Revelations From The Latest Batch Of Epstein Files

23:45Some of the wounds were two and a half inches deep. also a man by the name of Joseph Ryan who was an escort that came to the house with FetLife.com and the theory was that Brendan Banfield who you're looking at right there in court as he was being told that he is guilty of these crimes and the au pair the nanny that they had hired from Brazil that they worked together to create a situation where they purported to be Christine got a Gmail account, signed up on FetLife, acting like Christine, asking this man to come to their home. Christine wants him and be sure to bring his knife as part of everything he does.

24:25And when that might arrived in the house, the prosecution theory was Brendan Banfield, former IRS investigative agent, by the way, and the au pair stormed into the bedroom, shot Joseph Ryan to death, and then proceeded to stab Christine. Why? So they could lead a life together. And the au pair turned on Banfield. That's the au pair right there in the center. And she testified for two days saying it was Brendan's plan. Divorce, not an option. She would have too much money. I would lose my little four-year-old girl. So this is the way we have to go. And that he was the one that designed the plan.

25:05They executed it. And now he will spend the rest of his life in prison. No possibility of parole in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

25:14Jake Tapper:All right, Gene Kusaris, thanks so much. Appreciate it. Some major news reported first on CNN. A major departure coming soon of the Justice Department. What our teams are learning about this one is next.

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26:00Jake Tapper:We have some really great reporting now for you in our Law and Justice lead. Sources say that Ed Martin, the pardon attorney and the head of the Justice Department's Weaponization Working Group, which isn't what you think it is, but is what you think it is in a different way. Well, Ed Martin is expected to leave the department in the coming weeks. CNN's chief legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid broke the story. Paula, Why would someone once called President Trump's favorite U.S. attorney, though he couldn't get confirmed, why would he want to leave or be shoved out the door? Because President Trump's other favorite prosecutor, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanch, has made Martin's life miserable inside DOJ.

26:41As you noted, Martin couldn't get confirmed as U.S. attorney, so he was sent to the Justice Department to work in the main justice headquarters, and he was given two titles, director of the weaponization group and then also pardon attorney. But once he was inside DOJ, Todd Blanche, the number two, he runs the day-to-day operations. He wanted to make sure that Martin didn't have too much power to make mischief in a Justice Department that has already seen a series of scandals. So when it comes to the weaponization group, he was never really leading that group. Now, one source suggested that Todd layered him.

27:12Another source suggested that Martin was never doing the work. But bottom line is he was never in charge really of that group, nor has he done any significant work. Now, when it comes to the pardon attorney, that is currently where his office is. He does review pardon applications, but you and I both know, you know, you've written a book on the Biden administration. Pardon decisions are ultimately made at the White House. You review some paperwork.

27:33Jake Tapper:They're not supposed to be, but they are under the last two. They are, exactly. So the fact is that he really just doesn't have a lot of power. So we are told that he's expected to leave the department in the coming weeks. We don't know where he's going, but a source tells me he has spent the last week at the White House. So again, not out of favor with the administration, but expected to be out of DOJ. And this comes hours after you also reported that the Justice Department's weaponization working group plans to significantly ramp up efforts. I just need to take one second. The weaponization working group is supposed to be looking at how the Justice Department weaponized the Justice Department under Biden or whatever.

28:13Jake Tapper:Even though we all see lots of examples of the Trump administration doing the same, if not worse. Anyway. 100 percent, yes. That said, how would Ed Martin's departure affect this plan to ramp up the weaponization working group? So it doesn't really appear that it has much of an impact. It's unclear if he was invited. They met today because now the Epstein review sort of behind them, they have more resources and they want to focus on this because Trump has admonished the Justice Department for not delivering on his prioritized investigations. Now, of course, some people would argue that in and of itself, the White House pressuring DOJ is weaponization.

28:49But this group is expected to start meeting every single day to deliver on one of seven reviews that Attorney General Pambandi announced for the day she got in office. This includes the prosecutors who investigated Trump when he was out of office, both in New York and the Jack Smith investigations. There are also some issues that are just sort of Republican causes. Generally, allegations of Catholic discrimination under the Biden administration, a memo on protecting school officials against threats, protections for whistleblowers, prosecuting anti-abortion demonstrators. We don't know what they might be able to come up with in the next two months, but they are under a lot of pressure.

29:22I'm told that they will try to get something out from this group in the next two months.

29:27Jake Tapper:All right, Paula Reid, thank you so much and welcome back. Thank you. From your maternity leave, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful baby. Coming up, what some notable Republicans, including President Trump, are saying about an upset election in Texas, a Democrats double digit win in a district that Trump claimed victory in in 2024. Stay with us.

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31:06Jake Tapper:In our politics lead, that's President Trump pretending not to be involved at all in this weekend's special election for a Texas state Senate seat, despite having endorsed the Republican candidate and urged his base to turn out the vote in at least three different social media posts. Now, despite Trump's involvement, the Democrat Taylor Remitt held a 14-point lead in a district that Trump won by nearly 17 points in 2024. Here now, the panel. So, Shermichael, Texas Republican Congressman Pete Sessions was on CNN today trying to talk about the Democrats' upset victory. Take a listen. The success of a rain dance has a lot to do with timing.

31:45And what happened is there was a huge snowstorm, ice storm, really, that hit North Texas and Central Texas.

31:54Jake Tapper:Now, that's true. And the vote tally was down. And yet Democrats turned out and Republicans didn't. We should note a different reaction from Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. He said, quote, Republicans should be clear eyed about the political environment heading into the midterms, unquote. Michael, who's right, the congressman or the governor? We're probably going to err with the governor on this one. I mean, look, it's an indication the president won that district by, what, 17 points, I believe you stated in the opening monologue. It matters. Like, it's not a congressional race, but what it indicates is that there's an enthusiasm increase on the opposite side.

