154. Epstein Files: Is Trump Really Cleared?

3 Feb 2026 · 45 min · 13 chapters

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The Rest Is Politics: US - Episode 154 Summary

Podcast Overview Hosts:

  • Anthony Scaramucci (Former White House Director of Communications)
  • Katty Kay (BBC Special Correspondent)

Episode Title: 154. Epstein Files: Is Trump Really Cleared? Release Date: [Episode Date Here]

Description: This episode delves into recent revelations from the Epstein documents, Trump’s connections to Epstein, implications for the midterm elections in Texas, and the troubles faced by Tulsi Gabbard.

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Key Topics Discussed

  1. Epstein Files Release
  2. Background: The Department of Justice released millions of documents related to Jeffrey Epstein, including 180,000 images and 2,000 videos.
  3. Key Revelations:
  4. Emails between notable figures, including Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Elon Musk, indicating various connections to Epstein.
  5. Allegations against Bill Gates regarding an affair and health issues linked to a Russian woman.
  6. Donald Trump’s assertion that the documents clear him of any wrongdoing.
  • Implications for Trump:
  • Trump claims he is absolved, despite being mentioned numerous times in the documents.
  • Scaramucci suggests that Trump will remain insulated from any implications arising from these documents.
  1. Political Fallout from Epstein Files
  2. Victims' Rights: Discussion on how the release of documents failed to protect the identities of Epstein's victims, highlighting systemic issues within the justice system.
  3. Institutional Failure: The legacy of Epstein as a sexual predator who exploited powerful connections is emphasized.
  4. Reactions from the Elite: Concerns raised about the responses from powerful individuals mentioned in the documents—many appear to have avoided repercussions.
  1. Texas Special Election
  2. Unexpected Democratic Victory: A Democrat, Taylor Remitt, won a significant Texas state Senate seat, marking a notable shift in a traditionally Republican stronghold.
  3. Implications for Midterms:
  4. Speculations about a trend of Democratic successes in upcoming elections, driven by issues like cost of living and immigration policies.
  5. Notable decline in support for Trump among young and Hispanic voters, crucial demographics for his previous campaigns.
  1. Tulsi Gabbard’s Controversial Role
  2. Participation in FBI Raid: Gabbard's involvement in the FBI search of Fulton County, Georgia, raised questions about her motives and the legality of her presence.
  3. Potential Political Calculations: Gabbard appears to be attempting to align herself with Trump narratives to secure her position within the administration.

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Key Takeaways

  • Trump's Perception: The episode reflects on how Trump navigates controversies, often through discrediting others or refocusing discussions on past grievances, such as the 2020 election.
  • Systemic Issues: The discussion highlights broader societal issues regarding power dynamics, justice, and how the elite often escape accountability while victims suffer.
  • Political Climate: The surprising electoral outcomes in traditionally conservative regions suggest shifting political sentiments that could influence future elections.

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Conclusion The podcast episode provides a complex and insightful analysis of current political dynamics in the US, especially relating to the Epstein files and their implications for Trump and the upcoming elections. The hosts navigate through intricate narratives, showcasing how personal and political interests intertwine in the broader context of American politics.

For further insights, listeners are encouraged to become founding members for ad-free content and exclusive discussions.

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Follow Us:

  • Instagram: [@RestPoliticsUS](https://instagram.com/RestPoliticsUS)
  • Twitter: [@RestPoliticsUS](https://twitter.com/RestPoliticsUS)
  • Website: [therestispoliticsus.com](https://therestispoliticsus.com)

Producer Credits:

  • Fiona Douglas
  • India Dunkley
  • Kieron Leslie
  • Charlie Johnson
  • Callum Hill
  • Sam Oakley
  • Tom Whiter

Note: The episode reflects the hosts' opinions and interpretations of the discussed events and is not intended to represent all viewpoints on the matter.

Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.

Chapters

Tap a time to open that second in VO

Discussion on Epstein Files Release

2:30 to 6:05

Hosts analyze the implications of released Epstein documents and Trump's defense.

“The DOJ released millions of these documents that they've been holding over the weekend.”

Impact of Epstein and Trump on Politics

6:05 to 10:14

Discussion on how Epstein's legacy affects political dynamics and the elite.

“It's now called the Starmer Victoria Albert Museum and it's closing for two years.”

Trump's Political Maneuvering

10:14 to 14:01

Hosts explore the distractions created by Trump amidst the Epstein controversy.

“fallout and damaging fallout to other people.”

The Elite and Epstein: A Tainted Connection

14:01 to 17:04

Explore the controversial ties between elite figures and Epstein's legacy.

“And the cozy tone with which these men talk to him about sexual issues doesn't make any of these men look good.”

Victims of Epstein: Unprotected and Forgotten

17:05 to 20:24

Discuss the neglect of Epstein's victims in the release of sensitive files.

“and then there was a bus boycott throughout the south by the african-american citizens that lived in the South, and it caused massive consequential damage.”

Political Ramifications: Trump, Epstein, and Public Perception

20:25 to 27:12

Analyze the impact of the Epstein files on Trump's approval ratings and political landscape.

“And my heart does go out to these people.”

