Jeffrey Epstein files - a once friendly ghost haunting Trump, splitting MAGA base

Key topics:MAGA base erupts over Epstein probe findings, rejecting official reportInternal rifts grow as MAGA leaders clash over conspiracy narrativesTrump struggles to unify base amid Epstein fallout and policy backlash.Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here.The auditorium doors will open for BNIC#2 on 10 September 2025 in Hermanus. For more information and tickets, click here..By Timothy L. O'Brien.Trouble is brewing among the MAGAs.“How many of you are satisfied with the results of the Epstein investigation?” Fox pundit Laura Ingraham asked attendees at a Friday summit of young conservatives sponsored by Turning Point USA, an influential far-right activist group close to the Trump administration. The answer, according to the Washington Post, was a crescendo of boos.Jeffrey Epstein, in case you forgot, was a well-connected former money manager who hanged himself in a Manhattan jail cell in 2019 while facing federal criminal charges of sex trafficking minors. He had been accused repeatedly over the years of manipulating and molesting underage girls and pleaded guilty in 2008 to state charges in Florida of securing the services of a child for prostitution and for soliciting prostitution.Epstein had scores of friends in high places. A former president, Bill Clinton; Prince Andrew of the British royal family; business contacts such as Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Leslie Wexner, the onetime chief executive officer of retailer Victoria’s Secret; and prominent attorneys such as Alan Dershowitz all were in his orbit. Epstein’s address book overflowed with star-studded names from Hollywood, Wall Street and Washington. Donald Trump’s name was among them (more on that later).Despite Trump figuring prominently in Epstein’s network, a tale took root in the MAGAsphere: Epstein maintained a secret list of his clients and used it to manipulate corrupt government officials and other A-listers. The conspiracy theory also held that Epstein’s death wasn’t a suicide. Rather, he was murdered in his cell to silence him as part of a cover-up.Last week, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Justice Department, both headed by Trump appointees who had once helped stoke the Epstein yarns, issued a memorandum stating that a thorough investigation by the agencies concluded that Epstein didn’t maintain a secret list and had, indeed, killed himself.The memo landed like the Covid-19 vaccine among the MAGA faithful. They wanted no part of it and instead called for Attorney General Pam Bondi’s resignation. Tucker Carlson, a veteran conspiracy theorist, opined on his podcast that Bondi, who helped seed the Epstein conspiracies, was now “covering up crimes, very serious crimes by their own description.”While all of this was happening, Bondi continued a purge inside the Justice Department of law enforcement officials involved in the investigation of the Jan. 6 insurrection at the US Capitol. Axios reported on Friday that 20 of her employees involved in that probe and the federal investigation into Trump’s handling of classified documents had been fired. The Jan. 6 siege was broadcast live, filmed and lavishly documented, but Trump’s supporters have minimized its significance and Trump’s role in it, choosing to amplify the Epstein lunacies instead. Carlson himself has routinely portrayed Jan. 6 as a false flag operation initiated by law enforcement to snare Trump supporters. Go figure.And there’s the rub. When no one knows which conspiracy theory to believe, and you partake in a movement animated by conspiracies about science, education, the economy, the weather, the government, the world and reality, two things tend to happen: fault lines develop within the cult and then its members start turning on one another..Read more:.The Economist: Paedophile Jeffrey Epstein is still causing trouble for Donald Trump.That certainly seems to be the case now. Dan Bongino, an Epstein provocateur before Trump appointed him deputy director of the FBI, has reportedly threatened to quit over his distaste with how Bondi handled the Epstein review. To confuse you further, Bongino reportedly was aligned with Bondi on the review, but that alliance splintered once the MAGA criticisms began rolling in. FBI Director Kash Patel, Bongino’s boss, was also an Epstein conspiracy theorist before Trump put him atop the nation’s law enforcement apparatus. Who knows whose side he’ll ultimately take in this kindergarten dustup, but for now he seems to be sticking with Bondi. So complicated. So conspiratorial. Such a silly waste of taxpayer dollars and voters’ attention spans.And the hits keep on coming. On Saturday, Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser, took to social media to warn the president that “the EPSTEIN AFFAIR is not going away.” Elon Musk, who once said in a post that he later deleted that Trump was named in the government’s Epstein files, also aired his views on Saturday. He said Trump could end MAGA’s internecine warfare if he were to “just release the files as promised.”For his part, Trump, who has also spent years trafficking in conspiracy theories, is never one to stay out of an argument like this, especially when it threatens his own political coalition. He tried to resolve things on Saturday evening with a post on his social media platform — and by defending Bondi and offering up a crazy quilt of more conspiracy theories.“We’re on one Team, MAGA, and I don’t like what’s happening. We have a PERFECT Administration, THE TALK OF THE WORLD, and ‘selfish people’ are trying to hurt it, all over a guy who never dies, Jeffrey Epstein. For years, it’s Epstein, over and over again. Why are we giving publicity to Files written by Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration?” he allowed. “Why didn’t these Radical Left Lunatics release the Epstein Files? If there was ANYTHING in there that could have hurt the MAGA Movement, why didn’t they use it? ... Kash Patel, and the FBI, must be focused on investigating Voter Fraud, Political Corruption, ActBlue, The Rigged and Stolen Election of 2020, and arresting Thugs and Criminals. … Let’s keep it that way, and not waste Time and Energy on Jeffrey Epstein, somebody that nobody cares about.”Trump, of course, would have as much interest as anyone who traveled in Epstein’s world in keeping a lid on revelations. As I noted in a column in 2019, for a while he was more than just a casual acquaintance of Epstein.Epstein was a member of Trump’s Palm Beach club, Mar-a-Lago, and they dined together at each other’s homes. Trump flew on Epstein’s plane multiple times. According to Miami Herald reporter Julie Brown, Epstein was quoted in court papers as saying he wanted to set up his modeling agency — which prosecutors believed he used to gain access to underage girls — “the same way Trump set up his modeling agency.”Although a court filing said Mar-a-Lago eventually dumped Epstein from its ranks after he approached an underage girl there, Trump generally spoke about Epstein fondly — to me and to others. “I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy,” Trump told New York magazine in 2002. “He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”I suspect Trump’s incentive now for making the Epstein matter disappear is largely political. His base is unhappy that he’s giving carve-outs on raids and deportations to business sectors like farming and lodging that depend on undocumented immigrants to survive. They’re also troubled by the prospect of the president providing more military aid to Ukraine so it can survive its war with Russia. And they’re very unhappy that the Epstein conspiracy has lost its wings.Charlie Kirk, Turning Point USA’s young founder, told the Washington Post during his group’s three-day conference that Trump risks splintering his base ahead of next year’s midterm elections. The “excitement I saw among younger voters could be defused,” he said, equating the loss of enthusiasm to losing “air out of a balloon.”If that’s the case, and if the infighting continues amid an economy threatened by cartwheeling tariff policies, Trump may have to learn the lessons of courting conspiracy — and political whirlwinds..© 2025 Bloomberg L.P.