32:30And perhaps we need to figure out a way to do a bit more to turn on our voters, number one. Number two, you're looking at some of those independents who may have crossed over and voted for Trump in 2024. Some of the numbers I've seen suggest, it's still kind of early, but it suggests that those folks decided to vote Democrat this time. That should scare Republicans or at least raise some alarms because you're going to have a lot of tight races where you're going to need about 5 % to 6 % within the margin of error to turn out those people to get a victory. If we're losing them, you're almost handing the House to Democrats.

32:59You know who those people were? They were Latinos. That's actually who has... 50%, I think, right? Well, yep, there was a 50-point swing in one particular district district or part of this district that really swung just in an incredible way. And it's a heavily Latino district. And there's only one real message to take from that. They don't like what they're seeing. They don't like what they're seeing on the economy. They don't like what they're seeing on immigration. And so this is, I think, a real bellwether because we've seen Latinos be a huge swing vote. Donald Trump got them in the last election.

33:30They made a big swing in his direction. But now we're seeing that shift right back.

33:34Jake Tapper:So the big question, though, is And I'll come to you. OK, the big question is whether or not this is a bellwether, not just of a political environment nationally, but also specifically in Texas, because Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett, Democrat from Texas, she's running to be the state's Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate. She posted, quote, this is a seat no Democrat has held since the 80s. And today we prove what we've known all along. Texas is in play. And don't count us out. Do you do you buy it? It depends who actually is going to run. So I think Jasmine Crockett will have a tougher race than if it's Tallarico, who is more moderate, who I think is probably better suited to the map that we see in Texas.

34:20But yeah, I mean, this has been the dream and the hope of Democrats for so long, right? How long have we heard Texas eventually is going to go blue? It's finally the moment. Oh, my goodness. Oh, long before that.

34:31Jake Tapper:You old enough to remember Ron Kirk, the mayor of Dallas running? God, yeah. I was like, in middle school, Jake. Yeah, you don't. But what do you think? Do you think Texas is in play, whether it is the Senate race, which depends obviously also on whether John Cornyn can win the primary. I was just going to say that. Or the governor's race, where a Latina, who is the sister of Sochi Hinojosa, our colleague, is running to be the Democratic nominee to take on Abbott. So, OK, the answer to the Senate seat, I actually do agree. I know the Congresswoman. I like her a lot. But I do think she, I think Republicans, I think my side would utilize a lot of her previous messages against her.

35:08And if I'm a Democrat, you've got to be concerned about that. In terms of the governorship, we have a huge Hispanic population there. One of the groups that I keep looking at are young men. Lulu and I have talked about this a lot off air, on air. We are losing them. And if you look at this most recent race, Jake, a lot of the Latino men who voted for Republicans, voted for President Trump in droves, went back to the other side. I'm not necessarily sure what the messaging will be from Republicans to convince them to stay with us. It has to be economics. I do think we've got to figure out this immigration thing.

35:37I think Lulu is absolutely right about this. A lot of those young men are also seeing uncertainty in terms of educational attainment. What does the future look like for young men who aren't going to college at the same rates and levels as our female counterparts? We haven't necessarily provided a clear message to that. And so if you're a young man, Hispanic, even black, by the way, you're not seeing that from Republicans and Democrats appear to be talking about the right things, whether or not he delivers another question, you're likely going to give them another look.

36:04Jake Tapper:So here's what one of the issues, obviously, is that President Trump gets in his own way, like he'll achieve something and then he'll change the subject with something that doesn't help him. Here's an example. President Trump is now threatening to sue comedian Trevor Noah, who hosted last night's Grammy Awards. I'm gonna play the jab that Trump apparently took issue with, which by the way, I wouldn't have played if Trump hadn't threatened to sue him Anyway, here it is That is a Grammy that every artist wants almost as much as Trump wants Greenland Which makes sense, I mean, because Epstein's island is gone, he needs a new one to hang out with Bill Clinton So, oh, I told you it's my last year What are you gonna do about it?

36:46Jake Tapper:Well, I'll tell you what President Trump says he's going to do about it. He jumped on Truth Social at 1 a.m. and wrote, Noah said, Trevor Noah said incorrectly about me that Donald Trump and Bill Clinton spent time on F.C. and I went wrong. It looks like I'll be sending my lawyers to sue this poor, pathetic, talentless dope of an emcee and suing him for plenty dollar sign. Get ready, Noah. I'm going to have some fun with you. Look, parody satire is protected. But even if it weren't. What? I got to tell you, I'm actually surprised that he mentioned Bill Clinton. I haven't heard many people, I don't know if Trevor Noah's politics, but I'm going to presume he's to the left of where I stand.

37:20I haven't heard many people bring up the former president in that regard. So to me, there's humor in that alone. I know this is a very touchy topic for the president. I completely get it. But, you know, it was kind of humorous. And anyone after Clinton took a jab, so why not? This is the action of authoritarians around the world who cannot take a joke, who are thin-skinned. And this president in particular is incredibly thin-skinned. He does not like jokes at his expense. But why would you highlight a joke about the Epstein files at a moment when everyone is talking about the Epstein files and him and his relationship to Epstein?

37:55Even if, of course, he is right, there has been no proof that he ever was at Epstein Island.

37:59Jake Tapper:The Grammys in general were not a hospitable environment if President Trump was watching. It doesn't sound like he was. Sounds like somebody sent him the clip after. Here is artist after artist condemning the Trump administration's immigration crackdown. I'm up here as a granddaughter of an immigrant. I'm a product of bravery and I think those people deserve to be celebrated I'm gonna say eyes out

38:30We're not Savas we're not animals. We're not aliens. We are humans and we are Americans I feel like we just need to keep fighting and speaking up and protesting and our our voices really do matter and the people matter and um i say sorry that's not your there's nothing

38:51Jake Tapper:wrong with your audio that was them beeping out uh billy eilish when she said reportedly f ice here's a question does it matter obviously we know that artists hollywood tend to lean left does it matter when people because there was a lot of criticism i think it was was it the oscars when people weren't that vocal at the grammys they were yeah um i think we're actually seeing a shift and we know that it matters because President Trump is always fighting the culture war. I mean, that's why it's called the culture war. And this is very fertile ground for him. This is exactly what he loves to battle against.