Texas Special Election Results

28:40 to 29:59

Discussion on the surprising Texas Senate seat win by a Democrat and its implications.

“Decker, a private investigator uncovering the sunshine state's darkest secrets.”

Voter Trends and Republican Losses

29:59 to 33:01

Analysis of voter shifts among demographics that supported Trump in 2024.

“there was a special election for a Texas state Senate seat.”

Trump's Narrative on Election Security

33:01 to 35:45

Exploration of Trump's focus on the 2020 election and its impact on future elections.

“You know, and again, demographically, the Latino voters and some of these suburban electorate that voted for Trump in 24, they look like, hey, man, we had enough of this guy.”

FBI Raid and Tulsi Gabbard's Involvement

35:45 to 38:19

Details about the FBI raid in Fulton County and Gabbard's controversial presence.

“They would want someone of credibility to sow the seeds of distrust in the electoral process.”
Show all 13 chapters

Analysis of Gabbard's Motivations

38:19 to 42:05

Discussion on Gabbard's motivations for her actions in Georgia and implications for her career.

“get in with Donald Trump is you say, Mr.”

Trump's Legal Challenges and Political Pressure

42:05 to 44:16

Explore the ongoing legal challenges facing Trump and his responses to political pressure.

“60 different lawsuits brought by the Trump team, and all of them dismissed.”

Cryptic Messages from Scaramucci

44:16 to 44:28

Scaramucci shares his cryptic thoughts on political narratives and external influences.

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Transcript

Automatic transcript. May contain errors.

0:00Katty Kay:TaxAct can think of a million things more fun than filing taxes. TaxAct is going to name some now. Sitting in traffic. Folding a fitted bedsheet. Listening to your co-worker talk about his fantasy team. Digging a hole. Digging an even larger hole next to that original hole. Unfortunately, TaxAct's filing software can't make taxes fun. But TaxAct can help you get them done. TaxAct. Let's get them over with.

0:31Anthony Scaramucci:Rinse knows that greatness takes time, but so does laundry. So Rinse will take your laundry and hand deliver it to your door, expertly cleaned. And you can take the time pursuing your passions. Time once spent sorting and waiting, folding and queuing, now spent challenging and innovating and pushing your way to greatness. So pick up the Irish flute or those calligraphy pens or that daunting Beef Wellington recipe card and leave the laundry to us. Rinse. It's time to be great.

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1:38Anthony Scaramucci:Welcome to The Rest is Politics US with me, Katty Kay, down oddly in Texas, which is the center of America's political world this Monday. And we'll explain that in the second half. Hello, Anthony.

1:51Katty Kay:Is that a blue state now, Katty Kay?

1:53Anthony Scaramucci:Well, who knows? We'll get into that. No, I don't think it is. They go chasing unicorns down here, but they have had a little bit of a victory. And we can talk about the meaning of that.

2:03Katty Kay:Okay, so what are we talking about today, Kat?

2:05Anthony Scaramucci:So we're going to talk about the Epstein files, dum-dum-dum, and millions of documents have been released and photographs and images and videos. And we will talk about what we actually learned after this massive wait that we've had for these files. Who looks like they're implicated, who looks like they're not. Donald Trump says this all clears him. We'll get into that. And then in the second half, we are going to talk about this state Senate race in Texas where a Democrat won unexpectedly in a very Trumpy area, and it's got Republicans all over Twitter, and they're worried about what it might mean for the midterm elections.

2:48Anthony Scaramucci:But let's start with Epstein. And quickly, just to remind everybody. The DOJ released millions of these documents that they've been holding over the weekend. 180 ,000 images were released. Some 2 ,000 videos were released. Emails, lists, diagrams all out there. There are emails between Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Jeffrey Epstein inviting him to various parties. There are emails between Elon Musk asking where Epstein's wildest where Epstein's wildest parties would be. There are emails which suggest Bill Gates had an affair and may, according to some of these documents, have caught a sexually transmitted disease from a Russian girl.

3:33Anthony Scaramucci:There are photos of Andrew crouching over a woman, young woman, I would say, judging by the image, lying on the floor. Donald Trump, in reaction to these documents has said that it all absolves him from blame and he has attacked and threatened to sue the comedian Trevor Noah after Noah claimed that Donald Trump had been on Epstein's island. I mean, it's very hard, Anthony, I think, to make sense of everything from the Epstein files because there are so many of them. So, we have investigative reporters who are trawling through them and literally as we're speaking, recording this on Monday lunchtime, people are still giving us, drops that are coming out of them on Twitter and from the major news organizations.

4:18Anthony Scaramucci:I think for me, the biggest issue is the DOJ is saying this is probably going to be the last major tranche of documents that come out. Will the people who were calling for the release of Epstein files be satisfied with this big chunk of emails and documents and videos? Will they think, okay, I'm clear. Jeffrey Epstein was a very bad guy. There isn't any more need for any criminal prosecutions. Donald Trump is in the clear as he says he is. And I have learned everything I need to know to make me convinced that there was not a conspiracy of people in powerful positions protecting Jeffrey Epstein because either they were getting something from him of a sexual nature, or he had some kind of dirt on them.

5:05Do you think this dump does that?

