Trump Bombarded With Epstein Questions

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0:46Right now, save 25 % on your first order at Zazzle.com. That's Zazzle.com. Make it z-amazing. Welcome to The Beat. I'm Ari Melber, and we have a lot tonight, including James Carville just around the corner, on the Trump-Epstein crash-out. But we begin with how the agenda of this president in this summer period is completely smothered by his mishandling of Epstein. Their prior relationship, their social links, the first administration, where, as I reminded you, Jeffrey Epstein died under suspicious circumstances under the Trump DOJ custody and all the recent broken promises. Now we have what has become a bizarre turn in a story that for some people on the right was always a conspiracy content thing, but of course rests on a foundation of real crimes, real victims, and at least one person, of course, in prison, the convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's conspirator.

1:39Now there's talk of her trying to get out of prison if Donald Trump will help her. This normally would not even be a thing that we would cover, for example, if she were just asking for this randomly with no other ties to the administration. But this is a Trump DOJ that has pulled her out of prison for interviews. And a president who has done what was previously unthinkable, which is leave open the door to a pardon for this person. This is all playing out while Trump is dogged by these questions, ducking reporters. Can't get away from this even as he went all the way to Scotland. This is from Sky News.

2:13Are you enjoying the Scottish hospitality? There were Sky News questions, sure. Mr Trump, can you escape the Jeffrey Epstein crisis? Maybe that's why we heard this. What's that song? I don't know, it's very famous though. It's from a musical, yeah. Memories. Music boomed out from the convoy of golf carts, droning out the surrounding sound. It is, of course, just one moment and one tactic, but also is the very living allegory of the problem for this president. Flying across the pond, can't get away from the story. Driving, literally, away from the questions that are still being shouted. And somebody apparently playing music, trying to literally drown out the questions.

3:02But that's not working. Doesn't work on the baseline step of saying, oh, we heard music, so we won't cover it. Sky obviously still made a point to cover that. We're showing you how that's being covered by journalists abroad. But more substantively, the questions that you do not answer about something this big that was sold this much by Trump and Bondi and his allies are not going to just go away by turning up the music. they can wait they can dodge but they'll be coming home to a continuation of questions like this on the flight back you said yesterday you're falling out with jeffrey epstein was over him taking some of the workers from your business but your administration in the past said that you threw him out because he was a creep so can you explain that discrepancy the same thing you know sort of a little bit of the same thing but no he took people that worked for me and i told him don't do it anymore and he did it and i i said stay the hell out of here it's the president did one of those stolen um you know persons that include virginia heffrey uh i don't know i think she worked at the spa i think so i think that was one of the people yeah he stole her what you heard there and you can see it in the transcript is this trumpian style of speech that we've all become somewhat accustomed to?

4:23I don't know. Not sure. I think so. Landing on the yeah. Now, if this were a random question about an old story and you said, well, give someone the benefit of the doubt, maybe they're trying to remember, but there's nothing random about it. This is the story that has consumed Donald Trump as president for many days now, but of course, as a candidate for many months when he sold a certain version of it. His history with Epstein and those people and those victims are all something that he has had time to reflect on. And he seems to be unable to clearly explain what he did then, what the nature of their relationship was, how it ended, what he did or didn't say to him at the time.

5:06Maybe they were friends without any other crimes, but why deny and sue the Wall Street Journal over those alleged birthday salutations if that's all they were? These are the kind of questions that are dragging down Trump. And that's before, That's the Epstein history. Personally, that's before you even get to, of course, the handling of this in government, that MAGA and other critics are dealing with not only whatever Trump's personal history may or may not be, could be nothing, could be nothing of an ethical or legal dimension. That's possible. And he still has to answer for why there is the apparent secrecy, the broken vow to release material.

5:43And now what many podcasters and critics call a blatant cover up. They put out a memo saying we can't release anything more. Days later, under pressure, Trump says we might release more. All of it looks like a Watergate of sex trafficking. Doesn't mean we know who was involved beyond what the case showed. I want to be very clear. I've said that repeatedly. But it does mean on the cover up side, there are questions that are just not being answered, whether that's from reporters, MAGA allies, legal analysts. And we've heard, of course, from some victims who've also criticized the Trump government administration's handling of this, totally separate from whatever happened back at Mar-a-Lago.