39:24And so we are now seeing celebrities. I interview celebrities, a lot of them. And after Donald Trump won the last election, there was a big muted response.

39:35Jake Tapper:Oh, I remember your interview with Jennifer Lawrence. Yeah, she's like, I don't want to talk about this anymore. I don't think I can convince people what celebrities say don't matter. And I think now we're seeing them catch up with the culture, right? We're seeing protesters on the street, and now they're saying they're speaking out again. And I think we're going to see more of it. I love your interviews. New York Times Magazine. Thanks to both of you. Really appreciate it. Moments ago, in the Oval Office, President Trump said a resolution could be closed to end this partial government shutdown.

39:58Jake Tapper:Is it? A lot of federal workers want to know what CNN is hearing on Capitol Hill. That's next.

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40:40Jake Tapper:And we're back with the Politics Lead. Moments go, President Trump said that Congress is close on ending the partial government shutdown that is currently on day three. I will say that I spoke with Senator Schumer numerous times, and I don't think they want to see a shutdown. The House is expected to take up the vote tomorrow. CNN's Manu Raju is on Capitol Hill. Manu, you watch this stuff all day, every day. Is the shutdown going to end? There's a very good possibility, I should say, a decent chance, Jake. It ends tomorrow. But it's very uncertain at this moment because Speaker Mike Johnson has virtually no margin for error.

41:18Democrats in the House have abandoned this bill that was cut between Chuck Schumer and the White House. They said they were not part of this agreement. And as a result, Mike Johnson needs to pass his vote with Republican votes alone. And he can only afford to lose one Republican vote. And there are several members in the far right of his conference who are threatening to tank this in the first procedural vote tomorrow, which is one reason why that President Trump himself is laying down the pressure. He's calling individual members and he's making the case for them to vote yes in this key vote tomorrow.

41:50This is what Congressman Tom Cole, the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, told me just moments ago. If you want to vote against it, make sure it gets to Florida. Then you have that opportunity. But I think there's a bipartisan coalition bill that will pass the funding as long as the legislation gets to the floor. Does the president need to get involved here? I've gotten involved. The president actually has issued a tweet this afternoon. I just read it. And he's called individual Republicans. So he's working hard. He wants this bill passed. And the speaker himself has been working it, too, meeting with individual members.

42:25Tomorrow, Jake, is that critical vote. We'll see what happens if he can get Republicans in line. If he cannot get Republicans in line beyond that first procedural vote, then they'll have to go to Democrats and see what the Democrats want. And that could potentially prolong the government shutdown even longer. Jake.

42:44Jake Tapper:Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper. This hour we're learning new details about what reportedly happened behind the scenes of that FBI search at a Georgia elections office. The New York Times reporting today that President Trump not only had ordered the director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, to travel down for the search related to the 2020 election, but the president also spoke to the FBI agents involved in the operation. Much more on this unusual, aberrant situation and moments. Also, it is the striking photo that became emblematic of the ICE crackdown. A five-year-old boy with his Spider-Man backpack and his bunny hat being taken away by ICE agents.

43:25Jake Tapper:Now five-year-old Liam and his father are back home after a judge ordered their release in a strong rebuke of the Trump administration. But is this case over? And NASA running into some issues today in a crucial test for its moon mission. We're going to explain what happened during the dress rehearsal as the astronauts are already in quarantine preparing for their launch.

43:52Jake Tapper:A lead tonight, an answer as to why President Trump's Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, was on the scene when FBI agents seized truckloads of 2020 ballots at a Fulton County, Georgia election center last week. The New York Times reports that President Trump personally ordered the director of national intelligence to go to Atlanta for this operation, according to a U.S. official. The Times also reporting that the day after the raid, Ms. Gabbard used her cell phone to call Mr. Trump. The president addressed the FBI agents on speakerphone, asking them questions as well as praising and thanking them for their work, unquote.

44:30Jake Tapper:You know, it's arguable whether a president's direct involvement in a law enforcement operation would clearly be an abuse of power. But this all comes as Trump is now shutting down the Kennedy Center for two years and suing the IRS for 10 billion of your tax dollars and threatening to sue Trevor Noah for a joke he made at the Grammys. All of the peace. We're also just learning that the Trump family had signed a$500 million deal with an Abu Dhabi royal for a stake in the Trump family's crypto operation, World Liberty Financial. This happened just four days before Trump's inauguration, according to a new Wall Street Journal report, which Trump just told reporters today he knew nothing about.

45:14Jake Tapper:Even on this long list of stuff, this news about Gabbard phoning Trump to talk with FBI agents raiding an elections office for political reasons stands out. The Times reports that Trump had additionally coordinated her actions with the deputy FBI director, Andrew Bailey, according to a U.S. official, which directly contradicts, directly, what Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche told our colleague Dana Bash just yesterday. The president told reporters, quote, they got into the votes. You're going to see some interesting things happening. What interesting things is he talking about? And why was he so involved in an FBI and DOJ raid?

46:01Well, just because he said that doesn't mean that he's involved. I don't believe he was involved. As the president has said, election integrity is of the highest importance to the American people, hopefully to everybody in this country, Democrats and Republicans alike. And so we are doing everything we can to make sure that we have free and fair elections.

