The Right Enemies

Finally, common sense.

No, not Karoline Leavitt, press secretary of President Donald Trump, but one BBC reporter who notes a not-odd couple.

BREAKING 🚨 Karoline Leavitt just said President Trump OFFICIALLY SUES the BBC for doctoring his Jan 6th speech. Sue them into bankruptcy

"This is a leftist propaganda MACHINE”

MIC DROP 🔥

pic.twitter.com/Nqkwxf01R1

— MAGA Voice (@MAGAVoice) November 12, 2025

The London Economic reports

Broadcaster Jonathan Dimbleby has defended the BBC by pointing to who the most vocal critics of the corporation are.

On Sunday, director general Tim Davie and BBC News CEO Deborah Turness both announced their resignations, following criticism over a the way a Panorama documentary edited Donald Trump’s infamous January 6 speech in 2021.

A leaked 19-page memo on impartiality by Michael Prescott, a former external adviser to the BBC’s editorial standards committee, ruled the broadcaster gave the impression that he told supporters he would march with them to the US Capitol to “fight like hell.”

Trump has subsequently threatened to sue the BBC for $1bn in damages if the corporation doesn’t issue a full apology and retraction of the programme.

America isn’t the only foreign power to have attacked the BBC.

A statement from Israel’s London embassy on Monday stated: “For years, we have repeatedly warned about the BBC’s consistent failures to uphold the standards of accuracy, impartiality, and integrity expected from a public broadcaster.”

Wait for it; wait for it-

Meanwhile, the Russian embassy shared a post on X on Tuesday which said BBC journalists “manipulate facts & censor information that does not align with their partisan editorial stance.”

It added: “Ideological dogma has replaced journalistic ethics there, distorting the very principles of media independence & freedom of information.”

Following all this, former BBC journalist Jonathan Dimbleby has suggested criticism from states run by Putin, Trump and Netanyahu might be the perfect defence for the corporation.

Speaking to LBC, he said: “If you’ve got the combination of Netanyahu, Putin and Trump denouncing the BBC, there must be something quite good about it.”

He continued: “The one salvation of the BBC will be that as we gain a little bit more perspective, people will recognise that it is actually the most trusted and impartial broadcasting institution in the world.”

As to Israel, your mileage may vary. However, it's only appropriate that Donald Trump and the government of Vladimir Putin hold a similar view of press freedom. The enemy of both is the free press. In few instances has the adage "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" been more applicable. 

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Dangerous Misconception(s)

Oh, yes. Sure, Joe!

Joe Rogan: "It's not that Trump doesn't have faults. He most certainly has faults, but we all have faults. But they had control of the media and they turned him into something that he wasn't just 10 years ago to them."pic.twitter.com/f0Hj1noLzJ

— Joe Rogan Podcast News (@joeroganhq) November 9, 2025

As the saying from last decade goes, that (comment) didn't age well.

A disgrace that FOX gives what is basically free political advertising to Trump during an NFL game. https://t.co/svliG7e2ax

— Congressman Brendan Boyle (@RepBrendanBoyle) November 9, 2025

Trump was offered a platform to repeat, and reinforce, some of his go-to lies. He was set up with the non-question "We'd love to hear your thoughts about where we are as a nation, how we're doing."  The President replied

Well, we're doing  great and recruitments is doing phenomenally and, uh, people have spirit, the stock market hit an all-time high, prices are coming down. We inherited a mess, prices are coming way down, and I'll tell you, our country has over $17 trillion they have invested, which is a record. So we're doing great.

So great that his party, north, south, east, and west, was pummeled on on Election Day. Military recruitment in fact has been on the rise, since before Trump was re-elected. Prices are increasing, not decreasing. And the $17 trillion figure Trump has cited periodically is far larger than the $8.8 trillion claimed in the White House website, which itself is a gross exaggeration. Even the rise in the stock market is shaky, with most economists believing it is built on a foundation of sand, with the artificial intelligence craze leading the way. Things are not "great" or even good.

Nonetheless, the danger is not in what Trump says but that the media generally has been fine with it, notwithstanding Rogan's imagination. 