6:19In Washington, Republicans are subpoenaing Maxwell, partly because they apparently don't think that whatever DOJ did is enough. They want to talk to her themselves. And some Democrats say what DOJ did is suspicious. So, again, a bipartisan view that other government officials are breaking with Trump and want to handle this separately because they don't trust him. Maxwell even saying she would testify to the Congress under conditions like immunity and getting some briefing about advanced questions. Committee says it won't try to grant her immunity. It's not even clear when you're already incarcerated in these federal crimes what other immunity would really be relevant, except for perhaps, of course, lying to Congress and perjury.

6:57Maxwell's lawyer, talking about Trump, says in the alternative, were she to get, quote, clemency, she'd be willing and eager to testify openly and honestly in public before Congress. Maxwell's attorney is basically telegraphing something in public. She is the one person who's paid the most for what was then defendant and then deceased Epstein's alleged crimes. He never went to trial on many of those sort of things. the idea that there's any discussion or open door to letting her out of prison right now is not only completely legally baseless and ethically curious but it also would be the exact opposite of what MAGA and other folks said was so important about this story remember that Epstein and his co-conspirators did bad things so why would Trump leave that door open I'm asking these questions but I'm not pretending these are just open neutral some of these questions raise more questions, like why are we even talking about pardoning someone involved and convicted of the sex trafficking of minors?

7:55There's also heat on Trump from the right. We've seen this over the weeks. We saw it last week. We saw Rogan. Here is Megyn Kelly, who has been, especially in Trump's second term, a staunch MAGA ally on a ton of issues, some controversies, federal power, ICE, etc. Here's her scathing takedown on this governmental part. Remember what I told you, how this Trump administration itself has been handling this case. The way they've handled the scandal has been so bad, you know, leading everybody up to the water's edge and then not giving anyone a drink. It's like rule one of how not to play out a scandal.

8:34What do you think? Completely agree. This is self-inflicted. First of all, nobody told Pam Bondi she had to issue that memo in the middle of a slow news summer where people would, of course, predictably be digesting it and the Republican base be horrified by it for the entire summer. That's really how this has unfolded. And whoever told the Justice Department that this could somehow be buried and that people would move on and that the Trump administration could get away with that ridiculous two-page summation of, you're not getting any more information because there's no there there, should be fired.

9:09That person is an idiot and didn't understand the Republican base, certainly the core MAGA base. So now can we really trust anything this woman says when she, it's either this, give something up or someone up or spend 20 years in jail. So they've really created this own pickle for themselves. And we still haven't had a presser by Pam Bondi or even a long form interview. So it's hard to have a lot of sympathy for the complaints of why won't this go away? That's Megyn Kelly's breakdown. speaking as someone who knows this universe. She's interviewed Trump. She's in the MAGA podcast digital space now.

9:42She was, of course, at Fox News prior. She's also an attorney. And she referred to some very public facts there that Bondi was doing all these interviews and selling all this without giving it up for allegedly, according to Kelly, what she views as Bondi's aggrandizement on the political right. Then, as Piers Morgan mentions, they came up with nothing. And then, And as Kelly explains, they've gone quiet. No press conference, no governing apparent obligation to explain this beyond those two pages. In a well-functioning government, you have government officials who speak to journalists, credentialed press, and of course, other branches of government like Congress.

10:19Bondi could testify, could even privately brief the Congress if any of this were serious and on the level. But what you're also seeing, and this is why it's a story with layers, is what Piers Morgan and Megyn Kelly and Joe Rogan appear to be frustrated with, what Rogan called the gaslighting by the administration, what Kelly says is the refusal to deal with journalists and critics fairly, is something that Trump has been rightly accused of on a host of issues in this and the last term. We're not new to this And yet some people seem absolutely aghast and upset About the quote gaslighting Rogan Or the stonewalling of journalistic and open interview questions Kelly, as if this has not been the playbook all the time Apparently, and this is where the humanity comes into it Because it is all people dealing with politics here Apparently those people, and I say this fully respectfully Don't like it when that MAGA playbook is used on them We're joined now by Molly Jong-Fast from Vanity Fair and MSNBC analyst.