46:19Jake Tapper:Well, it sure sounds like he was involved if he is directing the director of national intelligence and talking to the FBI deputy director and talking to FBI agents on the scene. So that was not true. And this focus on free and fair elections. I mean, he made this suggestion in an interview with the former FBI director, Dan Bongino, on his podcast today. Take a listen. The Republicans should say we want to take over. We should take over the voting, the voting in at least many 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting. And then we have states that are so crooked and they're counting votes.

47:00We have states that I won that show I didn't win.

47:04Jake Tapper:No, we don't. The states that show that Donald Trump lost, he actually lost. I want to bring in CNN chief law enforcement analyst John Miller. John, how unusual is a phone call from a president to FBI agents during an FBI operation having to do with an election that he lost? I can't think of anything more unusual, but this entire thing is stacked with unprecedented kind of setting asides of mores and rules because you have the Director of National Intelligence flying in on the scene, leading an FBI operation, a criminal investigation, domestic criminal investigation on U.S. soil. Remember, the DNI has no investigative authorities.

47:52If you read ERPTA, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act that creates the office. The DNI has no investigative authorities, has no authority to supervise or run an investigation by another agency. The intelligence community should be focused on foreign threats. And here is the Director of National Intelligence on the ground. And then, according to this reporting in the New York Times by Willie Rashbaum, Devlin Barrett, and Julian Barnes, three solid people when it comes to covering the intelligence community and the FBI. The next day after the raid, she's in the FBI office putting the agents on the phone after debriefing them with the president, who basically gives them an attaboy speech after asking them questions about the case, what a great job they're doing.

48:39This just doesn't occur. The FBI is supposed to be separated and apart from political influence. It is supposed to be independent and operating without fear or favor. A lot of that has gone out the window with the political appointments at the FBI, but not even the veil of the idea that they're operating independently now when you have outside agencies seeming to be in charge and the president talking to them or instructing them directly. It's bizarre.

49:10Jake Tapper:And John, in speaking directly to these FBI investigators, could the president or even and Director of National Intelligence Gabbard, could they have compromised whatever this criminal investigation is? Well, Jake, if there's ever a charge, the entire defense is now kind of based on everything about this case that's not normal and that seems politically influenced. They have basically constructed a defense by carrying it out this way. An official told the New York Times that the White House had given Tulsi Gabbard far-ranging authority to hunt for voter fraud in other states. Is that typical for a director of national intelligence?

49:49Jake Tapper:Is that what they're supposed to be focusing on? The director of national intelligence has several authorities when it comes to infrastructure protection and ensuring that things like voting and elections are safe from foreign cyber attack, foreign influence operations, which is very different from what we're seeing in a case where no one has ever suggested that the 2020 election in Georgia, that the processes were affected by some foreign power. So it's a little bit fish out of water there. And the congressional committees that the DNI reports to haven't heard anything about China or Russia trying to hack into the Georgia voting machines, at least not yet.

50:32Jake Tapper:John Miller, thanks so much. Joining us now to discuss is is Democratic Georgia State Senator Josh McLaurin. Josh, thanks so much for joining us. What do you make of this unusual order by Donald Trump to the DNI and also to the deputy FBI director and this phone call to the FBI agents? Hi, Jake. Well, really glad to join you. I mean, the bottom line is that Fulton County is tired of being Donald Trump's punching bag. And we know that Trump is moving to weaponize agencies. I mean, Doge was just the tip of the iceberg, it seemed, last year. Now the FBI is some sort of personal goon squad, unfortunately, for Trump to carry out his bidding.

51:10And it didn't seem to me from the FBI agents that I saw in that video that you're showing right now that that some of those agents were particularly happy to be there. I mean, you have a local FBI office in Atlanta where there's reporting that the one of the leading officials there was forced out in the last few days before the raid because they may not have been on board with this. This is all national FBI and DNI intrigue being foisted upon Fulton County, which is just the latest in the series of offenses and threats to Fulton County and our local administration that Donald Trump has brought over the years.

51:39Jake Tapper:And just to reiterate, we've said this a million times, but Trump's own attorney general, Bill Barr, said there was no evidence of any fraud that would have swung the election in any state. And then you have the Republican governor, the Republican secretary of state and on and on and on, all of whom looked at the vote in Fulton County and said it was kosher. And then they looked at it again. The Fulton County Commissioner confirmed to CNN that the county now plans to hit the Trump administration with a lawsuit challenging the legality. of the FBI raid and seizure. Do you know when we can expect the lawsuit to actually be filed?

52:15I heard rumors that it would be early this week, so we're all waiting with bated breath. And I mean that seriously. We want so badly at the state level for the Fulton County officials to stand up for the county, file the motion, challenge illegality. And I'll tell you what we already know. I've talked to election law experts who said that this criminal warrant is basically just a regurgitation of failed complaints that have been lodged with the MAGA-friendly state election board, but have still all been shut down. And so what we're seeing is just, again, an attempt to rehash the same thing. You know, Senate Republicans in Georgia, ironically, on Groundhog Day, passed a resolution urging Brad Raffensperger today to turn over voter rolls with sensitive information.

52:51They just can't quit the addiction. And again, Groundhog Day is a very ironic day to do that. It's like they want to replay the 2020 election over and over and over again at the expense of addressing voters' real concerns about the Epstein files, about ICE, about CBP, about tariffs, about costs. Obviously, the list goes on. But it seems clear that the reason this raid was ordered, notwithstanding all of the finality of the review that's already been done, all of the procedure that has already been given to this fantasy, this conspiracy theory, it's obvious that the Steve Bannon playbook is in full effect, that Donald Trump is just ordering this raid to distract us from talking about Minnesota and the host of other problems that he's foisted upon the entire country.

53:29Jake Tapper:We learned last week that the voting records were taken to an FBI records facility in Virginia. Do you have any information at all about what the FBI is doing with Fulton County's records at the moment? We don't know. I mean, there were three huge enterprise moving trucks where we saw the ballots being loaded. I was there myself Wednesday night and we saw, you know, again, it's impossible to see exactly what was going on, but the ballots moving on the trucks and then being carted away. At this point, it's anyone's guess. And one of the things I've warned about, in addition to the possibility that the FBI lied in these warrants with affidavits that regurgitate lies about the election.