5:08Anthony Scaramucci:Is this it done and dusted with the whole Epstein file saga?

5:12Katty Kay:I would say not done and dusted, but I maintain that Donald Trump will be effectively insulated from this. And I maintain that despite whatever he did, and it was probably a lot, but who knows? Again, that's my opinion. That was probably a lot. But I maintain that he will be absolved from this. They're spending months and months and months cleansing him and redacting him from the documents. And even though, and again, this is a fact, so I can state it, he's shown up 48 ,000 times in 3 million documents. There is no smoking gun, as you and I predicted on this show several months ago. But what I'm surprised about is that you're not talking about the Starmer Victoria Albert Museum, which is closing for two years due to its renovation due to low attendance.

6:01Katty Kay:See, I'm surprised that you're not talking about that, see? Because Prime Minister Starmer, you may not have saw this in the news, he put his name on the Victoria Albert Museum. It's now called the Starmer Victoria Albert Museum and it's closing for two years.

6:14Anthony Scaramucci:Yeah, well, that's because then you see he was so overwhelmed with people wanting to come to the museum that he just like, they have to triple the size of it because everybody wanted to show up. Should we fill people in on what you're actually talking about?

6:26Katty Kay:Because our UK listeners, if Starmer, Prime Minister Starmer, put his name on that museum or a symphony hall or you pick something, I guess Westminster Abbey, we could call it the Starmer Westminster Abbey. But Donald Trump put his name on the Kennedy Center. And so it's now the Trump Kennedy Center.

6:47Anthony Scaramucci:A very big, famous art center that I've been to many times just down the road from me in Washington.

6:52Katty Kay:But, Caddy, it is an art center, but it is actually a memorial to the slain president, like the Lincoln Memorial and like the Jefferson Memorial. Jackie Kennedy, his widow, wanted his memorial to be like a performing arts center because they were into the performing arts. And if you look at it and step back from it, it's a 1960s version of what the Lincoln Memorial is rendered after. But Donald Trump, in order to defile it because everything Trump touches or almost everything dies, he's now put his name on the Kennedy Center, the memorial of the slain president, and a result of which no one's going.

7:35Katty Kay:Yeah. And performances are being dropped and there's a boycott of people. And so he's closing the center for two years of renovation, which I'm sure he's going to put gilded Liberace like marble and gold in the place to make it even more of a disaster. But I'm bringing this up because we're not in a normal country right now. We're not United States, not normal. Of course, Prime Minister Starmer, I was kidding, fellas. Prime Minister Starmer did not name the Victoria Albert Museum after himself. But I'm saying it to point out how absolutely outrageous what Donald Trump is doing and how little pushback he's getting from the first article of the U.S.

8:19Katty Kay:Constitution known as the U.S. Congress.

8:21Anthony Scaramucci:Yeah, I mean, first of all, changing the name of the Kennedy Center, there are a lot of questions about whether he was actually allowed to do that. So, he changes the name, he brings in a new board, he puts himself as chair of the board and says that he's going to de-woke-ify the Kennedy Center and it's going to become much more kind of MAGA-friendly performances. They have, my understanding is they have, I was told by somebody who's in the arts world in Washington, they have a whole load of shows booked until the fall end of this year. That's fine. They've got lots of shows. But then the problem was they had no programming.

8:54Anthony Scaramucci:And they had no programming because guess what? All of the shows were thinking either they don't want to go and perform there because it's now the Trump Kennedy Center. And so they're doing it as a political statement. Or apparently there's no money for marketing. It's in disarray. they're worried the audiences won't show up. They keep trying to move the shows into smaller and smaller theaters and people, they can't make money out of it. So this whole big thing that he announced, which was really a vanity project on par for the president, a kind of glorification of Donald Trump's presidency, has actually turned out to be hugely detrimental to the art scene in Washington, DC, because the Kennedy Center is the big dog in town.

9:33Anthony Scaramucci:And so it's something that doesn't work. And I think in a way, the comparison here is, and we'll get back to Epstein in a minute, I promise everybody. But there are things that Donald Trump does which are overreach, which then don't work. And in the process, you cause damage to other people, all the people working at the Kennedy Center, all of the artists who are going to perform at the Kennedy Center, the citizens of DC who enjoy going to the Kennedy Center. Not that he really cares about that, but I think it's one example of, and we've had several of them over the last few weeks, whether it's been Greenland, Minneapolis, much more serious, where overreach on the part of the president has resulted in grow back by the president, but quite a lot of bad political fallout and damaging fallout to other people.

10:17Katty Kay:So, Katie, it is connected to the Epstein thing, if you don't mind me saying so, because it's another distraction. And the goal is I am waiting for my Department of Justice to cleanse these files of anything related to me. And I am going to continue to distract the american public with my nonsense and i'm also doing the best i can to inflame the liberals i want their heads and their hair on fire as they run around talking about and remarking about my idiocy and so all of that is working but i i want to list three people who are impacted by the files yes and then i want you to respond to them okay so the first one is jeff epstein himself and so he it's posthumous but he is decisively a rogue figure who wasn't just a sexual predator but i think it's definitive at this point that he was running a system and this was not a solo crime and his legacy in my opinion is now inseparable from institutional failure for a world that I will describe as the elites, okay?

