A couple of weeks ago, I was fatalistic about the outrageous Epstein cover-up. As the story faded from the headlines, it looked as if Donald Trump’s patented combination of delay, distraction, and denial would work once again. Aargh!
No more. Now I think Trump is scared, and the Epstein story is like a bad case of herpes that lies dormant for weeks but doesn’t go away for a long time. Why else would he pull out all the stops with House Republicans and warn that anyone pushing for the release of the Epstein files would be seen by him as engaging in a “very hostile act”?
The New York Times reports that efforts to circumvent House leadership with a discharge petition and bring this matter to the floor have “stalled” two votes shy of the six Republicans needed. So maybe Trump’s thuggish threats have once again bought him some breathing room. As Democratic Rep. Jim McGovern told the New Republic, “The Rules Committee Republicans are scared shitless of Donald Trump, to put it bluntly.”
But the politics of the Epstein story remain treacherous for Trump. Instead of the usual partisan lines, the MAGA base is split over it, with nut job Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene demanding the release of the files and nut job presidential adviser Laura Loomer manning the X barricades for her man:
Over at Project Veritas, rightwing provocateur James O’Keefe assigned one of his undercover subordinates to surreptitiously tape a DOJ official saying that the department will redact the names of Republicans and release the names of Democrats implicated in the files. O’Keefe may have wanted to expose the longtime “deep state” official and it will surely cost him his job. But the tape also reflects O’Keefe’s criticism of Attorney General Pam Bondi’s conduct.
If that wasn’t tricky enough for Trump, there’s a new potent force in this story: Jeffrey Epstein’s victims, who have turned from terrified 14-year-old “Jane Does” into intrepid and hugely sympathetic warriors for transparency and justice. Wednesday, September 3, 2025, the date of their news conference in front of the Capitol, may be remembered as the beginning of the first real accountability of Trump’s second term.
One after another, the women struck exactly the right tone in asserting themselves and placing the responsibility for squelching the files where it belongs. “I’m no longer weak. I am no longer powerless, and I’m no longer alone,” Anouska De Georgiou, a former teen model, said. “President Trump, you have so much influence and power in this situation. Please use that influence and power to help us, because we need it now, and the country needs it now.”
Trump’s response? He called the news conference, sponsored by the mind-bending coalition of Greene, progressive Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna, and brave Rep. Thomas Massie, part of a “Democratic hoax.” The whole thing is “irrelevant,” he said.
That’s Trump’s line, and he’s sticking to it, just as Roy Cohn taught him. The problem for him is that it isn’t convincing, even to much of his hardcore base. While some of his sycophants closed ranks behind him on Wednesday, other MAGA influencers — worried that their followers weren’t cool with trashing Epstein’s victims — began backing away, more fearful of losing their social media meal tickets than of Trump. Cover-up options that seemed viable just a few days ago — like pardoning Ghislaine Maxwell – now seem dead.
House Republicans, assuming their MAGA supporters are stupid, thought they could get away with another document dump — this time, 33,000 pages of files meant, like previous “releases,” to put the story to rest.
Nope. Pre-AI, it would have taken days to confirm that only three percent of the documents (mostly meaningless ones) had anything new in them. Now, Democrats and the media could do this within minutes, and no Republicans contested it.
Beyond “irrelevant” and “Democratic hoax,” Trump and the Republicans are trying to claim that the privacy of the young women will be jeopardized if the full Epstein files are released. But the women themselves have refuted that. And Trump’s line that other innocent people will be hurt if he does what he promised isn’t washing, either. The White House has told Republicans on the Hill that those “others” who sexually abused young women are not just Democrats — as Trump alleged during the 2024 campaign — but GOP donors. Trying to protect them from embarrassment is not a sustainable damage control strategy.
So what happens now? Maybe nothing at first, as Trump muddles through. But eventually, Massie’s call for constituents to demand action will at least result in meetings between the Epstein victims and the 31 GOP House members who are women. The meetings may not yield results. Rep. Nancy Mace fled a House Oversight Committee closed-door meeting with victims, tweeting that she was having “a full blown panic attack” and “GOD BLESS ALL SURVIVORS,” then went out of her way to defend Trump.
But I still think more women will now step forward, and their stories will condition the debate over releasing the files. Someone at the news conference used my new favorite line: “Courage is contagious.”
House Republicans, led by despicable Oversight Chair Rep. James Comer, still have various ways to pretend to be investigating while trying to run out the clock. But there’s plenty of time on the clock before the midterms for the herpes to re-surface. “This is not going to go away,” McGovern said. “Sooner or later, we will get those extra two Republicans that would force a vote on the Massie-Khanna bill.”
if they do, the bill will almost certainly pass, as will a similar measure in the Senate, where Republicans don’t carry quite as much water for Trump as the House ‘fraidy cats do. When they have to actually vote on this, Republicans in both chambers will be loath to tell these victims that what they suffered is “irrelevant.”
Trump will then be faced with the question of whether to veto the bill. I think he will, out of fear of what’s in the files about him and possibly about Melania. If he didn’t fear their release, he wouldn’t have had FBI Director Kash Patel tell his people to go through the files to flag his name.
Vetoing that bill will be very bad for Republicans in the midterms. And it’s even possible that to save their skins, Republicans in both houses will vote to override it. Call me naive, but do not rule that out.
At the news conference, we heard from a relative of Virginia Giuffre, whom Epstein had hired away from Mar-a-Lago and then abused. She kept a journal that was found after her suicide:
I look forward to the day when money and power do not stop the truth from coming out, and the righteous from prevailing.
That day may be coming.
"The whole thing is irrelevant!" Whom does he think he's fooling! Why on earth would Trump have the slightest concern about the release of those tapes if they were of no consequence?
These women are heroes.