New Questions About Trump WH's Epstein Meetings

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0:35With 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. Welcome to The Beat, everyone. I'm Ari Melber. We begin with the Epstein uproar continuing new details today that undercut White House claims as well as fueling more questions. NBC News reporting top officials did huddle last night specifically to discuss the Epstein scandal and what they will do about ongoing questions and transparency, something that VP Vance basically all but denied yesterday.

1:12Maybe Trump officials are rattled. Maybe they don't have one story to tell. the meeting followed that messaging from the president who handed the ball, handed the mic to Vice President Vance, who said they weren't going to be doing that kind of meeting, call that fake news. But the reporting says that Attorney General Bondi and FBI Director Patel were there and that this occurred different than some of the initial reports ultimately at the White House. Now, if the location changed, but the topics and meeting participants stayed the same, it looks like basically the core point of the early reporting that they were so quick to deny that there was a kind of high-level emergency Epstein meeting still happened.

1:51Now, here's Vance and Trump, as mentioned. It's completely fake news. We're not meeting to talk about the Epstein situation. And I think the reporter reported it needs to get better sources. Look, the whole thing is a hoax. It's put out by the Democrats because we've had the most successful six months in the history of our country. And that's just a way of trying to divert attention to something that's total bullshit. The president there, who has increasingly sounded disinhibited in this second term, swearing in public, not something we usually see from presidents, but more important in the rhetoric are the underlying facts.

2:31That contrary to the denials, there is evidence and reporting there is a meeting. that contrary to the initial claims that Donald Trump and his team would bring transparency to the Epstein case, the Epstein files, as we've heard them called, no transparency at all. And MAGA leaders, among others, saying it's a cover-up. And despite the denial, the report suggests that the strategy meeting advances residence was basically canceled in response to the reporting about it. So again, they are trying to do certain things while not getting caught doing those things, and they are willing to change locations or perhaps other details for the optics.

3:08But the story goes well beyond optics, with reporting that casts doubt about Trump's denials and the way that he has tried to defend whatever his history is with Epstein. He had recently claimed to have banned Epstein from Mar-a-Lago in 2000. AIDS said that he did ban the now deceased sex trafficker, but it was later in 2004. But a New York Post article stokes different questions because it was in 2007 that that outlet, a tabloid that has long covered Donald Trump, far, far longer than he was in politics, noted that Epstein denies he's banned from Mar-a-Lago and says, in fact, he was recently invited to an event there.

3:45Now, that doesn't squash or end the matter because it may be that Epstein was trying to get out from under the perception that he's banned. And of course, you could be banned from somewhere and still have someone invite you there, not knowing you're banned. So a lot of that just feeds, again, the questions about why it's so hard for everyone involved in their history to explain exactly what it was and when it ended. New heat on Trump. Meanwhile, for MAGA, as we've been telling you, Trump has all but kept the door open to pardoning the only living Epstein conspirator in prison, Ms. Maxwell, far-right podcaster Candace Owens, responding thusly.

4:22Don't even act surprised when he pardons Clay Maxwell. That would just be foolish of you, foolish of me to think that he's not going to pardon Goliad Maxwell. OK, Trump is implicated by his sheer deceit right now in this moment. He is being so deceitful. It's incredible. Trump officials scrambling to get their story straight. MAGA voices who have got again have been loyal on many other issues and controversies have now made it clear week after week this one is different. They will not go along with the spin or outright lies, some call it, gaslighting, Joe Rogan call it. The heat from MAGA is a reminder that a president who has at times had an almost cult-like loyalty, which many politicians would like, is finding limits on it early in the second term.

5:08With that in mind, we turn to a guest well versed on exactly these issues. Sarah Matthews served as Trump White House Deputy Press Secretary, currently serves working with the Home of the Brave Pack, but also has distanced herself from Donald Trump from Jan 6th on. Welcome back to the program. Thanks so much for having me on again. What do you see specifically in a MAGA revolt that will not quiet as Donald Trump betrays or breaks many of the vows that he and others made about transparency, at least in this case? Yeah, this is something that Donald Trump campaigned on. He said that when he was put back in office that he would release this list.