For what seems several years but has been far less, we have heard "Russia. Russia. Russia." as a dismissive reference to the investigation of Donald Trump for the interference by Russia in the 2016 presidential election.  Yet, in his investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, Special Counsel Robert Mueller identified

accounts of dozens of contacts between senior members of the Trump campaign and several Russians, including those who said they were Russian government agents, for the purpose of electing Donald Trump and defeating Hillary Clinton. It includes reports of secret meetings with campaign officials, including two members of the Trump family, which Mueller concludes violate campaign finance laws.

Mueller did not accuse anyone of "collusion" because "collusion" is not a legal term and is not in itself a federal crime.

Moreover, Mueller remarked "(I)f we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the President clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state. Based on the facts and the applicable legal standards, we are unable to reach that judgment." That sounds a lot like "we suspect he did but proving it beyond a reasonable doubt in court would be uncertain."

Approximately 17 months after the Mueller report was released, the Senate Intelligence Committee- chaired Marco Rubio of Florida- revealed, as explained here

how the Trump campaign willingly engaged with Russian operatives implementing the influence effort. For instance, the report exposes interactions and information exchanged between Russian intelligence officer Konstantin Kilimnik and then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort. According to the report, campaign figures “presented attractive targets for foreign influence, creating notable counterintelligence vulnerabilities.” (Manafort was later convicted of tax and bank fraud.)

Yet, Trump would continually refer to the controversy as a "hoax," His acolytes consistently followed suit. As recently as twelve months ago, a statement by the Ohio Senate majority referred to "the same Democrats who pushed the Russia collusion hoax" and claimed- dishonestly- that the Steele dossier "was debunked by the Mueller report."  It did no such thing.

And still it goes on. However, broadcast media still allows Republicans of all sort to go on the air, call "Russia, Russia, Russia" a hoax, assert that the Mueller report found there was no collusion, and that the Steele dossier has been debunked.

Only one item in the Steele dossier- a collection of uncorroborated intelligence reports intended to be just that- has been shown to be false. Trump attorney Michael Cohen did not meet in Prague during the 2016 campaign.

And yet, even the august New York Times ran an article in 2021 entitled- inaccurately- "why the discredited dossier does not undercut the Russia investigation." Cut to 2025 and President Trump is blaming Ukraine for defending itself against aggression by Moscow, but somehow the Steele dossier is routinely slammed as "debunked" or "discredited," and the media goes along as if the critic has remarked something as innocuous as "it's hot in Miami in August."

This is not old news or moot. Much of Donald Trump's political success and power stems from his claim that he was cheated out of becoming your, and my, President by Democratic shenanigans, assisted by the media, in 2016. Add to that refusal of the media to label as a "lie" Trump's obviously false statements. And his rapidly declining health (video below from Australian television). Further, there is the conventional wisdom that Mr. Trump was hit by a bullet in Butler, Pennsylvania in July, 2024.

    

As of this past April, Donald was prescribed two medicines for cholesterol reduction, one for a skin condition, and aspirin.

Well, yes, aspirin, a de facto drug which prolongs bleeding time and inhibits platelet aggregation. And yet, struck by a bullet or a bullet fragment- the FBI's conclusion- the victim did not even require stitches. It is unknown exactly how long he bled because hospital doctors did not issue a statement or hold a news conference, nor was a medical report ever released.

Nonetheless, an AP article nearly two weeks after the crime was entitled "FBI says Trump was indeed struck by bullet during assassination attempt." In the minds of most Americans, that reads "bullet," not "bullet or bullet fragments."  

Aware of all that- more likely, not aware of all that- Joe Rogan appears convinced that the media has ceaselessly victimized Donald Trump. This self-delusion, shared by the vast majority of Trump supporters, will continue while Republicans uniformly embrace the President, Democrats don't question the zombie lies, and the media has no incentive to own up to their pro-Trump, pro-GOP bias.

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Don't Hold Your Breath

Free money! You can't beat that.

