Massachusetts are going to be voting on age. I think they're going to say, hey, well, you know, they're probably going to win that no matter what. But who can go around the country? Who can make the case the best? And that's going to play out in a lot of places. And you always want your party to want to be on. Most of all, I want to be on the winning side. Well, I'll give you a Democratic statistic. As you know, they say 87 percent of statistics are made up.
6:25I don't know if you ever heard that. But in a in non covid elections. OK, so you just take out the strange Biden Trump 2020. in history, the Democratic presidential candidates that have done the best were quite young in Obama and Clinton. And now you have the added sort of energy out here about, hey, too many old folks. Trump is old. Biden was old, et cetera.
6:56I think that's a legitimate desire on people. And I think when we turn when it turns to 2028, which we're going to be doing here in two months from now, maybe a little bit more than that. I think some of these younger candidates are going to make the point that we need some new vigor. We need new energy in the party. And I think that's going to matter. I really do. At what point do you cross into being young enough or old enough that voters are going to have to decide? But I don't think the party's going to be in a mood to nominate anybody in their 70s. And I left my 70s almost two years ago, so I can say that with some confidence.
7:31There you go. And I mean, again, you can't do ageism, right? We had you on long before Biden dropped out and you were saying, hey, I'm not saying it. You said it. You said, hey, I'm old. He's old. I think we got to look around. We got to be open minded. So that's great. Let's turn to Trump as promised. Four dollar gas, open ended war, approval crash for 32 percent. And then if you dig deeper, you go under the hood, as they say, it's actually worse. I mean, some of this economic data, we are only just beginning to see the depths of the problem for the working class. I get it. If you're making data centers, if you're top 1%, maybe you like Trump.
8:08But the other nine-tenths of the country, I mean, corporate profits now, which he has, of course, deregulated and told him to do whatever, wages grew about 10%, canceled out by inflation, as you see there. Corporate profits surging in these two years. You see the blue line going up since 24. The Securities and Exchange Commission, which is supposed to be a boring agency you don't think about, they're now going even lighter and more lenient on some of these big tech companies and stock companies. And it looks like it's costing the American public. Where does that gap fit in in these midterms? People feel correctly.
8:45Corporate profits are up because of technology and they don't have to hire that many people. And the People they get, they don't have to pay that much. And so if I'm a corporate investor, that's actually what I'm looking for. If I'm a working person, I'm trying to earn a living. That's exactly what I'm not looking for. And I believe firmly that this needs to be addressed through the tax code. Tax the hell out of them. They're going to make all this money. They're going to hire fewer people. And what you have to do is tax them and give people who are not finding the higher wages that they need or kind of jobs they need, give them a break.
9:24But you can do this. We can do this as a country. And we don't, you know, when we came in and Trump came in, these Republicans gave them all these gigantic tax cuts. They got to write stuff off. They got to recapture this. God knows what. And, you know, make all your profits. So April 15th, we're going to come in and see you in corporate corporate taxes are going to go up in this country and you're going to pay more and there's going to be fewer loopholes. And we're going to take that money and put it back in the country, quite simply. And more of it's going to go toward young people because they're the ones that are entering this horrific job market.
10:00If our young person right now probably going in as bad a job market as we've had in a long time. Yeah. Well, you know, there's a learning curve in life and politics. people are learning quickly about the AI and the data. And we've been covering a lot on this program. And there's interesting tools to use. Great. But if you care about the well-being of society, which I don't think is just a, quote, liberal thing, you've got a lot of folks saying, wait a minute and slow down and let's have protections, labor, environmental, et cetera. And so the data center backlash, just we've been covering in the last six months has exploded.
10:36it. People who might not have used the term data center two years ago and now go wait. And Trump is completely on the opposite side of this. The new quote from him, I'm just going to I don't have to play it. I'll just tell you what he said. Only reason communities should not want data centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor, he posted. James. Well, look, I think I read what my friend Governor Shapiro of Pennsylvania said. I think I think this guy, as much as anybody understands what's happening. And at one point, this is some form of progress. You can't stop it. But what you can do is you can regulate it and you can tax it.