5:49And it wasn't just him. It was many of these administration officials as well. You look at folks like Cash Patel, Dan Bongino. They were out there saying the same thing that they wanted to see transparency when it came to Jeffrey Epstein. And all of a sudden, they seem to have changed their tune. You obviously know that Pam Bondi initially had all these right-wing influencers come to the White House, and they gave him these binders of phase one of releasing the Epstein files. And then all of a sudden, the White House no longer wants to talk about it. Donald Trump keeps saying that this is a hoax.

6:21He's saying that using colorful language to describe it, as you noted as well at the top of the program. And it just begs the question, what are they trying to cover up? because they either have to admit that they lied to their voters about there being a list, or they need to acknowledge that they're part of the cover-up when it comes to this. And it's not only a slap in the face to their voters when they campaigned on this. More importantly, it's a slap in the face to the victims who really deserve answers and transparency on this issue. Let's take a listen to Congresswoman Mace, how she's trying to play this.

6:58Most of the voters that I talk to want to see the files released. I mean, that's what I've heard all across South Carolina. But they're blaming the president's administration bonding for not being transparent enough. Do you understand why they feel that way? Well, I know that the president has asked for files to be released, like the transcript from the grand jury. He asked for those files to come out and be released. And I guess the judge blocked it. Sarah, we've seen some elected Republicans do that dance While the base and the sort of podcasters and new media folks Who are clearly not as one note as, say, Fox News Are taking a different tune Given that you yourself have spoken out against Donald Trump While you obviously worked for him for some reasons You drew a line and then experienced sort of the backlash That can come from that on the right or with MAGA What do you think of this type of revolt and how does it play inside the White House, given your knowledge?

7:55Yeah, I mean, this definitely is difficult for Republicans to manage. Obviously, with anything with Donald Trump, they're constantly towing a line and trying to appease him. But with this issue in particular, we're seeing that it's sticking around. It's not going away. Obviously, we've been talking about it in the news for weeks. And so this isn't something that I feel like these elected officials can just ignore or brush off because they know that their constituents want answers. And especially when you're coming from some of those more deep red districts, I think, or deep red states, they know that their constituents in particular really care about this issue.

8:30And so they can't just brush it off, even though obviously the White House would love for them to do that. But I think it makes it even more difficult for someone not just like a Nancy Mace, but you look at Speaker Mike Johnson and how he's had to navigate this. He literally sent his office and everyone out of D.C. for the summer already and started the August recess early because he doesn't want to be talking about this issue and he's just hoping that it will go away. Do you think that basically this whole approach, you're talking about make it go away, run out the clock, do you think there's any risk that sort of they lose people in a more fundamental way?

9:13We talked this week about how George Bush withstood many scandals and criticisms, but ultimately he had a Katrina moment. He never rebounded from it. Do you think Epstein could grow that large or is that sort of misunderstanding the way this movement works, one you know about? I think with any controversy with Donald Trump, it always appears like he's Teflon. nothing is able to stick and the news cycle quickly changes and he's able to bounce right back from any controversy I've ever witnessed with him. But this seems to be like the one that might have some sticking power. And I think it's because his MAGA base cares so deeply about this issue and he's trying to gaslight them.

9:55And I think that they're actually seeing through the lies and the distractions that him and the administration are pushing. And so it doesn't matter how many backroom, war room strategy type of meetings that this White House and the DOJ and the FBI are going to have on how to combat this. I think that the voters and the American people are demanding transparency and answers on this. And it does seem to really have riled up the base. As you noted with the podcaster types of Candace Owens, Joe Rogan, they're talking about this issue too. And a lot of those newer voters that came into the coalition for Trump who've voted for him in 2024, they aren't as loyal maybe as some of the OG MAGA base.

10:40And so I think that a lot of those voters are going to be really, really upset. And that's not exactly what you want as we go into the midterm election cycle, that this is what we're talking about, that we're talking about Epstein. And it does just appear like there is a cover-up happening from the administration. Yeah. OG MAGA base, Sarah. I don't know that one, but I think I understand it. And And you are reminding people Trump picked up a couple of points in 24. So those are people by definition, statistically, that may not have been there, as you say. And so they're more up for grabs. Even Rogan went from Bernie Sanders, people might recall, all the way over to Trump.

11:18He's got 30 million listeners, give or take. And as you say, if he's not OG, might also be more debatable. So that's super interesting. Sarah Matthews, thank you. Let me tell folks what's coming up. We got a basic fact check on these free speech debates and why one Russian author is saying Trump is doing Soviet tactics. An economic fact check as well. And an Epstein survivor joins us later this hour. We'll be back in 90 seconds.