11:30Katty Kay:The number two victim, and I think this is the most consequential, Caddy, is the elite orbit, okay? These are the real losers, okay? These are the billionaires, the powerful lawyers, the media executives, intelligence adjacent figures, royal former Prince Andrew, and political insiders like Lord Mandelson, who may or may not be a lord by the time this broadcast is over. He's resigned, as we both know, from the Labor Party. But I think this is potentially big, because I think this is what younger politicians like Mondani and a new crop of politicians are going to run on. And believe it or not, there's a lot of seething anger by a very large group of people in this country over the fact that these billionaires and quasi trillionaires and political figures, no harm will be done to them in the United States.

12:26Katty Kay:They're losing their jobs in places in Europe and they're getting defrocked like Andrew did in UK. But the Department of Justice, Dana Bash was told over the weekend, nobody's getting prosecuted. Nobody's getting prosecuted. Here's a list of all the bad guys. But I think there's going to be political blowback from this.

12:47Anthony Scaramucci:Yeah, I think you're right. One other thing, I think you're so smart to bring this up and to frame it in that context, because it is difficult from this massive pile of documents to pull somebody out and say, this person is definitively guilty of having colluded with Jeffrey Epstein to traffic young girls, having sex with underage girls, and having a kind of system of nefariousness, because there are so many documents that we're still sorting through them. But there are plenty of very important people, the kinds of people who speak at Davos, where you and I were, the kinds of people who speak at democratic conventions, the kind of people who speak at republic conventions who have been lionized over the course of the last 20 years, who even in the cursory first look at some of these documents don't come out of this well.

13:32Anthony Scaramucci:Now, did they commit crimes? We can't say that yet. We don't know that yet. We haven't got all of the information from these documents yet. But the degree to which they were in cahoots with Jeffrey Epstein, the tone of the emails that they sent backwards and forwards with Jeffrey Epstein, I mean, maybe Andrew is at the most egregious end of it. But knowing what we do about Epstein and the way that he was raping young girls for years and years and years, hundreds of them. And the cozy tone with which these men talk to him about sexual issues doesn't make any of these men look good. And the fact that there is no retribution against them.

14:11Anthony Scaramucci:It's interesting that when Bernie Sanders and AOC went on that tour, they called it the fight the oligarchy tour, which sounds like it's sort of us against the business leaders. But I think in a way you're right. It's us against the elite. It's the elite that have been protecting themselves, whether it's because their assets have gone up, because they have had more of the share of the pie of GDP, because income disparity has grown, or because they've protected themselves with a sexual monster like Epstein. I think you're right. I think it's such a smart way of framing it, Anthony.

14:43Katty Kay:So I just want to go one step further, because again, I think they're all tied together. So Epstein is bothering a lot of people. And guess who those people happen to be in Trump's base? Okay. They are the Marjorie Taylor Greens who were, quote, unquote, pure MAGA. And it's tied to the Kennedy Center because I'm going to tell you why.

15:07Anthony Scaramucci:I'm waiting for this. I'm waiting for the tieback. Okay. So ready?

15:10Katty Kay:The Kennedy Center was effectively boycotted. And the boycott had such a big impact that they're now closing the center. Now, one of our podcast contemporaries is a personal friend of ours, Scott Galloway, is calling for a boycott of the MAG-7. Okay, you can go to his website, unsubscribe, and he is asking people to resist and unsubscribe. That's the name of the website. And it's launching on February 1st, which is a day or two ago.

15:41Anthony Scaramucci:It's basically an economic boycott of America that he's calling.

15:44Katty Kay:Well, you see, what he's calling for is a boycott of the MAG-7. He doesn't want to hurt small businesses and he doesn't want to strike, which always disproportionately hurts small businesses. So how is it all tied together? It's tied together because Trump has sufficiently pissed everybody off by saying that there was a file that he was going to release. Then he becomes president. She lies about it. Then she says there's no file. Then Massey and Marjorie Taylor Greene said there is a file. Now they're going to 6 million document dump a file that has redacted Trump and anybody close to Trump from the file.

16:26Katty Kay:But guess what, Caddy? Everybody and their mother knows exactly what they did. And so there's a point of potential resistance right now where if Galloway and this group starts a boycott process similar to what they did in the Kennedy, the Trump Kennedy Center, this is going to be an unmitigated disaster for those tech companies okay uh in the united states in the 1950s if you were black you could not sit in the front of the buses in the south rosa parks said f you guys i'm too tired i'm not moving to the back they threw off the bus and then there was a bus boycott throughout the south by the african-american citizens that lived in the South, and it caused massive consequential damage.

17:18Katty Kay:So this is all connected, Caddy, because this is going to trigger something now that even people in Trump's base are talking about wanting to do.

17:29Anthony Scaramucci:Although I think it is one thing for theater companies to boycott performing at the Kennedy Center and for audience goers not to buy tickets at the Kennedy Center and another for people who have made a lot of money from the Mag 7 or have them in their pension funds to suddenly say, okay, I'm going to liquidate all of my Mag 7 stocks, even if that means I might have to retire a little bit later or I take a financial hit to myself.