That will fix inflation, great plan. Very strong plan. pic.twitter.com/6vra7Uzc6U

— Sarah Longwell (@SarahLongwell25) November 9, 2025

Not so fast:

Bessent: “The $2,000 dividend (that Trump just promised Americans) could come in lots of forms. It could be just the tax decreases that we are seeing.”pic.twitter.com/DBbYIjg9K6

&m

As the discussion on ABC's This Week turned to tariffs, Bessent stated

And then, finally, in terms of the general tariffs, we are doing these trial deals that would not be possible. We were at a tipping point in terms of the economy, in terms of our trade balance, and we are re-balancing successfully.

When Stephanopoulos responded "Do you have a proposal, a formal proposal, to give a $2,000 dividend to every American?", the Treasury secretary replied 

I haven't spoken to the president about this yet, but, you know, it could -- the $2,000 dividend could come in lots of forms, in lots of ways, George. You know, it could be just the tax decreases that we are seeing on the president's agenda. You know, no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on Social Security. Deductibility of auto loans. So, you know, those are substantial deductions that, you know, are being financed in the tax bill.

Investopedia describes "dividends" as "a percentage of a company's earnings paid to its shareholders as their share of the profits. Dividends are generally paid quarterly, with the amount decided by the board of directors based on the company's most recent earnings."

A tax decrease, a tax credit, or a tax deduction is not a "dividend." However, the media is less likely to question a "dividend" than "free money" because "dividend" sounds, well, so Republican. It also bears a resemblance to the $2,000 which President Trump recommended, and Congress approved, as COVID relief funding during Mr. Trump's lame duck period.

So Bessent is lying. Trump is, also, but in a major upset, not about everything. Tariffs revenue is approximately $350 billion, not "trillions of dollars," at an annualized pace. However, Trump's estimation of a national debt of $37 trillion is reasonably accurate. Credit where credit is due.

Consequently, on November 9, 2025, President Trump made one honest statement.  It was truly a wondrous day even though, as we learned again, the Treasury secretary is a pile of green slime.

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Their Enemy Within

On September 16, 2025, the USA Senate by voice vote unanimously approved a resolution condemning the murder six days earlier of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. It was introduced by Republican senator Mike Lee of Utah, who

introduced the resolution shortly after Kirk’s death last week, calling on his colleagues to condemn his assassination “in the strongest possible terms” while also honoring his life and “commitment to the constitutional principles of civil discussion and debate between all people in the United States regardless of political affiliation.” The resolution passed in a unanimous voice vote when it was brought to the Senate floor for consideration.

“This is just a flag, planted on a hill,” Lee said of his resolution. “What matters is where we carry it next.”

The Senator was not just (warning: cliches ahead) blowing smoke or whistling Dixie. There was an array of speakers at the memorial service turned political rally. held in Glendale, Arizona five days later. Among the Trump Administration notables was presidential advisor Stephen Miller, whose remarks- accurately described here as "fiery"- included

They cannot conceive of the army that they have arisen in all of us because we stand for what is good, what is virtuous, what is noble. And to those trying to incite violence against us, those trying to foment hatred against us, what do you have? You have nothing. You are nothing. You are wickedness. You are jealousy. You are envy. You are hatred. You are nothing. You can build nothing. You can produce nothing. You can create nothing.

We are the ones who build. We are the ones who create. We are the ones who lift up humanity. You thought you could kill Charlie Kirk. You have made him immortal. You have immortalized Charlie Kirk. And now millions will carry on his legacy. And we will devote the rest of our lives to finishing the causes for which Charlie gave his last measure of devotion. You cannot defeat us. You cannot slow us. You cannot stop us. You cannot deter us.

We will carry Charlie and Erika in our heart every single day and fight that much harder because of what you did to us. You have no idea the dragon you have awakened. You have no idea how determined we will be to save the civilization, to save the West, to save this republic, because our children are strong and our grandchildren will be strong. And our children's children's children will be strong.

And what will you leave behind? Nothing. Nothing. To our enemies, you have nothing to give. You have nothing to offer. You have nothing to share but bitterness. We have beauty. We have light. We have goodness. We have determination. We have vision. We have strength. We built the world that we inhabit now, generation by generation.

When you saw or read of the speech, you probably were not surprised to learn that Miller did not specify the "they" because, of course, he didn't. 