11:16And Julie Kay Brown, an investigative journalist with the Miami Herald, who's won two POC Awards for Excellence in Journalism, is really one of the foremost national experts on Epstein. And I mean on the case, the victims, the substance of this, not some of what has passed for the political circus since then. She's the author of Perversion of Justice, the Jeffrey Epstein story. Welcome to both of you. And it is with no negativity towards our good friend Molly Jong-Fast that Molly and I will start with the politics and then we'll go to Julie's fine reporting. I say that with respect to all. But Molly, I will start on the politics.

11:51What do you think of this almost angry shock by MAGA leaders, and credit to ones like Rogan who are being honest, that they don't like that they say Trump is lying to them about an important matter? I'm agreeing with Megyn Kelly, and it's freaking me out. I mean, she had a lot of good points. Why should we believe anything that Ghislaine Maxwell says? She was sentenced four years ago that clearly wants a pardon. The idea that she has some new information seems pretty wild. But I also think the bigger problem that Trump has, and Megyn Kelly made a really good point here, which is they have created a problem for themselves in the Trump administration.

12:36And one of the ways they've done that is you have Pam Bondi, who runs a DOJ that really does serve at the pleasure of Donald Trump. And previous administrations have normally had a firewall between the admin and the DOJ. And they've done that for a reason, right? The DOJ is supposed to be independent. They are supposed to do their own investigations. They are not supposed to serve as an arm of an administration. And but you see, Bondi has been very much, you know, sort of deferential. And I serve at the pleasure of Donald Trump. And that means that there is no there. They have no plausible deniability in the admin.

13:12You know, they know they have the DOJ as sort of an arm of the presidency. And this creates even more of a feeling that this DOJ is really working for the guy in charge. Hmm. Yeah, all fair. That speaks to how Bondi has sort of set the tone this far. Julie, as someone who's been so versed in the reporting here, and as I mentioned, the serious stories, the victims affected, the families and lives altered, if not to some degree irrevocably altered. What do you see as important? What is your vantage point, having been with this, not as political content, but as reporting on real people?

13:52Julie K Brown:Well, I always say I think that the Justice Department has failed multiple times, failed these victims, you know, from the very beginning when Maria Farmer went to the FBI and nothing was done, which was way back in the early 2000s. So it's just more of the same disappointment upon disappointment for these victims. I doubt that they were even contacted when the DOJ decided that they weren't going to release the records. And that's sort of the pattern here, treating the victims as an afterthought, when really they should be considered first and foremost in at least some of these decisions. And they should have the respect of being told.

14:37Let me slow you down. For the important point you're making, obviously, there's been a lot of politics on the right here. You're observing that if the DOJ, given what everyone went through, was going to put out a memo about a resolution of this, the normal course, the proper thing would be to deal with the victims' families in the same way they have impact statements in court and not to treat it as a two-page PR move, you're saying.

15:01Julie K Brown:Exactly. And not only that, but the president, I think, within days of that happening and, you know, the explosion of coverage that we saw of it started calling it a hoax. And could you imagine if you were sexually abused as a child repeatedly? And the president of the United States is calling this whole scandal a hoax. It's not a hoax. And, you know, there are real victims over, you know, probably over 200 young women and girls. So it's it's more of our criminal justice system, giving people who have power and money precedence over, you know, vulnerable. In this case, a lot of vulnerable girls and young women.

15:50And Julie, as you know, this was a huge deal before Epstein died in custody. It was under the Trump Justice Department and Bureau of Prisons. It was suspicious and it took years to get further information about it. Given your reporting, how do you view that in custody death and the government's explanations for it?