17:57Katty Kay:This could be consumers that don't own any stocks, but they have an Instagram account. They have a Amazon Prime account. And they pull back from that. They are ordering stuff from these different companies they switch from apple to samsung and they say geez i'm really sorry i'm now have to protest your fawning over the wannabe dictator so i have to

18:19Anthony Scaramucci:fawn and we should watch that because it'd be very interesting to see how far that goes and how big it gets i want to say one other thing on the epstein files before we move on to some of the politics which are super interesting um and what on earth was tulsi gabbard doing down in georgia We'll get to that too in a second. But we've taken time on this show to talk about the victims of the Epstein files. The Justice Department said that one of the reasons they had taken their time to release these files was because they wanted to protect the identity of the victims. They were going to go through all of these files and make sure that names and faces of people who had been sexually abused as girls by Jeffrey Epstein, that they didn't have their names put out there in public without even their permission being given and potentially could have dangerous threats against them, get re-traumatized.

Read the full transcript

19:09Anthony Scaramucci:It is not something that they wanted to do. But guess what? In this big dump of documents over the course of the weekend, the victims were not protected. I mean, to your point about there is a system for the elites and there is a system for the victims, once again, the victims have been the last people on the food chain and they've been forgotten because there are names and faces of survivors who are out there. There's a driving license of one victim. Her name is Anushka DiGiorgio. She has said that she can use her name now because her name and her face are there on her driving license. Somebody took the time to redact her address, but they left her name and her face out there.

19:47Anthony Scaramucci:And so she's now out there in public. Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, had said specifically this wouldn't happen. So, I mean, I think it gets to your point, Anthony. There is one world for the rich and powerful, and there is another world and another set of rules for the people that have no wealth and no power. And in this case, those are the surviving victims of Jeffrey Epstein, and they have been forgotten once again in this process.

20:11Katty Kay:So, Katty, when you say that the wishes of the victims goes unrequited by the actions of our government. I just have to tell you how much that pains me and how much sympathy I would like to express to them and on their behalf. It's just a very upsetting thing. And my heart does go out to these people. If you want to add that to ICE and you want to add that to literally the worst poll numbers, the president has a 61%, as you and I are speaking, is a 61 % negative approval rating right now. And when people ask why, they say ICE. And now you have this underlying context. The House subcommittee voted over the weekend to try to hold back even more information or continue to slow roll the Epstein file.

21:06Katty Kay:And so these people are sitting around scratching their heads saying, okay, you really made us move a mountain here. You told us you were not four sexual predators you told us there were no more forever wars you told us you were going after the criminals you were going after the worker bees you're going to go after the criminals in the immigration saga and they're pushing and listen you know i know we're going to get to the texas you're in texas we're going to talk a little bit about what happened in texas and frankly that could have been a one-off but i really think that the heat is on the republicans right now and again just to state for people the idiocy of this keir stormer has announced that he's going to take greenland for his majesty's government okay and look at the look at the look on your

21:57Anthony Scaramucci:yeah i know you have to but this is the crazy world we live in where you have to put it in

22:02Katty Kay:that context a brit could be listening right now right exactly and say what are you talking about Well, no, no. Keir Starmer -

22:09Anthony Scaramucci:Or even Barack Obama says that Canada is going to be the 51st state.

22:12Katty Kay:So it's beyond the pale. And so when I pick up the phone, because these people do talk to me, I don't even know why they're talking to me. But when I pick up the phone and I talk to a Republican congressional leader, which I did this morning, and I say, this doesn't bother you? Oh, the Greenland thing is over. It's been resolved favorably. And what about the traffic coming over the border from Canada, where you want to talk about where a boycott has already started on American goods and American tourism? That would be the Canadian citizens. I'm scratching my nose for all of you guys listening.

22:52Katty Kay:I'm scratching my nose on YouTube. That's what Canada is doing to us, Katty Kat. And that is hurting a lot of small businesses. That would be the bordering states with Canada, New York, and Michigan, Minnesota, etc. But it's also hurting in Florida. Okay. So again, Mr. Congressman, what's up? The equivocation and the ground shifting of the norms is bizarre.

23:24Anthony Scaramucci:Not to mention, by the way, everyone should read the Wall Street Journal article about the UAE sheikh who invested a huge amount of money in the Trump family crypto business on the eve of the inauguration.

23:37Katty Kay:so caddy we're going to get to that too but i just want you to hear the ground shifting equivocation right oh he doesn't really mean that with canada and you know i talked to him about putin and and he says well i've got to be nice to putin so i can get him to the table but then why not be nice to prime minister corney don't you want to get them to the table and do business with them too okay Now, this is where I'm going to get in trouble, and Goldhanger will probably edit me out, but I don't care, Caddy, because it is my opinion. I'm going to share it with you. It's pretty clear from the documents that Epstein had a relationship with the Russians.

24:20Katty Kay:It's pretty clear. I'm not going to go so far to say that he was an agent of Russia and he was running a pedophile ring to create compromise on all of the world's Western elites. I'm not going to go that far to say that.

24:35Anthony Scaramucci:But you are just going to say.

24:37Katty Kay:But I'm right on the edge, okay?

