Mini-cut of House Republicans bringing back the “if Trump was incriminated by the Epstein files then Biden would’ve released them” line on Thursday (although the first one was the “This is just a distraction from the Senate Dems’ shutdown cave” line). Now, tempting as it is to once again rehash the old “Trump stole classified nuclear secrets and the MAGA propaganda machine said the FBI planted the files, so SURE they’d believe it Merrick Garland said Trump raped teen sex trafficking victims” and call it a wrap, it’s worth noting what makes the deflection suck even worse this time.
First off, the emails dropped on Wednesday by the House Oversight Dems came from Epstein’s estate, not the Justice Department. They were never in government hands until this week. Second, even if they had been collected years ago, what in them is criminally actionable? You can say they definitely could’ve helped damage Trump politically last year, but that’s something for Dem voters to rage at Merrick Garland for not fighting dirtier. And also see above about whether MAGA voters would’ve believed it. Third, Trump is the president now and on Wednesday he tried and failed to strongarm Nancy Mace and Lauren Boebert into backing out of the discharge petition to force a vote to force the DOJ to release the files. That’s the whole fucking reason this “hoax” is still going on.
Trump doesn’t want the files released. He wants this all to go away, probably because they contain evidence that he at the very least knew that his friend was raping and abusing teenage girls. While it takes a lot of words to explain and the whole scandal is a confusing mess, that stark reality is actually pretty simple to understand: Trump was complicit in if not a satisfied customer of a sex trafficking ring and he’s trying to prevent the wider public from gaining that understanding.
The Wednesday emails did not help that effort. They hurt it. Even a freaking nutcase like Megyn Kelly has to give up the ghost and admit it then it becomes even harder to avoid the reality.