On Nov. 18, House Republicans, in full retreat after months of obstruction and partisan delaying tactics, joined Democrats in an almost unanimous vote supporting release of the Epstein files. Hours later, the U.S. Senate quickly approved the same legislation that directed the Justice Department to release evidence gathered in federal investigations into Donald Trump’s longtime friends convicted sex offenders Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.
After months of aggressive efforts to block the legislation that would release the Epstein files, on Nov. 16 President Trump abruptly changed his position, saying he now supported release of the Epstein documents. The dramatic shift occurred after it became apparent that hundreds of House Republicans would abandon the president and vote to pass the Epstein files bill.
While the Epstein release legislation will soon be sent to the president’s desk for signing, or a veto, Trump has long had the power to unilaterally release the Epstein files on his own without congressional action. But in a hint of a possible new tactic that could be used to prevent the release of the documents, Trump directed the Justice Department to open new investigations into public figures associated with Jeffrey Epstein, that he labeled as Democrats. Active Justice Department criminal investigations could be cited as a reason to prevent public release or redact certain information within the Epstein files. Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Heather Digby Parton, a columnist for Salon.com, who talks about President Trump’s reversal on release of the Epstein files and how it lends credence to what many describe as one of the biggest political coverups in U.S. history.
HEATHER DIGBY PARTON: Well, you know, he is anything but a person who is subject to shame. So being a hypocrite is just part of who he is. And he just shifted dramatically on this yesterday. But it came in as the word was coming down that they were losing Republican Congress people by the dozens on this issue and that he was going to lose that fight. And Trump can’t stand to lose. So basically he just jumped in front of the parade and decided to say, “Oh, I’ve been for this all along.” Where this becomes a problem for Donald Trump beyond the obvious, of course, which is that he was great friends with Epstein and is all over the files, no doubt, certainly all over the emails that we just saw released last week. But the problem for Trump is that conspiracy theories, you’re either in or you’re out, you’re a believer or you’re not.
And Trump’s on both sides of that. He’s always been kind of the conspiracy theorist president buying into all this stuff. That’s one of the reasons why he’s so beloved by his MAGA following. And on this one, he’s in the conspiracy, so he’s been on the back foot here this whole time. He just does not seem to be able to find any place to control it. And I don’t think he still is, even though he’s now saying that he’ll sign the bill. I mean, everybody knows he could release the files tomorrow if he wanted to, but he clearly does not want them to come out. And that just, of course, spurs more suspicion that there’s something going on there. I don’t know if this particular thing indicates there’s a real break within MAGA. But I do think that his attempt here to try and bring himself back into the MAGA-fold is an indication that something has gone very, very much awry among his own followers.
SCOTT HARRIS: I’ve been reading and I had some thoughts myself, of course, on the fact that Trump has the veto power. But there is another way out for Trump given the fact that he just within the last day or two called for new investigations of former President Clinton, JP Morgan Chase, democratic funder Reid Hoffman and former Secretary of the Treasury Larry Summers, who have been mentioned as being part of the Epstein file. Now, if those investigations are opened by Trump’s Department of Justice, that would mean they have an out to say we cannot release the files because there are current ongoing investigations happening. And of course there could have been investigations during his first administration and certainly in these last six months, but this is a convenient way to stop the release, is it not?
HEATHER DIGBY PARTON: Absolutely. And there’s no doubt in my mind that that’s exactly why he did that. He could release these right now if he wanted to. He has not shown any reticence to ordering the Department of Justice to do anything he wants it to. And they have not shown any kind of reluctance to follow his orders. So he could certainly do that. And he’s not doing that. And I do agree that this whole thing about the new investigation that he’s ordered and Pam Bondi, the attorney general saluting smartly and saying, “Yes sir, I’ll get right on that” is definitely setting that up. And interestingly, the part about that that he’s so completely obsessed with about Clinton and JP Morgan and all the rest of them, and Reid Hoffman, I guess Larry Summers, he says they’re all Democrats. And so they’re the ones he said all day today, he was saying in press appearances, “This is a Democrat problem, it’s a Democrat.”
Well, who was a Democrat when all this was taking place? Donald Trump, because he used to be one. So I don’t think that’s really the great excuse that he thinks it is. And in any case, last July, the Department of Justice came out with a big report that said that they had looked at all this, they had thoroughly investigated everything they had. They went over and they did, they sent him like a 100 and some FBI agents to go and comb through the files and some site out in Maryland. And I dunno if they looked at all the videos or what they did, but they actually did have people doing it. And they came out and said there was nothing in there and there was no reason to pursue any third parties—that they found no evidence, nothing that would predicate any kind of investigation on any third parties. That was just four months ago.
And so now they’re going to do a big investigation on all these people. So the whole thing is just a setup to try and keep the files out of the hands of the people. I mean, I dunno about you, but I am not thinking there’s going to be any big release of any files anytime soon.
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