54:02The other possibility is that they're doing something to tweak these ballots. I mean, you just said a moment ago, interviewing Mr. Miller, that Tulsi Gabbard could be part of an effort to malign the Fulton County elections once again, but this time with a new lie about foreign interference. So our concern is that they're going to modify the original documents. And they took everything, as far as I'm aware. You know, they took all the records that we had without a clear chain of custody. And so whatever they do to these records, there's not going to be a way to undo it or disprove it once it's in their control.

54:30So I think voters really should be concerned about the upcoming midterm. There's really three harms that could result from this seizure. One is, you know, inflating the election denial conspiracies generally. Two is justifying a state or federal takeover of Fulton elections, which Georgia law has been passed, SB 202, the bill that criminalizes handing out water in line. A lesser known feature of that bill was that it allows the state to take over Fulton elections under certain circumstances. And the third thing is that if it works in Fulton County, what's to stop Donald Trump from raiding an elections office before, during, or after an election in Maricopa County or Wayne County or all those places, you know, you played that clip of him on the podcast today that he would like to go bust up.

55:07So Fulton County feels a special responsibility here. It's not just about our home state. And I only represent Fulton County right now. But, you know, one of the reasons I'm running for lieutenant governor this year is because we need a state pushback, too. State Republicans have been more than complicit in beating up on Fulton County. And if we don't fight back now at the first line of defense, kind of like the people of Minnesota did, then we'll be in a position where Trump feels like he can get away with this

55:28Jake Tapper:after this trial balloon. Georgia State Senator Josh McLaurin, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says she's immediately deploying body cameras to all of the federal officers in Minneapolis. When she says, when she says the move could go into effect nationwide, that's next.

55:50Jake Tapper:We have some breaking news for you now. The Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says that all of her department's officers on the ground in Minneapolis will be issued body cameras. This move comes as DHS is facing increasing scrutiny over the conduct of these immigration enforcement personnel operations. Coming in the wake of the deaths, the shootings of Alex Preddy and Renee Good, Secretary Noem says the body camera program will expand nationwide once funding is available. Turning to our law and justice, lead a judge ordered the release of five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos. You'll remember Liam from the striking photo showing him being detained by ICE outside his Minneapolis home last month.

56:34Jake Tapper:Liam and his father spent more than a week inside a Texas detention facility before their release. Both are back in Minneapolis now where Liam has been reunited with his mother and his blue cartoon bunny hat. We should note that while DHS described Liam's father as a quote illegal alien, their attorneys say that the family entered the United States legally and were in the midst of applying for asylum and communicating with the government. One thing especially notable about this case is the scathing rebuke of the Trump administration by the U.S. District Judge, in his opinion, ordering Liam's release.

57:11Jake Tapper:Judge Fred Beery, a Clinton appointee, accused the Trump administration of, quote, traumatizing children, unquote, through what he calls, quote, ill-conceived and incompletely implemented, or I'm sorry, incompetently implemented daily deportation quotas. The judge actually calls his opinion a civics lesson at one point. And then there's this biting line where he says, quote, for some among us, the perfidious lust for unbridled power and the imposition of cruelty in its quest knows no bounds. and are bereft of human decency and the rule of law be damned, unquote. That's quite an order from a federal judge about the Trump administration.

57:54Jake Tapper:But Judge Beery is not alone. In fact, in recent weeks, more and more judges are openly scolding the Trump administration for alleged abuses of the Constitution and legal system with regard to the government's deportation efforts. Quote, ICE is not a law unto itself, unquote, wrote Minnesota District Court Chief Judge Patrick Schiltz in an order accusing the organization of violating 96 court orders across 74 cases. The judge writing, quote, this list should give pause to anyone, no matter his or her political beliefs, who cares about the rule of law. ICE has likely violated more court orders in January 2026 than some federal agencies have violated in their entire existence, unquote.

58:47Jake Tapper:Perhaps what's most notable about that is that Judge Schultz is a George W. Bush appointee who clerked for the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Nor are these rebukes just happening in Minnesota. Judge Mary McElroy, a Trump appointee, a Trump appointee to the U.S. District Court for Rhode Island, is similarly accusing ICE of defying her orders in January, writing, quote, It seems clear that the court can conclude that the Trump administration willfully violated two of this court's orders and willfully misrepresented facts to the court, unquote, There is nothing normal about judges accusing the government of willfully defying court orders in these numbers.

59:38Jake Tapper:So will any of this give pause to those who claim to care about the rule of law and the U.S. Constitution? One of the top officials at the Justice Department is telling CNN that he doesn't think any more charges will be brought in the Jeffrey Epstein investigation. Well, coming up next, we're going to talk to the journalist who exposed many of the horrific details of Epstein's sex trafficking ring. She's going to join us live to react next.

1:00:11Jake Tapper:In our law and justice lead, U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche signaling over the weekend that no new charges will be brought in the Jeffrey Epstein investigation. Blanche's comments come just a few days after the Justice Department released more than three million pages of files related to Epstein. Joining us now is Miami Herald investigative reporter Julie K. Brown. She's the author of Perversion of Justice, the Jeffrey Epstein story, a fantastic book. Her work in the Miami Herald exposed many of the horrific details of Epstein's alleged sex trafficking ring. And she's continuing that work on her substack.

1:00:43Jake Tapper:It's called The Epstein Files by Julie K. Brown. I recommend both. Julie, what was your reaction after hearing Todd Blanche essentially say that there was nothing in the released files that allowed us to prosecute anybody, unquote? well let's break it down a little bit first of all they initially said there was nothing to see here at all and we are finding out now that there were other people who were accused other men specifically who are accused of sexually assaulting and raping in some cases underage girls a lot of those documents however are redacted these men's names are are blacked out and so we can't see who they are, the ones that we do know about that aren't redacted, those cases where they list that they were accused of wrongdoing, the case notes themselves are redacted.