And neither has Mike Lee:

I’m still furious that they killed Charlie Kirk

And then celebrated his murder, claiming it was morally justified

And then mocked him—along with his grieving widow

America needs Charlie Kirk and his unique gifts now more than ever

That’s why they killed him pic.twitter.com/a9RPfrdu13

— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) November 6, 2025

The Utah senator didn't say who "they" str who killed Charlie Kirk. Neither does he say who "celebrated his murder" or "mocked him" or "his grieving widow." 

There was a time when conservatives mocked liberals for blaming crime on "society." No longer, because now it is an undefined, collective "they." Individual responsibility- or at least a claim to individual responsibility- is out, and fostering hate and division is in. "We're under invasion from within," President Trump declared two weeks ago. No different from a foreign enemy but more difficult in may ways because they don't wear uniforms. At least when they're wearing a uniform you can take them out" (or when they're in a boat).

And a lesson to this story. Democrats in September unanimously joined Republicans in condemning the murder of an individual whose ideological stance- opposition to the LGBTYQIA community,  abortion rights, gun safety legislation, black women-  was anathema to Democrats.  But for the sake of comity (or decency) they mourned the assassination of a right-wing Republican.

We have since seen the response of Mike Lee, members of the Trump Administration, and many other conservative Republicans to the Democratic effort to stand as one with Republicans over a matter of national concern, the murder of a conservative activist with millions of supporters.  It is to blame "they" and "them."   Democrats have been warned. They should take notice.

 

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Autopen Sham

Even a 5'5" point guard could dunk on this Republican congressman.

 

Once again, the Fake News Media ignored a major story. @GOPoversight released a bombshell report exposing the Biden Autopen Presidency.

ABC, CBS, and NBC gave it zero airtime. PBS dismissed it. Not one reported our findings or the testimony from senior Biden aides. pic.twitter.com/5Cdokrhnnk

— Rep. James Comer (@RepJamesComer) November 4, 2025

Trump (of course) himself has posted on Truth Social that all of the pardons issued by President Joe Biden "should be declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR  EFFECT." Dunking on both:

O'DONNELL: Why did you pardon Changpeng Zhao?

TRUMP: Are you ready? I don't know who he is

O'DONNELL: His crypto exchange Binance helped facilitate a $2b purchase of World Liberty Financial's stablecoin. And they you pardoned him.

TRUMP: Here's the thing -- I know nothing… pic.twitter.com/rJFXsJ2VvF

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 3, 2025

The Sergeant Schultz routine is fooling very few. In a memorandum issued July 7, 2005, the Office of Legal Counsel of the Department of Justice concluded

The President need not personally perform the physical act of affixing his signature to a bill he approves and decides to sign in order for the bill to become law. Rather, the President may sign a bill within the meaning of Article I, Section 7 by directing a subordinate to affix the President’s signature to such a bill, for example by autopen.

This guidance appears to be almost unavoidable, given that

according to the U.S. Constitution, the President has no such authority to overturn his predecessor’s pardons, especially not based on the type of signature, legal experts say. “The Constitution doesn't even require that the pardon be written, so the idea that the signature is by autopen rather than by handwritten signature seems not relevant to the constitutionality because Article II just says that the President has the power to pardon,” says Bernadette Meyler, a Stanford Law School professor and constitutional law expert. according to the U.S. Constitution, the President has no such authority to overturn his predecessor’s pardons, especially not based on the type of signature, legal experts say. “The Constitution doesn't even require that the pardon be written, so the idea that the signature is by autopen rather than by handwritten signature seems not relevant to the constitutionality because Article II just says that the President has the power to pardon,” says Bernadette Meyler, a Stanford Law School professor and constitutional law expert.

Autopen is an electronic signature that allows individuals to sign a document without physically being there. The signature mimics a handwritten signature but is done by a computer. a vast number of statutes and other documents have been signed by autopen, experts say. For instance, former President Barack Obama signed a national security measure via autopen while he was in France. Meyler says that if presidential pardons were to be invalidated because of an autopen signature, that could bring into question other policies that were signed by such.