24:39Anthony Scaramucci:Okay, so what is it in the file so far that suggests to you a strong link between Jeffrey Epstein and Moscow?

24:46Katty Kay:So, Cady, Vladimir Putin is mentioned no less than a thousand times, and there's insinuations in the file that Epstein had scheduled meetings with Putin and he had a relationship with Lavrov, the foreign minister. Now, I'm going to state candidly and for the record, there's no proof that Epstein ever met Putin, but the files do show something very troubling. Epstein claimed he had an appointment with Putin. It's right there in the emails. And then he later tried to position himself as a back channel to the Kremlin. Again, right there in the emails. And he was trying to offer insight on US leadership through Lavrov.

25:29Katty Kay:Okay. I mean, these are right in the email. So it tells you that he wanted proximity to Russian power so that he could sell access. And it raises serious counterintelligence questions. So again, these are my opinions. This is my surmise having delved into these documents over the weekend. This is an editorial opinion by me that I'm sharing. But again, you've heard me say this on this podcast, when the windows open and you hear clippity-clop, it is a horse. It is not a zebra. So these are my opinions, and I can show you directly in the files where there's a tie. But again, I love Vladimir Putin.

26:13Katty Kay:Vladimir Putin is my guy. I have a picture of Vladimir Putin and me in my house and my residence above the picture of my family members. And again, if you haven't caught on, I'm channeling Donald Trump because this is how he talks about the guy. And no president, Caddy, puts their name on the Lincoln, Jefferson, or Kennedy memorial. No president threatens to attack Canada or another allied country. No president fawns over the Russian leader who they know has been a dishonest, unsavory adversary of ours for a generation. No president does that, but this president does that, Ken. Okay, so these are my opinions that I'm sharing with you guys.

26:59Katty Kay:We can go to a break now, but listen to me. This has got to hurt somewhere in the system. Maybe it's going to hurt in the house races. Maybe it's going to hurt in a boycott. But the American people are giving this man a 61 % negative approval rating because of the facts, Gaddy. Not just my opinions, the facts.

27:25Anthony Scaramucci:Okay, we'll take a break and we'll be right back.

27:31Katty Kay:This episode is brought to you by Aura Frames. Now it's Mother's Day coming up and Aura Frames is perfect for the mom who says she doesn't need anything.

27:39Anthony Scaramucci:Yeah, and moms are always tricky to shop for.

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29:47Anthony Scaramucci:Welcome back. We said we want to pop down to Texas at Jamming, San Antonio, Texas. Lovely San Antonio, Texas, to speak to Trinity University down here, which a great group of people. But it's timely because Democrats have scored an unlikely victory. there was a special election for a Texas state Senate seat. Remember, every state has its own Senate and its own House of Representatives. And there was a special election for one of the Senate seats down here. And a Democrat, Taylor Remitt, won the seat by a large margin. The district had voted 17 points for Donald Trump in the 2024 election, but Remitt just won it by 14 points this weekend.

30:32Anthony Scaramucci:That represents a 30-point shift for those of you doing the maths on this. And I think you've got a lot of Democrats, Anthony, looking at what happened, not, I hope, telling themselves that Texas is about to go blue, which is the big white whale of all Democrats. But they're looking at this saying this is part of a pattern that we had. We reported on it a lot last year. We had those two big gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia, which swung to the Democrats in much bigger numbers than people had predicted. I had done some research that showed that you've had this huge swing. There have been, I think, in 2025, I think I mentioned this before, there were roughly five dozen special elections for seats in Congress and in state houses and Republicans candidates underperformed Donald Trump by an average of about 13 points.

31:23Anthony Scaramucci:So, across the country, you're seeing people, voters, go to the polls as they did in Texas this weekend to protest against two things. One is the cost of living, this affordability issue, which the president still hasn't done much about, and maybe presidents can't do that much about it. We'll see if the new Fed chair-designate can do much about it. But the other thing that they're protesting against is the immigration policies and everything that we've seen with ICE. It turns out that you were right that Americans don't like these mass deportations when they start going for a grandmother or a five-year-old child or they start killing American citizens as they have done up in Minneapolis over the last few weeks.

32:07Anthony Scaramucci:Then Americans don't like it. And I think that is a big part of what we're seeing. And the two groups that Republicans are losing in these local elections are the two groups that powered Donald Trump to power. They were young voters and Hispanic voters. Donald Trump built up this quite unusual coalition in 2024 that pushed him into the White House again. And it was young voters, young men in particular, and it was Hispanic voters. And his numbers have just fallen off the cliff with both of those two groups of voters. And I think that's what Democrats are looking at. I don't think Democrats are telling themselves they're going to win Texas.

32:40Anthony Scaramucci:But if you want to set this up as a stage ahead of the midterm elections, which are now whatever they are, 10 months away, nine months away, This is part of the reason that Democrats are feeling good. Donald Trump's reaction to this, I wasn't on the ballot, it's not about me, never heard of this, even though he had endorsed Taylor Remitz, Republican opponent in the race. Do you think that Democrats are right to look at this and say, this is good news for us? This is a good sign?