11:49Back with the White House pressure that they're facing on the Epstein case. Trump's orbit know it. We've seen the top officials who held the strategy session that they tried to deny holding because they didn't want to politically look like this was some emergency thing. They want to claim that this is going away. No signs of that. More Epstein victims are speaking out as well about the apparent leniency for Ms. Maxwell and the botched handling of the secrecy around this case. As I mentioned, we have one such individual coming up this hour, but I want to begin with Pulitzer prize-winning columnist, Eugene Robinson.

12:22You have covered so many issues in that town. How do you think this one is going, and what do you make of the White House really struggling to contain it even on a day-by-day basis, let alone find an ending to something with so many open questions? Well, this one seems to have some kind of staying power. It seems to have legs, Ari, and one reason is that the Trump administration keeps finding ways to keep the story alive. They can't just, you know, they're the ones really who can't stop talking about it, apparently calling the strategy session to talk about how to maybe eventually stop talking about it.

13:07I mean, it's so, it's not just Democrats or progressives, liberals, enemies of Trump who are keeping this alive. The difference here is that it's the MAGA base that expected him to release Epstein files and Epstein list and is not going to be satisfied until he either does or explains more forthrightly why he won't. yeah as you say uh there are many broken promises in politics but so many of them are forward looking like we will build a wall oh we didn't get to we'll blame someone so be it here it was we have the list but the attorney general tells them on fox they have the list and then oops We can't release it.

14:03So it feels very much like their cover up. Yeah, it does feel like that. And remember, at the heart of this is is a moral issue. Right. And that's what it was for a lot of people who who really believed in a larger conspiracy, pedophile conspiracy. Maybe it was Democrats. Maybe who knows who it was, but they believed that this existed. And here we have Jeffrey Epstein who did these things. And, you know, Donald Trump was supposed to be the mighty weapon against all of this evil. Right. The so-called deep state. Yeah, right. And so you can't feel two ways about what Jeffrey Epstein did. And so why isn't the president releasing all the information that he has, that the government has, about Epstein?

15:04It just seems like something that it seems like a moral issue that people should know this and people perhaps should be punished for participating in what Epstein was doing. Right. So you mentioned the moral part. And Gene, stay with me. We turn to our next guest who faced Epstein's abuse, Jess Michaels. She has previously spoken out about Epstein raping her in the early 1990s. She was 22 at the time. She's also now an advocate for sexual abuse victims. She founded Three Joannes, a resource to help survivors. Jess, thanks for being here. What do you want people to know? what is important about all this within the context of the wider debate, scandal, secrecy we've seen out of this Trump White House?

15:57Thank you so much for having me on, Ari. I really appreciate you being willing to hear a survivor's perspective, but not only a survivor's perspective, but an advocate, an advocate's perspective on what's happening, because there are several things I see happening. One is this is a very personal, painful, both physically, emotionally, mentally, intellectually painful experience to go through to see the level of injustice that's continuing to happen that has been going on now for decades. It's especially egregious because the victims did the right thing. They went to authorities. They've done all the right things.

16:40They have told their story over and over and over again, and no one is listening. The second part of that that I believe is truly problematic in the big picture is that I believe what we're seeing is a normalization of the decriminalization of sexual harm, rape, assault, pedophilia and trafficking. And one of the reasons I'm saying that is it's not just that they're ignoring survivors when they're having meetings, when they're discussing, when they're talking with the convicted pedophile sex trafficker. They're never, I have not heard the words Epstein survivor out of the White House ever.

17:33Right. And there's a lot of the approach that's been about sort of the political content of it. One real world result is the apparent leniency for an Epstein conspirator, Maxwell. What is your view of that? Oh, I think that's part of the reason why I believe there's this undercurrent of decriminalization and making her look like a victim. I'm really shocked and not that this woman has been able to weasel her way into working towards a pardon, working towards leniency. I mean, the shocking fact is that this crime rarely makes it to court. 10 % of cases make it court, two and a half percent actually end up in jail.

18:19And we finally got one. We finally got one with so much evidence, so much evidence. If this one doesn't stick, how will any others after this? I mean, we're talking decades of evidence, volumes of evidence. Yeah. Jess Michaels, as mentioned, we wanted to hear from you and get that context. Gene was talking about the moral dimension of this. Thanks to both of you. I'll tell viewers we're going to fit in a break and then we have a fact check on this crackdown on free speech when we come back.