So it is legal and common, used even by Donald Trump. Perhaps the President has raised a stink about this because he enjoys any chance to portray his immediate predecessor as a doddering, old fool. Or maybe it was to divert attention from his corrupt and dangerous action of late October in which he 

pardoned Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, who had previously pleaded guilty to enabling money laundering while heading the cryptocurrency exchange, the White House said Thursday.

The pardon of Zhao, widely known as CZ, came two months after The Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump family’s own crypto venture, which has generated about $4.5 billion since the 2024 election, has been helped by “a partnership with an under-the-radar trading platform quietly administered by Binance"...

NBC News, citing a public disclosure filing from Monday, reported that Binance in September had retained the services of the lobbyist Charles McDowell, who is a friend of the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr.

McDowell’s lobbying firm, Checkmate Government Relations, disclosed that it was paid $450,000 for the prior month’s work, which included lobbying the White House and Treasury Department for “executive relief” and “financial services policy issues relating to digital assets and cryptocurrency.”

The clemency grant for Zhao came nearly a week after Trump commuted the 87-month prison sentence of former New York Rep. George Santos, who had pleaded guilty to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.

Hours after the law and order President pardoned this thoroughly reprehensible, felonious Zhao, Trump was asked why he had issued the pardon and replied "I don't know he was recommended by a lot of people. A lot of people say that he wasn't guilty of anything. And so I gave him a pardon at the request of a lot of very good people."

Ten days later, Donald was asked by 60 Minutes correspondent Norah O'Donnell why he had pardoned Zhao and replied "I don't know who he is" and "here's the thing. I know nothing."

It is tempting to quip that Trump was completely truthful when he remarked "I know nothing."  because he's stupid or suffering from dementia.  However, he knows a lot. He knew that he was pardoning Changpeng Zhao because the latter had enriched the Trump family fortune.  He knew that lying on 60 Minutes at an AR-15 clip would discourage anyone in the media from honing in on one or two of his most dangerous lies. And he knew that the media would not want to emphasize his dishonesty, nor question his health or mental stability.

He understood all those things for the same reason that House Oversight Committee chairman Comer could make up a scandal out of whole cloth without pointing out that he, like the emperor, has no clothes. James Comer is not fair game because he is a Republican and much of the media believes that it's O.K. if you're a Republican because it's just too dangerous to stand up to Donald Trump. And Donald Trump is, well, Donald Trump, and is too dangerous to analyze as it did with President Biden.  The slide toward authoritarianism rolls on. 

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Doing a Solid For Trump

Donald Trump was right about two things.

When CBS' 60 Minutes aired an interview with Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris during last year's campaign, Trump argued that CBS should not have edited her answer about the Israel-Hamas war. He believed the network's parent company, Paramount, would cave to his demands.  He sued the latter corporation for $20 billion and it settled for $16 million, a hefty fee for exercising a freedom guaranteed by the First Amendment.

Editing any interview can be misleading and editing one of a major party presidential candidate or of a President does the public a disservice.

When CBS aired on Sunday evening an interview with Donald, it showed on air only 28 of the 73 minutes taped.. The Trump campaign should be relieved it did so.

That's not primarily because Donald made a fool of himself on the 45 minute portion, which was far less than the 74 minute video CBS aired online. (According to CBS' senior correspondent Norah O'Donnell, who conducted the interview, the exchange itself ran for almost 90 minutes) .Trump typically makes a fool of himself, which is of little import because he is wrapped in a layer of Teflon unequaled in American history.

One of Trump's most interesting critics, former US Representative from Illinois, understands:

On this @60Minutes interview. Trump lies as he breathes. He lies every time he opens his mouth. We’ve never ever faced this before. And the media still has no fucking clue how to deal with it. It is pointless to interview him if you don’t fact check his lies. It’s just pointless.

— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) November 3, 2025

 O'Donnell did check Trump's facts periodically. However, she was was stymied, whether by Paramount, CBS News, from informing the interviewee and the viewers in most of the cases in which the President made an untruthful remark.