11:19And that's what I've got to understand. I'm sitting in a Shenandoah Valley. There's a data set. I didn't know it was 15 miles. I just checked on my GPS. And I said, what the hell is that big building over there? It's all those cars parked. The data set. You're in Shenandoah tonight. You're not going to stop it. Yeah, I'm in Shenandoah right now. I mean, Middletown, Virginia, there's a huge— Carry on. Yeah, it's good hiking, but there's—yeah, it's nice, but there's a huge data center. But you're not going to stop it. I don't think you can stop it. I think Governor Shapiro is right. I think Bill Gates is right.
11:51And to some extent, this is going to—and people see us and they say, wait, we're building something that's going to destroy my job and my livelihood. And how can you blame them? because every time somebody comes in, big tech comes in, oh, we're here, we're going to help you. And this is happening all over the country. And this conversation, and thank God we're having it tonight, but it's going to be a front and center conversation come the cycle of 2028. And if you're running for president as a Democrat, you better have some ideas on this because people are going to ask you and they're going to want answers.
12:22Yeah, I think that makes sense to what you said. And when you break out of the black and white, it's like when they say Luddite, you know, oh stop completely well that's not necessarily realistic but when you look at new technologies uh when you get airplanes you need rules for airplanes uh this idea that you're just going to fill the airplanes full of people and test it out and see how many men women and children die or don't get saved or get hurt and then later add the rules that's currently what we're doing with ai we have an faa right we have railroad rules we don't have right now federal rules on ai and I'll let you finish.
12:59You're coming back after a quick break, but go ahead now. What do you want to say? You know, some industries need help when it got started. I mean, the oil and gas business had the depletion allowance. It took them a while. You can write stuff off. You get investment credit. AI started out making money, and every day they make more money. I mean, they barely had a teething issue. They just came up with money out of the wazoo, and they're just making more and more. And I'll come back to the thing that I really believe. The best way to deal with this is taxing. I hear you on that. The dogs of Shenandoah hear you as well.
13:32We got a 90-second break. James Carville comes back. We'll be right back. Bye. Hey, what's up, guys? It's Haley Bailey. Okay, I need to tell you about something. I just got YouTube Premium. It's got tons of awesome features like offline downloads so I can download my favorite videos before I travel and watch them whenever I don't have Wi-Fi because we all know airplane Wi-Fi is the worst. I get ad-free, I get backroom play, and there's like a ton more in there. You should try it. If you like YouTube, you'll love YouTube Premium. Try it now for two months free at youtube.com slash premium. Trial eligibility varies.
14:06Terms apply. Cancel anytime. That's a mouthful. Support for this podcast comes from Progressive, America's number one boat insurer. We've all made mistakes on the water, but there's one mistake you shouldn't make, being uninsured. With Progressive Boat Insurance, you can choose coverage for most mistakes you or other boaters could make, helping you float carefree all season long. Quote today. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Number one rating based on 2024 filings with State Departments of Insurance. I like things my way. My coffee, my schedule, and my treatment. So I talked to my doctor about self-injecting with the Vivgard Hytrulo Pre-Filled Syringe, which contains F-Gartigamide Alpha and Hyaluronidase QVFC.
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15:11We're back with James Carville, another primary day in America. We were talking Massachusetts. We talked about tech, Trump's sort of AI center gaffe. When you look at now, everything gears back up after Labor Day, and you're really in this final seven-week spread for the midterms, where are you on the Dems get out of the way? Because we just went through some of the numbers in the polling and Dems still need the affirmative message of why this is not just anti-Trump but turn the page to helping people's lives. Where are you on that balance? Why do they need to beef anything? People are going to vote on Trump.
15:44Trump is going to spend, I don't know, claims he'll spend$400 million on TV making it about Trump. He's going to go to Dallas. They're going to have this idiotic mini-convention, which is going to be a disaster. And my advice to Democrats is don't just do nothing. Stand there. And the time for the Democratic message is going to be when we run for president. But, you know, and you can say this is going to be about one thing and one thing only. Do you want to continue in the same direction of Trump or do you want to slow this train down? And I think clearly people want to slow it down. And one more point, we're in polling season.