16:12Julie K Brown:Well, there's a lot of questions about it. I don't I don't think we know the answers to. And it's fueled that the conspiracy theories surrounding this case are fueled by things such as the Trump administration releasing this video purportedly to show something about Epstein's cell when, in fact, the video that was in Epstein's wing was not operating. It wasn't recording that night. In fact, none of the cameras except for the one that they grabbed that footage from were working. and that footage is not of Epstein's cell. So why would you do that? I mean, I don't even understand why you would show that to the public and try to purport that it showed anything because it's not his cell.

16:58Julie K Brown:It's just a whole other area of the... So do you think it was misleading, that it was in bad faith? Well, I just want to zero in on that because yes, they tried to show that in conjunction with a memo to say, we're done here. What Megyn Kelly said, hey, go home. You're saying that itself looks misleading from the Trump DOJ. Yes, yes, that's exactly right. It is misleading. It's still out there, you know, that people are talking about the missing minutes. Well, the missing minutes are one thing, which are problematic, but the bigger thing is that that footage isn't even of a cell. Yeah, and so, Molly, in conclusion, it's almost enough to make you wonder whether this administration and this president is honest about how he's governing and affected lives of Americans.

17:50Yeah. And I think I think Julie has a really good point here, which is if you want to shut down a conspiracy. And again, obviously, there are things in the Epstein story that are real, real victims and things that are questions. Right. We don't know. But the way to shut it down or to answer questions is with a lot of data, right? Evidence, pictures. We know there are thousands of pages of data. You know, you have to retract some things. But ultimately, there's a lot of stuff that could be released. And I think releasing it will answer more questions. And, you know, obviously, you need to protect the victims.

18:27That should be number one. And I do think Julie really has a good point, which is there are so many victims. And it is, you know, the way we treat our victims is a measure of how we are as a society. So I do ultimately think it's really an important moral moment for all of us. But I also think there are ways to get this information out there. And that is really what these people are asking for. Yeah. Molly and Julie, my thanks to both of you. Coming up tonight, we have a special look at the attacks on the free press and how some of this is getting worse. We also have a lawyer representing one of the new whistleblowers in that DOJ case against basically whistleblower complaints that say they wanted to tell the courts F.U.

19:11and a lot of other things. There's a Senate vote looming about that. But first, next, we have James Carville on MAGA's biggest break with Trump ever. And we're back in 90 seconds.

19:28He's so people that work for me. Sorry, Jeff. Underage sex trafficking is one thing, but I draw the line at you stealing my omelet man. OK.

19:41Stephen Gobert finding a thin ray of humor amidst a serious story. We are now joined by longtime Democratic strategist, former President Clinton, advisor James Carville. Welcome back, James. We've heard from you about Trump, the politics of the right and MAGA, and the loyalty we're accustomed to seeing. Is this the biggest crack we've seen in the second term? And why is that loyalty fading? Well, I think it is a huge crack because it's an article of faith on the right that there are a cabal of coastal elites who engaged in some kind of underage sex trafficking. See the Comet Pizza story where their guy showed up.

20:24The problem is they were right, but it was one of them. So that is just in ways that that's inbred in them like like it's just part of their DNA, that entire narrative. And to some extent, they feel vindicated by this. See, we told you these rich people, these New York finance people, the people in Palm Beach, they live by one set of roofs. We live by another set of roofs. And the actual theory of the case was pretty good. But it wasn't Chuck Schumer. It was somebody else. And that's why they're having trouble dealing with this. And it just confirms a lot. And maybe the question that Megyn Kelly had and Molly was talking about, maybe there is no good answer.

21:14Sometimes that happens. They say, well, it's the way they put the information out. They don't have a very good response. Their responses cause us to ask more questions. Well, sometimes there just isn't a good answer. And I've talked to five different people today and just out of theoretical, how would you handle this if you were there? Just assume this is you. Everybody came to the same conclusion. I don't know if there is a way to handle it. on that point why do you think yeah why do you think Trump's handling it so poorly I mean you've talked before because we come to you for blunt criticism but you're not the guy who says Democrats are always perfect you didn't tell us Biden was perfect you talked about age and fitness before he dropped out you've said that Trump has been effective at times and Democrats have not but here it's the opposite here here the PR wizard seems to be melting down and crashing out in public and saying things that no one would want to be their lead defense when these kind of questions are looming.