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20:15Federally insured by NCUA. Donald Trump's trade war heating up again while he also tries to use and sometimes blatantly abuse federal government power to take control of free markets on Wall Street. An interesting contrast, as we've reported, because so many Wall Street folks worried that past Democratic administrations would interfere in their business. But this first year of Trump second term has done so more than any modern administration. As for the tariffs today, they are here hitting many countries, raising import taxes to the highest level since the Great Depression, as prices are up and job growth has slowed.

20:56Trump also meddles with these private companies. You have the tariffs, which so many American companies have vocally said will hurt both their employees and consumers in this country. But then you have the wider kind of Castro style meddling in what businesses do. And in some cases, it is an abuse of power. Overnight, the price of Intel dropped because Trump said the CEO must resign. Again, imagine if Fidel Castro, FDR or any liberal president was just randomly taking shots at presidents or CEOs of companies. He also raised the sort of specter of conflicts with China, but didn't use any due process.

21:35Remember, he oversees the Justice Department. He's not just a pundit here. And it raises the question of whether if he doesn't get his way, he'll have the DOJ investigate or do a sham probe. The Financial Times reported bankers find dealmaking tougher. The partisan agenda is clear. One saying it's a level of intrusion from this Republican White House they've never experienced before. In other words, worse than Obama or Clinton or other times where we did hear bankers worry about this, but now it's actually happening. Back in 2013, when Obama was using regular policy, not threats, we heard from Republicans that the president was trying to meddle to the point of picking winners and losers.

22:14Trump is actually doing that to a far, far higher degree, naming CEOs that should be fired, blatantly telling companies how to do hiring, whether to run diversity programs, etc. And remember, this is what Republicans said they opposed. It's a trade-off that's at the very core of a country founded on the sacred rights of the individual, the liberty of each and every American. It is not government's role to pick the winners and losers. Government picking winners and losers and losing big. It's socialism, It's command economy. It's picking winners and losers. I work for Ronald Reagan. Ronald Reagan was not in favor of picking winners and losers.

22:58That is how it sounded as a political attack. But the underlying concern is true. People don't like to be overregulated. And there's a lot of evidence that government systems like Cuba or China that have too much government involvement in the free market economy tend to interfere, slow growth. there's actual evidence on this. And then there's, of course, the actual justice and democracy of it. We have a constitutional system, much as Trump might try to push against it. We've seen that play out in the courts where the president does not just order enemies rounded up or businesses destroyed if he doesn't like what they're doing.

23:37It's called free markets and freedom. So it was interesting when CNBC's Andrew Ross Sorkin, who is very well sourced in this space, told us about top, powerful Wall Street people who worry about Trump going after them, investigating them, or even, as you'd see in Russia, jailing them. After this horrific shooting that happened in Midtown Manhattan earlier this week, this is one of those opportunities to have a reasonable conversation about gun violence in America. And a couple of CEOs called me up who said, yeah, we should be having that conversation, But I can't have that conversation because right now I'll lose that conversation.

24:16The president, if he wants to put me in jail, he can put me in jail. And then the tariffs, they have already rattled the markets. These new ones, of course, are just being absorbed and there is a ebb and flow to it or what Wall Street has called Trump chickening out. But we know when the early tariffs sunk stocks, plenty of those vocal MAGA podcasters didn't like it. Trump has put his tariffs all over the place. I've been trying to understand him. I don't. His giant tariff policy that he just dropped on the market unilaterally, probably unconstitutionally. I don't know how many of you guys are invested in crypto or stocks.

24:53What the f*** is going on with our country? Guys, why am I poor? Everything's in the s*** because of it. I'm down 7 million bucks in stocks and crypto. We're going to see more of the same and more of that revolt. economist Justin Wolfers will break it down next.

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26:43We're back with University of Michigan economics professor Justin Wilfers, host of the podcast Think Like an Economist. Welcome back. Glad to be here, man. Let's start with what it means that the under Trump, the United States is moving more towards what we'd see in Russia or Cuba than what we traditionally expect in the U.S. You can have a hawkish or dovish trade policy on the one hand, but on the other, we have a president who publicly admits he wants to pick the CEOs and he wants to threaten people within business. I'm really glad you're picking up on this, Ari. This is the most interventionist White House of my lifetime.