16:17We've had a couple. We've had the UMass poll. Today we had another one. Everybody's going to be coming out. A week from now, there's going to be the NBC poll and Wall Street Journal and the New York Times poll and the Quinnipiac and God knows what, ABC. We're going to see data out of the wazoo, as we would say. And then we're going to be able to aggregate that. But I would be totally surprised if it doesn't at some level mirror what we're seeing already. It generally does. And that usually way on, you know, way on Labor Day is kind of close to generally where you end up on Election Day. And when you look at the first term midterms, I mean, Trump got really shellacked.
17:00And statistically, he is more known and more opposed, less popular now than he was going into those midterms. Do you see a comparison there or things have changed so much? It's like a different season. You know, you knew we were going to have a good year in 18. and it was maybe a little better than you'd anticipate cyclically, I think this is going to be bigger. And I'm hearing from some people who are pretty knowledgeable, and remember this, there's state legislative seats all over the country. And they say there's eight Senate seats up for grabs. I can't imagine that we don't win at least seven of them.
17:36Usually when it tips, it tips in one party's favor. I'll sit here right now and say, I think the Democrats are going to be in the majority of the United States Senate on January 3rd. I just flat believed that. You know, I flat believed that Harris was going to win, and I was flat wrong. I could be wrong again. But everything I see, and I look at the polls, maybe we one point down in one of the eight. And, you know, you're an incumbent party, you generally poll what you get. It's not an even breakdown between the incumbent and any incumbent party. And believe me, I've been on the wrong side of that trade, and it hurts like hell.
18:13Well, and their side seems fatigued and they don't have message support because so much of the digital conversation that Trump did benefit from has turned against him on Epstein and the war and everything else. I mean, Tucker Carlson wants him out of office early. You know, I will say it again. I think he's going to leave early. He doesn't have any idea of how hard he's going to be hit. And these Republicans are going to turn on him because they're going to figure out. It's all about him. It's his convention. All his ads are going to be about him. He's going to take the money and do what he wants with it.
18:48And I got news for you, man. If you're a Republican Senate candidate in South Carolina, North Carolina or anywhere else, you have now figured out he does not care about you. And that is going to be abundantly clear come November. Abundant. Yeah. And on issues like gas and prices where people can't explain it away because they're living it. So James Carville from the hills of Shenandoah, where the dogs bark in packs. Thank you, sir. Good to see you. If you hit dog that barks, you got hit by the AI center. There you go. Our thanks to the Raging Cager. Thank you, sir. Let me tell folks what's coming up.
19:27We just spent the top of the show discussing the midterms and the election. If you've been following it closely, you might also say, OK, but what about Trump being on a path to lose and still trying to steal it with the mail ballots? Well, I have a legal breakdown on a new whistleblower warning that broke today. The Senate got a hold of this. You might have seen an alert on your phone. We're going to walk you through everything you need to know about that, the potential abuse of the post office, and how they're trying to stop it. So that's coming up. While next, we turn to the new heat over Epstein on the Trump DOJ.
19:58I'll see you soon.
20:09New questions facing the Trump administration tonight about the handling of not only the Epstein case, where the notorious sex trafficker, of course, died in prison, but also the only accomplice the United States ever convicted for the Epstein crimes, Jelaine Maxwell. Now, the Trump DOJ gave her very lenient treatment, orchestrating this unusual transfer for her to this more comfortable minimum security prison. And that is a place that we know the convicted trafficker has been getting this better treatment, new amenities, including a pet dog. Any such leniency for a convict serving a sentence for serious crimes is, of course, unusual.
20:46For the Trump administration, this was also suspicious because the DOJ convened this unusual jailhouse interview with her, you might remember. Then they leaked it and it tried to surface defenses for President Trump. In other words, it didn't seem like it was involved in any accurate traditional law enforcement method, but rather that it was trying to help Trump, the president overseeing the prisoner. It was also personally conducted by a high-ranking official, not a prosecutor who worked on the case or had dealt with her previously, which might possibly make sense, but rather by the then Deputy Attorney General, Todd Blanche, who you may recall has since been promoted to the top job.
21:26Now, Blanche really didn't offer a precedent for that kind of interview in his role or a logical explanation for swooping in to do it. Later, the claim was that they moved Maxwell because of threats against her life. Now, it's true the Bureau of Prisons, which is under the office of DOJ, of course, has an obligation to all inmates safety. But few experts, observers, or even longtime sympathetic Trump voices in digital media like Joe Rogan, who covered this issue a lot. Few of those folks thought that Blanche's explanation even made sense at the time. Now, Bloomberg reporter Jason Leopold used legal tools over a quest for many months to try to obtain the original Trump DOJ prison transfer application.