CNN posted an article, read by relatively few people, by its fact-checker extraordinaire, Daniel Dale. cited six examples of Trump citing "fictional" numbers and added "Trump made a variety of additional false claims on several subjects, including the government shutdown, the artificial intelligence boom, tariffs, his first impeachment and his former legal battle with '60 Minutes' itself."

But we're used to that. The man's lips move, he lies. However, during her time with Trump, O'Donnell asked about at least 16 topics: tariffs, artificial intelligence, the stock market, grocery prices, inflation, Taiwan, nuclear weapons testing, Vladimir Putin, Ukraine, Venezuela, Israel/Gaza, Abraham Accords, Israel, the government shutdown, health care, the filibuster. There may have been more but it's hard to focus attention properly during, or on, a trainwreck.

If an interviewer jumps from subject to subject, victory goes to the road team. Almost all successful public figures, especially Trump, hit a home run/score a touchdown/execute a slam dunk when the questioner does not hone in on an answer. O'Donnell tried, but was expected (or, less likely, decided on her own) to hit on nearly every possible topic.

And so President Trump gets to flood the zone with lies, accusations, half-truths, and more lies. An after the fact review of Donald's statements, such as undertaken by Daniel Dale, is necessary but not sufficient. Trump can make false, sometimes vicious, statements willy-nilly with little pushback because the interviewer wants to cover yet another topic. The result, in part, is that the interviewee controls the interview.

On one occasion, O'Donnell stated "I know our time with you is limited. I hear you." She said at another time  "and I know my time is- is limited with you so I want to be respectful- of you."  And of course "I know your time is limited so I do want to make sure I get through another- more of these topics."  She stopped just short of apologizing to Trump for limiting his time to get his talking points out.

The networks do the American people no favor if they bring on Donald Trump, only to allow him to ramble, talking about anything he feels like. Giving Donald Trump a platform to promote his propaganda is worse than doing no interview at all.

           

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Dare Him

Three members of the House of Representatives, one congresswoman-elect, and one Attorney General al are doing what they have to do. The guys from Louisiana and Massachusetts are wrong, but the latter is performing an important political function and public service. The Arizona Mirror notes that House speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.)

initially promised to seat (Representative-elect Adelita) Grijalva whenever she requested it, but then backtracked and said he’d only do so after Democrats in the U.S. Senate agreed to support a stopgap spending bill to reopen the government.

Republicans and Democrats have been playing the blame game for weeks now over who is responsible for the shutdown, with Republicans falsely claiming that Democrats refused to vote for a stopgap funding bill as a way to protect health care services for immigrants who lack legal status.

“Speaker Johnson may be blocking my swearing-in, but he can’t stop me from showing up for the people of Southern Arizona,” Grijalva said in a statement on Wednesday. “Every day that goes by without representation is another day our veterans, seniors, and working families are left without a voice in Congress.”

Because Johnson has refused to seat Grijalva, she now holds the record for the longest delay in seating a member of Congress following a special election, a distinction previously held by Rep. Jimmy Gomez, of California. But there’s a huge difference: Gomez requested the delay due to family issues, while Grijalva and other Democrats have repeatedly demanded that Johnson swear in Grijalva.

Grijalva and her state's chief law enforcement officer are not sitting this out as

Last week, Grijalva and Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes sued Johnson for the delay, arguing that his stall-tactics have denied the more than 800,000 Arizonans in the 7th Congressional District their constitutional right to representation. Johnson’s obligation to deliver the oath of office to elected members of Congress is not discretionary, they said in the lawsuit.

Grijalva, along with other Democrats, claim that Johnson is blocking her from taking office because she would be the 218th vote needed to force the release of the FBI’s case files concerning pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Republicans have largely opposed doing so because President Donald Trump is reportedly featured in those files, as he and Epstein were close friends in the 1990s before they had a falling out.

Johnson has denied those allegations.

Well, of  course he has. His handler, Donald Trump, would expect nothing less. However, the Epstein files are sufficiently dangerous to the President that the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Dick Durbin of Illinoi wrote separate letters to Attorney General Bondi, FBI director Patel, and Assistant FBI director Bongino upon a Wall Street Journal report that 1,000 FBI agents were asked to peruse the files. Durbin asked 

My office was told that these personnel were instructed to 'flag' any records in which President Trump was mentioned.... Why were personnel told to flag records in which President Trump was mentioned? What happened to the records mentioning President Trump once they were flagged?