33:07Katty Kay:You know, on the margin, I do. But I have a bigger question, okay? You know, and again, demographically, the Latino voters and some of these suburban electorate that voted for Trump in 24, they look like, hey, man, we had enough of this guy. But a bigger question for you. And that's about the electoral process and the integrity of the process. Democrats tell me, don't worry about that. Trump is not going to meddle in the midterm elections. It's too decentralized for him to meddle.

33:39Anthony Scaramucci:Do you believe that, Katty? I mean, I think those are great questions. And we've already seen some meddling because we've seen Texas and California make moves to redistrict their districts in ways that would politically advantage themselves, either Republicans in Texas or Democrats in California. That is a form of election engineering, if you like. That is a way you set the playing field. and the Republicans are trying to set the playing field so that they have more seats going into the midterm elections. I think the issue that has been raised in the last week or two by Donald Trump, and I don't know whether it is just because Donald, this is something he cannot let go, or whether it's something he brings up like a cultural weapon when he's doing badly because of all the scenes from Minneapolis, or there's a great deal of pushback and he's had to row back on Greenland, or he says that allied NATO forces didn't fight very well in the wars in Afghanistan, and he has to row back from that.

34:42Anthony Scaramucci:And so, guess what he brings up again? He starts bringing up the 2020 election. And if you had to kind of map the number of times he's mentioned the 2020 election during the course of the past year, I reckon AI could probably do it for us. You'd see a massive uptick in the last two or three weeks. He's gone back to his old playbook. The election was rigged. Now, there's no new evidence, and we can get into what was happening down in Fulton County, Georgia, where they've demanded the election rolls. There's no new evidence, as far as I can see, that's come out that suggests that there was something quantifiably different about the 2020 election that has not already been litigated.

35:17Anthony Scaramucci:So why is he bringing it up now? Why is he going back to that playbook? I think you're right. Maybe he's going back to the playbook to create a false narrative around election security more broadly that is designed to destabilize the upcoming midterm elections. So this is not actually about the 2020 election. This is a narrative that is taking place about the 2026 election. Is that what you're thinking?

35:43Katty Kay:Yes. And in Catherine Belton's book, Putin's People, which was written about five years ago, the legendary journalist Catherine Catherine Belton said that what would the Russians ideally want in the West, particularly in the longest standing democracy, the United States, what would they want? They would want someone of credibility to sow the seeds of distrust in the electoral process. Are the statements by the 45th and 47th president of the United States doing that, Kat?

36:21Anthony Scaramucci:Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you've got the double whammy of we know the fact that in 2016, the Russians were meddling in the US election process. But now it's not the Russians that are raising issues about electoral security. It's Donald Trump that keeps raising issues about election security. So what happened just to fill people in, this week, the FBI executed a search warrant at the Fulton County Election Office in Georgia. Fulton County was at the heart of all of the disputes about the 2020 election. Georgia, you'll remember, all of you, was a state that Donald Trump lost, but pretty narrowly, it was by about 10 ,000 votes.

36:58Anthony Scaramucci:He went to the Secretary of State and said, find me more votes. The Secretary of State said, no, that's not how it works. Fulton County was the county that a lot of the dispute was focused on. So last week, the FBI goes down to Fulton County and they have a search warrant and they want to search the Fulton County offices, and they want to take away things like the electoral rolls, more information about the 2020 election. This has been hauled over so many times. They've gone through it. They've litigated it so many times. And one of the things that was really weird about the raid was that Tulsi Gabbard, who is the director of national intelligence, was present at the raid.

37:39Anthony Scaramucci:The reporting from the Wall Street Journal is that she called Donald Trump from the office, from the faulty countenance election offices and kind of put him on speakerphone. But Tulsi Gabbard's role, a bit like the CIA, is to deal with foreign international threats. So a lot of questions. What's she doing there? Is it constitutional that she's there? Has she got new information of some international player meddling in the 2020 election? What's the new information that would justify a new search warrant when this has been gone over so many times already and nothing nefarious has been found? Or is Tulsi Gabbard just trying to save her own job?

38:17Anthony Scaramucci:And so she's trying to get in with Donald Trump and she knows that the way you get in with Donald Trump is you say, Mr. President, the 2020 election was stolen. I'm going to go down there. I've got new information. But the fallout is that people will not trust the election system as much as they did. So, Katty, Tulsi Gabbard, the Wall Street Journal, let's give them kudos

38:39Katty Kay:because they have a mole inside the White House. There's no question. And they have a mole that's an adjutant to the president.

38:47Anthony Scaramucci:In journalism, we call it a source, by the way. We don't call it a mole. This is not a John McCary novel.

38:51Katty Kay:Let me rephrase this. This is not the rest is classified. We have a source.

38:55Anthony Scaramucci:I know that you secretly want to be the host of the rest is classified. We have a source. So we can call it a mole just to make you happy.