22:16That prison record written at the time, if preserved accurately, might show what the government actually really said about the transfer. It could be compared to the Trump DOJ's later claims, including Blanche, who now, of course, runs the show there. Now, rather than releasing the full document that might support his prior claims, the DOJ basically cut out almost all the critical details from the original document you see here. Now the Trump DOJ, of course, previously has been caught breaking aspects of the Epstein law pushed by Congressman Massey, a Republican, and Ro Khanna, a Democrat, famously bipartisan passed, you know, through the Congress.
22:56They broke parts of the law through the redactions and filings that clearly broke the statutory deadlines. Now here, the administration is citing older federal information laws for an exception to the freedom of information rules. So they're saying that because of safety, as Leopold writes in the piece, they had to remove certain details. They also removed the documents section that could have a detailed justification for the unusual transfer I've been telling you about invoking supposed privacy. So when you take it all together, you have something that actually matters. This is not some game of politics about who said what or distanced themselves from Epstein when.
23:36We are talking about the current federal government's punishment of an Epstein co-conspirator and sex trafficker that was made more lenient. And after all of the problems with secrecy and hiding that led to that bipartisan bill being passed that I mentioned over the potential objection of the sitting president because it was veto proof. After all of that, and this work on transparency, that was the name of the law, you find the Trump DOJ again being secretive suspiciously about this sweetheart prison transfer deal for an Epstein co-conspirator. It's enough to make your head spin if you hadn't already given up on this government, right?
Read the full transcript
24:13I want to bring in Jason Leopold, the Bloomberg senior investigative reporter, author of the FOIA Files newsletter. He obtained that document after much work about the transfer. Welcome back. Thank you, Ari. Good to be back with you. Great to have you. I've told viewers before we need investigative reporters and journalists like yourself who actually take the time to do this work and the government tries to exhaust or tire you out or stonewall you. Here you have gotten the document. What's important about the redactions and are they, in your view, suspicious? Yeah, it's a great question. First of all, the document is the actual application that was used to justify the transfer of Jelaine Maxwell.
24:56So we know that it wasn't just a letter that was sent down by the attorney general's office or deputy attorney general, but it's an actual document. All of the redactions relate to privacy exemptions under the FOIA. And we can see in one of the boxes there that there was a requirement to provide an explanation about Maxwell's transfer. Why is she being transferred? Is that the whited out part there? Tell us what we're looking at. That is. Yeah, it's the it's the it's like the third box there. The big, chunky, you know, the big, chunky white box. So, you know, these are privacy exemptions. One is just personal privacy and the other is privacy when it's a record that's compiled for law enforcement purposes.
25:48Importantly, under the FOIA, the government agencies are supposed to perform a public interest balancing test. OK, and this balancing test is where, you know, they weigh whether there is, you know, a public, you know, the public interest outweighs right to privacy, but whether the record would also show government activity. Like, what's the government activity here? The government activity is that they, you know, they moved Jelaine Maxwell shortly after this interview with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. There has been no real explanation around why. And they're just, you know, right now keeping it, you know, obviously keeping it secret.
26:33There's an exemption there that also applies to medical information that, you know, is rightfully withheld. I mean, that kind of information would never be released. But that area where you have that kind of justification, given the overwhelming public interest here. Yeah, I would say that I do find it troubling, you know, frustrating. Well, let me jump in. Let me jump in. This is not some personal private matter. This is a person who was afforded their rights and was convicted of this heinous sex trafficking pursuant to the Epstein conspiracy. And they're doing their time for it. And their actual punishment they were given under the law is materially being lessened, being made more lenient than the original punishment, only at the direct intervention of these senior forces in the Trump DOJ.
27:28after this odd exculpatory interview exercise that was leaked, which, again, has no law enforcement purpose to leak it. And then the question becomes, are they redacting what was the explanation because it doesn't match what Blanche said or there was no explanation? Are they just basically it said, hey, we said so. And they redact that because they know that looks bad. I mean, yes, those are the questions. And I can tell you that, you know, this was released to me after Bloomberg and I sued. the Bureau of Prisons to compel the release of the record after they stonewalled it. But this is what we're going to get, you know, what I'm going to continue to fight for is trying to get that information out and have the, you know, the government kind of justify, you know, the withholdings or explain in deeper detail its rationale.
