Former President Donald Trump sued to keep documents about pedophile trafficker Jeffrey Epstein under wraps. For the first time, Congress has passed a bill requiring their release. What a dramatic turn of events! The bill as passed now requires the U.S. Attorney General to disclose all unclassified documents relating to Epstein within 30 days. Even though Trump made an unprecedented attempt to intimidate Republican lawmakers to vote against the bill, he lost that fight.
Trump was convinced of it enough to convene an emergency meeting in the White House Situation Room. There, he strongarmed Republican members of Congress to vote the legislation down. He denounced Republican sponsors of the bill as “idiots.” Then, he just totally rejected the Epstein files as some kind of “hoax invented by Democrats.”
In a striking comment, Trump referred to Marjorie Taylor Greene, a prominent Republican who supported the bill, as a “traitor.” As far as slowing down the legislative process through incendiary rhetoric, his goal seemed to have been to unite opposition within his party, though it obviously backfired.
In fact, the new law was signed by Trump just hours after this episode of “Jimmy Kimmel Live! The production featured critical and artistic commentary through the lens of this emerging situation. Kimmel addressed Trump’s motives for releasing the files, asking why he had not done so in the first place during his presidency.
“What is going on? Is he beating them? I don’t get it. They just blindly defend him. They don’t know what’s in those files! They’re taking his word for it.” – Jimmy Kimmel
Trump fully possessed the authority to declassified Epstein-related documents while in office, but chose not to. He never provided a satisfactory explanation for what he was doing or not doing during that critical time. We’re in an interesting and pretty challenged climate right now. Will the Justice Department fully implement this new law and release all the needed files?
Trump’s most recent meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House just last month. This is on the heels of the still-ongoing Epstein scandal. This past March, during this same meeting, he waved off questions about bin Salman’s possible role in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Critics claim that this new meeting undercuts Trump’s “Crooked Joe” accountability narrative right out of the gate. They worry that his repeat dismissal of serious allegations quells transparency.
“Trump’s whole vibe in this meeting is a reminder not to trust him when he tells you he cut ties with Epstein after learning the truth about him.” – Seth Meyers
As Congress moved forward with the legislation, Trump’s public statements reflected a mix of defiance and confusion among his supporters. He still went on to say that the Epstein files were political attack smear campaign. Those claims were not compelling enough to win over enough Republicans to stop the bill’s passage.
On his show, Stephen Colbert made a playful guess as to what Trump should do about the novel legislation. He warned that Trump’s unpredictability might lead to unexpected wins.
“Is he going to sign it? Is he going to not sign it and change his name to Signor Ramon and flee to Acapulco?” – Stephen Colbert
With the bill signed into law, all eyes now look toward implementation. The Justice Department will have to release all relevant unclassified documents related to Epstein within 30 days. Serious uncertainty clouds whether they’ll be able to comply with this requirement in its entirety.
As Jimmy Kimmel pointed out, this move gets us a step closer to being able to answer some important questions, like whether Trump knew what Epstein was up to.
“We are now one step closer to answering the question: what did the president know and how old were these women when he knew it?” – Jimmy Kimmel
The Epstein case has continued to generate tremendous public interest. Perhaps this is what has so many in the weeds speculating on whether Trump will move to pre-empt some of the damage or shelter himself from the fallout as these disclosures emerge.