39:01Katty Kay:Only for the Kennedy assassination, okay? McCloskey, if you're listening. Okay. But we have a source inside the administration that does not like the administration. And they're dropping dimes to the Wall Street Journal. And the Wall Street Journal is doing some exceptional reporting. We have to give them kudos. I agree. They reported on the$500 million. You tell me what it is, we'll call it a business transaction. But you're having a business transaction with the president. And then you're getting AI chips that were classified. I don't know. we'll just leave that there we'll leave it there we'll leave that hanging yes we're going to leave that hanging chat out there now we have at 5 a.m this morning the wall street journal is reporting that a whistleblower complaint was filed against tulsi galbert amazing yeah and that is so secretive they've got it locked in a cupboard yes so something is going on something's up and tulsi

39:58Anthony Scaramucci:needs to save her job and if you need to save your job in the trump administration you either go after people on the streets of minneapolis or you say the election was stolen so the inspector trying

40:10Katty Kay:to put pressure on the inspector general now to say that this confidential whistleblowing complaint isn't justifiable see what's going on but you see caddy this is the good news for america and this is the good news for people listening who say wow america has really lost its way yes that is true but there are still very very good people in america and there's still a system in place in america where there are unwilling participants in this faux fascist charade notice i said faux in front of fascists you can't be overly mad at me and they're rising up and And they're speaking out.

40:53Anthony Scaramucci:Just a bit mad, like just a little bit mad. Yeah.

40:56Katty Kay:Not like overly mad. Okay. So go ahead. Provide us your erudite analysis of Ms. Gabbard and her role in all this.

41:06Anthony Scaramucci:I think Ms. Gabbard is down there to save her job. I honestly think that's what she's doing. I think she was squeezed out of all of the Venezuela raid stuff. She is not respected in the Trump administration. She's been put on the outs and she's thought to herself, what can I do? I'll go down to Georgia and I'll find some way to make a show of being down there and I'll call the president when I'm down there and tell him that I'm in the Fulton County, Georgia election offices and that we've got new information and we're digging everything up and we're going to prove, Mr. President, that you should have been the 46th president.

41:42Anthony Scaramucci:You should have been reelected in 2020 and that the election was stolen. I honestly can't see otherwise why the head of DNI would be down there. Unless, you know, my God, there is some unbelievable kind of foreign intervention evidence that we haven't come across. But the way that that I have never known an election that has been litigated and relitigated and relitigated, whatever it was, 60 different lawsuits brought by the Trump team, and all of them dismissed. I mean, this was looked at by so many judges that if there was some massive fraud or some massive foreign intervention, I can't believe we wouldn't have found it.

42:17Anthony Scaramucci:So I think she was down there to save her job. And I think the president is going back to the 2020 election stuff because he's, as we've been saying on the show, he's feeling the heat. He's feeling that heat across a whole range of things. He's pulled back from Greenland. He's pulled back from what he said about allies, NATO troops. He's had to pull back on Minneapolis. Let's see what happens there. But he's had to pull back his people from Minneapolis. It's been climbed down central from the White house and i think when he's under pressure he goes back to 2020 okay we have to be fine i know

42:51Katty Kay:we have to go caddy but we have to do a little bit of role playing with me if you do not mind okay and i'm a reporter now okay so okay and you're the fbi agent and you have now she took out her cell phone not a classified phone but her cell phone and she called the president and the president got on the phone with tulsi gabbard to praise the fbi agents and now you're the fbi agent and i'm interviewing you and i say to you well

43:22Anthony Scaramucci:what did you think about that and you say what well we have gone over this i would like to see the new evidence i mean i if you're a good fbi agent you know that this has been litigated up the wazoo. If you're a Trump friendly FBI agent, you might be very flattered that she goes down there and he speaks to you while you're on the phone. And then you go out there and say, well, maybe there is new things. Maybe President Trump is still interested. We should still keep digging because maybe it was an unfair election. And that's the trouble where that's why it becomes insidious is that even though there is no evidence that the 2020 election was anything other than free and fair all of this just creates doubt which is guess what exact who is it who is the number one person that wants americans to have doubt about the electoral system

44:13Katty Kay:your friend vladimir putin i'm gonna leave it there right because i'm gonna get myself in trouble because i'm gonna say some stuff and you guys just say you can't say that so i'm not gonna say it but i'm gonna talk directly i'm breaking the fourth wall yeah and i'm gonna talk directly to the viewers and listeners the obvious is the obvious, Katika, and I'll leave it there.

44:38Anthony Scaramucci:Cryptic words from Mr. Scaramucci. Okay, that's it for today. This, of course, is, however, a super busy time, you'll have noticed in American politics. And we don't have time to cover everything on this episode. We have not really talked about Minneapolis, which we would love to because there is more going on up there that we should be talking about. We've only alluded to some of the graph that is taking place. But luckily for our members, we will be back on Wednesday to discuss more of the big stories this week. We're going to have an update on ICE, look at the Democrats' chances for the midterms beyond that Texas race we were just talking about, and how are other countries buying their way onto Donald Trump's Board of Peace.

45:18Anthony Scaramucci:So do join us for that. Become a founding member at therestispoliticsus.com. We would love to have you in the club and we'd love to hear your questions if you join up too so go on become a founding member thanks guys thanks for listening okay we'll see you later in the week thank you guys

From the publisher

What does the latest Epstein file dump tell us about Trump’s connections to Epstein? Will the Democrat win in Texas be spooking Trump? And, why is Tulsi Gabbard in trouble? 

Join Katty Kay and Anthony Scaramucci as they answer all these questions and more.

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