28:18I mean, but this goes to everything that's in that one page document. And there's a lot of, you know, great detail and background there. For example, you know, federal parole was abolished in 87. But there are questions at the bottom of it is that, you know, has parole date been scheduled? If so, when? There's redactions there, again, under personal privacy and another privacy exemption. But I'm not sure, you know, it's unclear what would be there. Is it a date? Is it a name? You know, one of them appears to be a name, but it's it's it's they just went overboard. And they also applied another redaction saying that there would, you know, as you noted, there would be a threat to life and safety.
29:07So, you know, does it make sense for the entire record to be redacted, given the overwhelming public interest? No, no. And then I want to mention here in The New York Times reporting that was quite voluminous about just how upended and sort of upset the White House was about all these links back to Trump. The vice president floated the idea that they would get potentially Tucker Carlson, who they viewed as an ally on the issue at the time, to go and interview Maxwell in prison. And then Blanche offered to interview Maxwell himself. That reporting matters because it suggests that this was not for a legitimate law enforcement purpose.
29:51It was for the purpose of publicizing or putting out propaganda from a less than credible convicted sex offender for the government's interests. Where does that fit in again to the larger story, not just this one page document, but the idea that there's a lot of contemporaneous reporting that they wanted to get Maxwell to say nice things about Donald Trump, whether they were true or not for their own personal agenda and that they may have abused DOJ powers and given leniency to the only imprisoned Epstein co-conspirator for that for that illicit purpose? Yeah, I mean, the timing is certainly suspect, right?
30:31I mean, as we can see here from the document, the transfer took place just a few days after. And as it relates to, you know, what was taking place behind the scenes, I think, you know, you nailed it. First of all, that's what I'm trying to get at here. And to be clear, whenever there's a redaction in a document from any government agency, I'm always skeptical. But but here there's so much there. The secrecy is so intense, so much secrecy revolving around what's taking place behind the scenes as it relates to the release of the Epstein files, as it relates to the process behind the scenes. The, you know, trying to cut through that has been extremely difficult, particularly, you know, even using the FOIA, because even those records that could tell us what's happening, who's speaking to whom are being locked down or, as you can see here, completely redacted.
31:35And, you know, this took me almost a year to gain access to this single page. Right, and that involves the dogged reporting, the requests, the going to the system, and then ultimately using the litigation to pursue it, which, as mentioned, is what we need. And then for folks who are cynical, it's also a reminder that some of these rules are working. The court system is working. The process you went through got something. And then the question is, as we've discussed, testing that. Or, and this happens in court, even if your reporting is very fair and open-minded, as I've been clear with viewers, sometimes secrecy leaves everyone with a negative inference.
32:09The voters, the people of this country can make up their own mind over whether they think this was secretively redacted, even though it completely upheld the official story or more likely the other. Otherwise, I'm over on time, but you can finish your thought. You're shaking your head. Yeah, no, I agree. And look, to be clear, these redactions, there could be legitimate reasons for it. Absolutely. And so, you know, we're waiting for that explanation. uh doj said that they could not even comment on this due to ongoing litigation right and again that's your piece what i'm telling viewers is if there was a sentence in there that said as mr blanche said at the time these are the or this is the security thing i don't think you redacted i mean i've been around enough cases to know that when it comes to evidence jason again thank you for your intrepid reporting and your fairness appreciate it i'm gonna finish a break when we come back joyce fans is here on that story i told you about new developments in a whistleblower on the attack on mail ballots.
33:16It's another primary voting day in America, but we are also looking at whether the midterms will be protected. A new whistleblower from inside the USPS now speaking out, warning in a detailed memo that they have Trump plans that could interfere with people getting their ballots. And this details a secretive, rushed, chaotic, and flawed process to try to use what is a paused executive order from Trump to limit voting by mail. This whistleblower says there could be catastrophic failure that would derail the midterm elections. And we're learning about this today from a very detailed written complaint that the Senate has and the New York Times also reported on.