1:01:39So we can't see what action they took or they didn't took or how they reached the conclusions that they did that this person shouldn't be prosecuted. So it's more to me, the story here is what they haven't released and what they're hiding more than why that they're not pursuing these charges. They're not being transparent to the public about exactly who has been accused and why they reached these conclusions.

1:02:05Jake Tapper:Yeah. And you see these accusations from the FBI 302. So those are the notes when somebody makes an allegation. It's not proof unto itself. But there's you're not able to see. Well, did they follow that up? Did they investigate? Did they assign somebody to this? President Trump, and again, nobody has publicly proved that he did anything wrong related to the Epstein files. But President Trump, he's mentioned more than a thousand times in these three million Epstein documents released Friday. He's, again, long denied any wrongdoing related to Epstein. Asked about the allegations made against Trump.

1:02:37Jake Tapper:Blanche said, the deputy attorney general said, many of the allegations made against the president were not credible. That they came from anonymous tips or unverifiable sources. And just a short time ago, President Trump said this. I have nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein. And in fact, if you look at the DOJ, they announced, you know, they released three million pages. It's like this is all they're supposed to be doing. And frankly, the DOJ, I think, should just say we have other things to do because that whole thing has turned out. I mean, other than Bill Clinton and, you know, Bill Gates and lots of people that have.

1:03:12There are a lot of questions about it, but nothing on me.

1:03:15Jake Tapper:I mean, it's not true that there are no questions. What do you make of that? Well, first of all, it's doesn't it seem a little strange that there are only certain names that are out there that aren't blacked out while there are other names that are blacked out. It's like they picked certain people that they wanted to allow to be exposed and they didn't pick other people because obviously there's other names in there that are blacked out. So that's the first question. And then the other thing I would point out is if I ignored every tip that I got as a journalist or every anonymous source that told me something without even investigating or looking into it, I mean, I wouldn't have any stories to write.

1:03:56I mean, you always have to pay attention to tips. And some of these tips, quite frankly, although some of them seem pretty wild and, you know, they seem kind of crazy. Some of them, however, seem to have a little bit of a pattern to them. If you look at them, a lot of them concerned these model parties at either Epstein's home or at Mar-a-Lago. And we do know that there were underage girls at some of these parties. And so it's possible that some of these tips maybe could have been investigated because they do follow a pattern.

1:04:33Jake Tapper:Julie Kay Brown, thank you so much. And thanks, as always, for your important journalism. Just weeks after putting his name on the front of the building, President Trump is now saying that the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is going to close for two years, starting in July, for renovations. I'm going to get a reaction from a member of the Kennedy Center board who is also a member of Congress next.

1:04:58Jake Tapper:In our politics lead, President Trump says that he is going to shut down the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. for two years, starting in July for renovations. It has nothing to do with the fact that there's a flood of artists canceling performances since Trump's takeover of what is supposed to be an apolitical venue. No, Trump did not mention that. And perhaps Trump did not see the Washington Post report from last October about ticket sales for the orchestra, theater and dance performances being the worst since the COVID pandemic. With me now, Democratic Congresswoman Joyce Beattie of Ohio.

1:05:35Jake Tapper:She's a congressional member of the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees. So Congresswoman, last October, Trump said that the Kennedy Center would remain fully open during construction, renovation and beautification, unquote. than today after lagging ticket sales and all these cancellations by artists, Trump said this.

1:05:56It's in very bad shape. It's run down. It's dilapidated. It's sort of dangerous. Things fall out. You can't do any work because people are coming in and out. I was thinking maybe there's a way of doing it simultaneously, but there really isn't. I'm not ripping it down. I'll be using the steel. So we're using the structure. We're using some of the marble and some of the marble comes down. But when it's open, it'll be brand new and really beautiful.

1:06:19Jake Tapper:Trump also said that the renovation will probably cost about$200 million. So what's your reaction to this news? Well, first of all, he illegally puts his name on the Kennedy Center. And now at the last minute, he's trying to save himself. He has embarrassed this country. He has embarrassed the arts. And here's what we know. The Congress provides the funding for that. We gave in October $45 million,$13 million of which he said would be for restoration. And maybe the president doesn't know that there's a difference between restoring something and doing a demolition. We had given$256 million, but that was to last until 2029.

1:07:03Once again, there was no indication that there was going to be the closure. Just a few months ago, he said it would not close while he was doing some restoration. Now it's going to close for two years. You know why? He's scrambling for cover because he's embarrassed more than 20 artists and performers, including the National Opera. When we think of the Symphony 15, Renee Flemings, a jazz quartet that has performed for some 30 years. So between the donors pulling away and the artists not wanting to be a part of this specifically because he started with putting his name on the building. He cannot silence us, and he certainly can't silence me.

1:07:47I'm not going to be bullied by him. We filed a lawsuit. We're also looking into legal ramifications of what he's done now. No indication to the full board that he was proposing a two-year cut after saying he would not close it. They would do it while it was open. We know what he did in the Sunken Garden in the East Wing. He thinks he's unstoppable, but the donors and the artists are speaking out loudly and clearly. Even at the Grammys the other night, people are speaking out against him. I think he's embarrassed, and we know he's embarrassed this country. He's embarrassed the arts. And Donald Trump, we're not going to allow that.

1:08:30I want my message to be loud and clear.

1:08:32Jake Tapper:When you attend board meetings for the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, when the board members are talking, is their main concern renovations? Do they express any concern over artists pulling out or the low attendance? Well, you have to remember, we have not had a board meeting since that last board meeting when they announced that his name was going to go up on the building. Once again, it was not unanimous. We weren't allowed. I wasn't allowed to voice my concern. And my concern was he cannot do that on his own. We know that had been planned, because within 48 hours or less, the letters were already there.