22:11So maybe he's guilty. So maybe there is no, maybe he's scared to death at tomorrow. Look, the other thing that's really interesting in here is the role of Melania and Jeffrey Epstein and Trump in the modeling business in New York City and Manhattan in the early 90s. I mean, that was a different world of the event. And now, of course, you have Epstein. What do you have? A guy that hangs himself in a jail cell. You had this guy, Jean-Luc Brunel. We forget about him, who was a modeling agency in Paris that hung himself. Maybe there's something really scandalous and really historic at the bottom of all this.

22:51I'm not saying I don't have proof there is, but we don't know. We're not reporting that. Maybe this is maybe this is one of these really weird coastal modeling agency sex trafficking things that lies at the court. We've got to consider that possibility. Right. And when you say consider the possibility, that's what happens in investigations that are run correctly. And you don't go around and say, oh, as The Wall Street Journal reports, if an important person's name was mentioned, whatever party, In this case, they report that Bondi told Trump it was Trump. That doesn't cool your heels on the release.

23:29But, of course, that brings us back to where we started, which is why, as you said, they may not have a good answer. It's also breaking through. I want to show a little late night and get your response to this.

23:46So the way they've handled the scandal has been so bad, you know, leading everybody up to the water's edge and then not giving anyone a drink. I completely agree. This is self-inflicted. Now that the president's very annoyed that it won't go away, it won't go away because of the way he's handled it. They've really created this own pickle for themselves. And we still haven't had a presser by Pam Bondi or even a long form interview. So it's hard to have a lot of sympathy for the complaints of why won't this go away? I never had the privilege of going to his island. You were doing really good right until privilege.

24:20Privilege was not the word you wanted to use. A trip to that terrible island was sadly not an honor that was ever bestowed upon me. I'm sorry, what? What? You never had the privilege of going to Epstein's Island? Sadly, I never had the honor of dining with Jeffrey Dahmer. It just... Trump said he was invited to the island but didn't want to go. I get it. It's so annoying when you get invited to a destination crime scene, isn't it? I mean, James, this is everywhere. Go ahead. I hate to laugh because, you know, there are dead people involved here. There are females whose lives, there are young girls now, adults whose lives have been ruined forever.

25:03You saw your gas and jewelry came around. But I'm sorry. You just can't help but bust out laughing at some of this. And, again, I'd say to Pierce, I'd say to Megyn Kelly, maybe there is no good answer. And sometimes that happens when you're in the middle of a PR crisis. This is people kind of have it figured out. And if they try to give Maxwell a pardon, go look at the sentencing memo that the U.S. attorney put in the Southern District of New York. Look at what the judge said. They could have convicted her of four or five different charges of perjury. And then, Ari, we tend to forget if they do pardon her, the New Mexico authorities might get involved because Epstein had like a 7 ,500-acre ranch outside of Santa Fe.

25:49and their stories about that being part of the stops on a travel log. I don't know, but I suspect there'll be some curiosity from maybe the statute of limitations is run. I don't know, but there are questions. They got a lot. There's a lot of baseball left to play here. That's all I can say. It's not even close to being able to. A lot of innings left. And I appreciate your point. There's the seriousness. And we had the great investigative reporter, Julie Brown, wrote a whole book on this and worked with victims and families. And yet her view, her journalistic objective view overlaps with what you and by the way, Megyn Kelly and others are saying, which is that this Trump administration, this government handling of the case is wrong, is secretive, is misleading to the American public.

26:35Some people care about that for the weird conspiracy political reasons you mentioned. Some people care about it because they actually care about the people. You put it all together and you got a 70 plus percent negative for Trump on this big story that he was feeding. So, James, I know you're sticking with us. I want you to know when you sit perfectly still, the Statue of Liberty crown behind you almost looks like you're wearing it. And I know you love this country. I know you love this country, so it's a good look. We'll be right back with more Carvel after this. Thank you. Most ice cream is good, but not Jenny's.