33:57But the context is in court, A judge has just blocked that order, which was initially allowed by the Supreme Court recently. But on Thursday, they called attention to the fact that states have already ordered their mail ballots. And the Trump folks offered, quote, no reply to counter the compliance for the 26 midterm elections could be impossible for those that are already beginning the process. This is something we mentioned in reporting on this. The Supreme Court lifted that stay at a time where it might have been too late. As for this new whistleblower, they say that internally, officials may be secretly defying the court order and rushing forward with this.
34:33There will be another hearing on Thursday. As of right now, though, if you're saying, okay, how panicked should one be? Trump's order is blocked. That's the law of the land this moment. Trump administration is exercising its right to appeal that ruling. Now, they have an uphill battle because every day that goes by, we are closer to the actual midterms. but that appeals court could rule again. The Supreme Court could get involved again. It was not that long ago, earlier last week, when the Supreme Court did allow for this order to take effect. But even that was really a limited thing because they weren't saying what Trump wants to do is legal.
35:11They were just saying it's not paused yet as illegal. I know when we sound this lawyerly, it's always a little bit of a bad sign. But part of the reasoning was that the Supreme Court said that whole case had come up too early. Courts review final rules, not proposed rules. If the Postal Service's final rule does harm the states, though, they said, then they may, quote, challenge that rule. So all of this is on pause at this moment. It's not time to panic, but it is time to pay very close attention and also take the whistleblower's warning seriously. It's basically an accusation that the Trump folks are plotting to do this even at a time that it's supposed to be paused.
35:51and the whole plot could deny election mail services in states that refuse to go along with the unprecedented request by Trump to get all of their voter data, even though it's not a postal service activity. It could also interfere with hundreds of thousands or millions of others voting by mail, according to a New York Times analysis. And in a sign of why this is probably illegal, the way it would work would basically impact Democrats more, which makes it look like political meddling. And don't forget, there is one pretty famous Republican who still votes by mail, President Trump. He just voted in Florida's Republican primary by mail within the last few weeks, as Politico reported.
36:36Voters have been marching for voting rights. He himself mailed in his ballot. So it doesn't make any sense. It does not make sense. It does not look legal. And it appears that, eyeing a loss, Donald Trump is trying to do anything to overturn the lawful election. In normal times, that would sound like a huge allegation to make on the national news about the sitting president before the election's even been held. But since that is exactly what he did, aided and abetted by violent criminals in 2020, it's no longer an allegation. It's a continuation of a convicted pattern. I want to bring in former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance, who writes extensively about these issues.
37:26I tried to walk through that both fairly because there's some legal mumbo jumbo, but also explain why we're way past the point of having to give this benefit of the doubt to a government that's been caught trying to criminally steal elections. Walk us through what you see and what the sort of panic level is on the mail ballots. Yeah, I thought you did a great job, Ari. It's a confusing situation. And when we talk about the panic level, we should start with the fact that it's confusing. That's intentional. That's part of Donald Trump's goal here is to make it so complicated and confusing that people just won't vote.
38:03So if there's one takeaway from this whole mess, it's this. Do whatever it takes for you to vote. Cast a ballot. Make sure it gets counted this November. No one would be trying this hard to interfere with your right to vote if they weren't desperately afraid of the power we all have as citizens voting. So to your point, we now have at least two competing threads. We've got these two cases in front of Judge Peltowani in Boston. And there was a lot of conversation about whether it was too early to bring the lawsuit. That's what the Supreme Court ruled about last week. They said too soon for the court to intervene because the Postal Service hasn't taken steps towards implementing the executive order.
38:49Well, now that's happened. And here, I think, is the most disturbing fact. The government, which had been arguing the argument that the Supreme Court accepted too early, not yet ripe for a decision, immediately shifted and said, now it's too late. Now the appellate courts won't have time to decide this issue before the election, so you can't bring your lawsuit. And if anything points out just the Kafkaesque ridiculous nature of what the government is doing here, it's that notion that there was never any time where plaintiffs could sue. But the Supreme Court has already promised that they should have that opportunity.