1:09:14They were up on the building and he can't do that to the only living memorial we have of John F. Kennedy. Yes, the family has spoken out. But you have to also remember he came in and fired the chairman of our board, fired David, fired Deborah, who was our CEO and put on the board all of his little cronies who do just what he tells them to do. Most of the board members were removed.

1:09:45Jake Tapper:So when Rick Grinnell, who is now in charge of day-to-day operations at the Kennedy Center, when he was interviewed by PBS about a month ago about all these changes and all the artist cancellations and all the bad ticket sales, he pointed, he said that, first of all, venues all over the country, including Broadway, are having a tough time. And two, that Trump has done a great job with raising corporate funds,$130 million or something like that. Is that accurate? And what do you think of that argument? Well, I think at the time when he said it, he might have believed it or been told to say it by Donald Trump.

1:10:25But it's very clear now when you look at the donors who are pulling out, You cannot maintain the stamina that we had prior to Donald Trump when you have major artists going away, donors. And our records now reflect that. Between him being anti-D-E-N-I, we had artists to stop performing then. And now coupled with his illegal placement of his name on the building and then this latest shut down for two years, he doesn't care about the jobs and the salaries. Because here's the thing. What happens to all of those employees when he's shut down? Traditionally, if you were going to do a shutdown or a merger, you would have study committees to talk about it.

1:11:07It would come before the full board. None of that has happened. Donald Trump made this decision to try to save himself the embarrassment because he's not going to have people attending the Kennedy Center because of him.

1:11:20Jake Tapper:Democratic Congresswoman Joyce Beatty of Ohio, thank you so much. Always good to have you on, ma 'am. My next guest is calling on Americans to use their wallets to send a message to the Trump administration and use their phones. We'll tell you how next.

1:11:41Jake Tapper:In our Money Lead, our next guest argues that protests alone aren't going to change the Trump administration when it comes to its immigration enforcement tactics, but rather how you vote with your dollars and your apps could. Here now, Scott Galloway, a bestselling author, podcast host, professor of marketing at New York University. I could go on and on, but we only have two hours. Scott, before we get to what you're calling, quote, resist and unsubscribe, do you think protests like Friday's national shutdown, do you think they don't work or don't work as well as this will?

1:12:22Well, I think it's a cumulative effect. I think protest is really powerful. One, just on a basic level, it feels good to do something with other people. It does build infrastructure, builds lists, gives people a sense of empowerment. So I think any type of protest is powerful. The problem with a one-day strike is it's more of an annoyance. I think you need sustained week-long or even month-long protests or economic strikes to begin to build real momentum. So I think it all adds up. I think there's a cumulative effect. But I, you know, my thinking about this, I think these national protests are incredibly inspiring.

1:12:57The issue, Jake, is that it appears the administration doesn't really immediately respond to signs. They're more cinematic so far than effective. What I've seen is that the administration responds to one thing and one thing only, and that is markets. specifically when the 10-year spikes or the S &P goes down, they seem to walk away plans to annex Greenland or to raise tariffs. So in my view, if we wanna be, in addition to being right, be effective, it's a focus on the markets.

1:13:26Jake Tapper:So you're calling on Americans who want Trump to walk back this tough, harsh immigration enforcement to quote, resist and unsubscribe. This would be a month-long national economic strike. What companies are you specifically targeting And why do you think this is the best way to actually force the administration to change their policies? So targeting two sets of companies, and I don't want to pretend to be the arbiter of where people should spend their money. I've created a site called Resist and Unsubscribe that has two types of companies, what I call ground zero. And that is big tech companies that appear to have the president's ear.

1:14:04And quite frankly, I would argue are enabling him. And the reason why these firms are so powerful in terms of blocking your subscriptions or canceling is that if you look at, for example, Kroger's, if you were to tell people to stop or reduce their spend on grocery, Kroger trades at 0.3 times revenues. OpenAI trades at 40 times revenues. So literally, a dollar less spent on OpenAI is about 120 times more powerful. And if you look at the S &P, of which 40 % now constitutes a small number of subscription AI or tech-related companies, if you have an opponent, what you want to do is hit them hard, but hit them where it hurts most.

1:14:44So I think for every ounce of action, or in this case, inaction, you're going to get a much bigger effect. Because these are the folks he listens to. These are the people. These are the companies that drive the markets. And, Jake, you don't have to give up your Saturday. You don't have to stop going to work and not to in any way disparage those. But this is the easiest, highest ROI means of sending a message to the president is to go after subscription revenues of big tech companies. And then the second layer down, what I'm calling the blast zone, is companies that are directly working with ICE, whether it's AT &T or Palantir or Hilton housing ICE employees that are enabling or providing the infrastructure for ICE actions.

1:15:24Jake Tapper:So let's look at some of the companies that you're talking about. Ground Zero includes tech giants Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft, Uber, as well as their subscription services, just to name a few. So you would ask people to unsubscribe from all of those companies and subscriptions for a month? I think it's up to the individual. I guess the question I would ask is what I've done in my family is I've said, do we really need five streaming media platforms? I found that in my company, there are a lot of redundant LLMs. Do we need both Anthropic and ChatGPT? I have found that I've been taking approximately 350 Uber rides a year.

1:16:07I've started taking the subway. I think there are fairly easy means of finding subscription-based, tech-driven cash flows that you can not only save money on, but will have a real impact. I also find this is a little bit like dry January, where it's a decent time to take stock of where you can save money while also having a big impact. I think most of us, what we don't fully realize, for example, Uber has raised its prices 7 % to 10 % a year for the last 10 years. And most of big tech consolidates the market with a below market pricing and then slowly but surely raises prices as streaming media has done.