39:24We'll see what happens when this case goes back to them. But it was clear in the context of that case, Ari, that this was a rule, a rush to implement a new rule with only 60 days left on the clock that the Postal Service couldn't handle. And then add to that today's bombshell, the whistleblower who provides details. So let me slow you down on that point, because does that mean, in your view, above and beyond all of the law, that the Postal Service is less likely to be able to carry out the Trump plot? Well, I think it's problematic. The Trump plot is confuse, delay, and the Postal Service, even though it can't implement a working system, it can absolutely implement a system that interferes with ballots being delivered and returned for counting.
40:19And that, it seems to me, is the whole goal here. If nothing else, let's say the courts were to block all of this nonsense today and make it go away, Trump would then argue after the election, look, the courts blocked me. These elections were dominated by fraud. None of these results are reliable. In other words, what's being set up is a win-win situation for Trump and others who want to interfere with free and fair elections. That means it's incumbent on people like you and me to help the public understand that these elections, we can have confidence in them. This may mean we have to stand in longer lines.
40:55This may mean we have to vote in person instead of by mail. But the point is our local county officials, they will count the ballots that they receive. It's our job to make sure that they receive them. Yeah. I mean, to summarize what you're saying, the bad news is we've been through this before. And the good news is we've been through this before. And so that you got to kind of keep that in mind and power ahead with the exposure, the scrutiny, et cetera. I want to also ask you about this other breaking news we actually got about voting in Texas. We had a busy show. Joyce, stay with me. We'll hit that when we come back next.
41:43Texas could be key to who controls the Senate after these midterms. And we now have reporting from MSNOW out of Tarrant County. That's got just outside of Dallas, Fort Worth area, where they are cutting a third of polling places in this sudden move. This is breaking news tonight. One Democrat says it's basic voter suppression. There's going to be 90 polling sites cut, which tells you that even in Texas, they had that many sites and now there are a third less. It was a divided three to two vote with a Republican majority board cutting those number of polling locations. A crowd formed outside, one Democratic commissioner protesting this, throwing paper.
42:24You could see a pretty packed room there. This is one piece of one state that could ultimately affect everything. Joyce Vance is back. And, Joyce, we talked about some of these newfangled secret plots. This is more old school. And while I want to be clear, there is a legal authority to decide about polling locations, this looks targeted as a way to undercut Democratic turnout, or at least make it more difficult. Making changes this close to the election really does give that appearance. You know, under Texas law, every county gets to decide the number of polling places it will have and where to put them.
43:01And the county has put forward a narrative that says that they're just closing underutilized polling places. But one of them is on a college campus. So I think this bears careful watching. Yeah, and as you say, we don't want to take every little potential change in all of the local ways that voting works in America and overreact. This is distinct from the other story we mentioned. But given that you've got two million people, it includes Fort Worth, this area, and all of a sudden you said we're close to the mark, Republicans might not have been that worried six months ago about losing Texas where they had an incumbent senator.
43:40Now we're seeing the politics catching up with this. and instead of trying to make a better argument, Democrats, at least in that county, saying they're trying to suppress the vote. We'll keep an eye on it. Joyce, on more than one part of the voting story tonight, thanks for being here. Nice to be with you, Ari. Appreciate it. We'll be right back. Hey, what's up, guys? It's Haley Bailey. Okay, I need to tell you about something. I just got YouTube Premium. It's got tons of awesome features like offline downloads so I can download my favorite videos before I travel and watch them whenever I don't have Wi-Fi because we all know airplane Wi-Fi is the worst.
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45:32Well, we followed a lot of news tonight, especially on the voting front. Stay informed. Make sure you exercise your right to vote. And I'll see you here tomorrow at 6 p.m. Eastern. I like things my way, my coffee, my schedule, and my treatment. So I talked to my doctor about self-injecting with the Vivgard Hytrulo Pre-Filled Syringe, which contains F-Gartigamide Alpha and Hyaluronidase QVFC. It's injected under your skin subcutaneously. It means I can inject in my space on my time. It's my treatment, my way. Visit VivgardMyWay.com. That's V-Y-V-G-A-R-T MyWay.com. And talk to your doctor about Vivgard Hytrulo.
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September 1, 2026; 6pm; The Trump DOJ is facing new questions over its handling of the Epstein case. MS NOW’s Ari Melber reports and is joined by Bloomberg’s Jason Leopold. Plus, legendary strategist James Carville joins to discuss the latest from the Trump White House and the upcoming midterm elections.
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