1:16:43So I'm suggesting you not only have a big impact on the markets and send a strong message to the administration, but you'll find that you're probably spending money where you don't need to be and the prices have increased or creeped up. And this is a great way to take stock of where you might be able to save money with very little or minimum downside to your family. Do you really need five streaming platforms? Do you need two LLMs? Do you need three ride hailing companies? I think this is a chance to do some spring cleaning financially, if you will.

1:17:11Jake Tapper:Interesting. And under Meta, you list links to delete Facebook and WhatsApp, but you write, quote, hey, we'd boycott Instagram too, which we should note is also owned by Meta, if we could, but we need it to get this message to you, unquote. So what would you tell someone who wants to support your effort, but they can't, let's say, delete WhatsApp because they use it to communicate with all their friends and family members, many of whom are abroad? I think it's a fair point. Look, I don't believe in coal fire plants, but I turn on my lights. And what I would suggest is we need to vote for an administration that has strong antitrust such that if we don't like that a company is helping teens engage in suicidal ideal ideation or does not seem to care about the weaponization of their platforms during elections, then we need an administration that has antitrust.

1:18:05Because where we are now is the following. It is very hard to get any sort of traction in a movement like this unless you engage with a company that has monopoly power over news and information, which is meta. Two-thirds of Americans are now getting their news from social media, and two-thirds of social media is controlled by one company. So I want to be clear. I am not happy about having to use meta, but the reality is they They have monopoly power. And most of these most of these don't. There's a viable substitute. I haven't found a substitute for communicating this type of effort without the endorsement of Meta.

1:18:39However, you can not click on their ads or not advertise on Meta. But to be honest, I'm stuck with a coal fire plant called Meta right now.

1:18:47Jake Tapper:It's interesting that you talk about this because I debate with some of my friends out in Hollywood as to why ultimately Bob Iger and Disney buckled and put Kimmel back on the air. I always say, look, after they suspended, after Iger buckled to what Brendan Carr of the FCC and Trump were pushing and they suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live, there was this spike in cancellations for their products. Disney Plus, Hulu. And a week later, ABC put Kimmel back on the air. There are other people who say, no, no, no, Iger was always going to do the right thing and he cares about his legacy, et cetera, et cetera.

1:19:20Jake Tapper:But I don't think that. What do you think? there's studies on this jake the reason that the reason that disney and these movements are powerful is because of jake tapper and it's not even economic damage it's reputational damage that creates margin pressure people don't want to go to work with them their employees start emailing the ceo the actual number of subscriptions was meaningful or cancellations but not profound what really moved the needle here was when media picked up on this and said that this appears to be nothing but enabling the president intimidation of the press, which, I mean, we know this, the moment you start intimidating or letting journalists be arrested or intimidating companies into what type of content it gets FTC approval or not, it is very hard to put that genie back in the bottle.

1:20:11And whether it was Turkey in 2012 or Russia in the early 2000s, all it leads to do as a nation that is angrier and much poorer. But typically, it's reputational advantage vis-a-vis the media reporting on these issues as opposed to actual financial damage.

1:20:27Jake Tapper:Interesting. You also, let's talk about the blast zone. These are active enablers in your parlance of ICE, blast zone companies. This is, as you noted, AT &T, Comcast, FedEx, Marriott, Home Depot, Lowe's. Do you see any one of those companies having more influence over the president than others in terms of boycotting them?

1:20:50The thing that has the most impact on the president, quite frankly, is the big tech platforms that control or move the markets. So, for example, when Microsoft barely missed expectations, its stock, it shed 10 % of its market cap, which is 1 % of the NASDAQ. And when you look at the sympathy where other companies traded down, the NASDAQ 100 lost 1.5 % of its value. That is a real market movement. In sum, the president listens to the markets and surrounds himself with who he believes are his new idols, and that is billionaires. And then they all text you and text me saying they hate themselves, which quite frankly doesn't do us a lot of good.

1:21:31So it's really the string that gets pulled here, the results in action, is the companies where the smallest amount of revenue misses create the most disruption in the marketplace. So whether that's Hilton or AT &T, the companies in the blast zone, quite frankly, maybe with the exception of Palantir, which trades at 100 times revenues. They are not who I think this president listens to. This president listens to companies that drive the market and who he can use as props. Let me get very dark for a second. Early 1930s, the CEOs of the biggest industrial companies in Germany made a deal with Hitler and said, we will keep quiet on this slow grade to fascism if you rid of the trade unions and make us more profitable.

1:22:11They put their morals and their fears aside to make more money. And I think there's a strong analogy in comparison with what is happening today. And that is the CEOs have opted for profits despite the fact they know what is going on here directly attacks the underpinnings of democracy and rule of law that they have enjoyed to ascend to the heights they've ascended to. This is, we have been here before and it does not end well.

1:22:36Jake Tapper:Fascinating stuff. Scott Galloway, We can't get enough of you on this show. Come back soon. The latest test for NASA's next moon mission is running into some issues today. That story's next.

1:22:51Jake Tapper:Our last lead start in our out-of-this-world lead, a so-called wet dress rehearsal of the Artemis II launch is happening now. NASA hopes to send the first crewed mission around the moon in more than 50 years. Now, during this rehearsal, NASA goes through all the steps of a traditional launch, from fueling to countdown, but then they stopped just before takeoff. A hydrogen leak this afternoon, however, forced NASA to temporarily stop its fueling. NASA hopes the real launch will take place before late April. Some breaking baby news before we go. We are thrilled to welcome Nora Jane to the lead family, the daughter of our producer Haley and her husband Brendan.

1:23:32Jake Tapper:Nora was born last Tuesday, January 27th. Weighing in nine pounds, four ounces, that's a big baby. Congratulations to Haley and Brandon and big sister Isla. We cannot wait to meet baby Nora. Erin Burnett out front starts now.