If I were an adviser to the Administration, I would have recommended that Bondi maintain no personnel was told to flag records in which President Trump was mentioned. The records pertained to a period well before Donald Trump ever was elected.

Nonetheless, there appears to have been no response from the regime. And according to NBC News, "Attorney General Pam Bondi and her deputy Todd Blanche informed President Donald Trump in May that his name appeared multiple times in the government's files on Jeffrey Epstein that the Department of Justice and the FBI reviewed."  Surprise! They have not been released.

There was a curious discussion between an MSNBC host and U.S. Representative Seth Moulton about that very same deceased child predator, with a portion of the video transcribed beneath the tweet.

MOULTON: If you're one of the people, like Trump, who took advantage of young girls with Jeffrey Epstein--

SCARBOROUGH: We don't have evidence that he took advantage of young girls with Epstein

MOULTON: Right. Common sense be damned

SCARBOROUGH: Let's look at the facts. Is he… pic.twitter.com/GNmBSgjBcB

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 31, 2025

S.M. ... from this White House, you know, if you're a criminal, you're going to buy your way to freedom with Trump. If you are one of the people, like him, who took advantage of young girls with Jeffrey Epstein, then we're just going to make that go away. Fortunately-

J.S.: We don't have evidence that he took advantage of young girls with Jeffrey Epstein.

S.M.: Right, well, common sense be damned.

J.M.: I'm not saying common sense be damned. I'm saying facts. Let's look at the facts.

S.M.: He's obviously in the Epstein files. And the reason that, fundamentally, Speaker Johnson has us on vacation is because he doesn't want to seat the newly-elected Democratic Representative.

J.S.: But you said he took advantage of young girls. You have absolutely no evidence of that.

S.M.:I think it's pretty obvious that that's what is going on.

J.S.: You think it's pretty obvious?

S.M. And I think it's pretty obvious that a-

At that point, Scarborough cut Moulton off in order to ask print journalist and sometime co-host Jonathan Lemire his opinion.

Neither I nor Rupar knows a great deal about the corporate culture of MSNBC, nor what is recommended to its hosts by management, nor what discretion the hosts have. Although Scarborough was somewhat bizarrely defensive of the President, he may have been required, accurately, that there is no hard evidence that Donald Trump "took advantage of young girls."

So Scarborough may have played the role too infrequently played by news hosts when Republicans claim as facts items which are definitively false. (See "Russia Hoax.")

There is no such evidence that we know of. There is no evidence because the Epstein files have not been released.  It's lacking because Speaker Mike Johnson, a fully-owned subsidiary of Donald J. Trump, has called the House of Representatives into recess to avoid passage of a discharge petition which would force out of committee a bill calling for release of the files. 

Does that justify Representative Moulton claiming of the President what has not been proven? Absolutely.

Press secretary Karoline Leavitt has the perfect platform to deny this allegation but has not directly addressed it. President Trump himself could specifically deny the allegation. Pam Bondi has had the opportunity, being asked at a committee hearing by Democratic senator Sheldon Whitehouse 

about reporting from author Michael Wolff, who alleged Epstein had shown him a photo of Trump with topless young women. Whitehouse questioned Bondi whether she was aware if the FBI had found those photographs in its search of Epstein’s estate.

Bondi shot back, accusing the senator of making “salacious remarks” and “trying to slander” Trump. The attorney general also alleged Whitehouse took money from “one of Epstein’s closest confidants,” Reid Hoffman.

The Attorney General thereby attacked the Senator and avoided specifically denying that Trump had engaged in such behavior.

But even if Bondi had uttered the simple, yet definitive, words "Mr. Trump never engaged in sexual activity of any sort at any time with anyone under the age of consent," it would matter little. The boss lies not often, but continually, and members of his Administration know they are expected to do the same, though not quite as frequently lest Donald not be #1 at something.

To be fair, the boss' lackeys have little reason to dwell on the topic of Trump's intimate involvement with the most famed, and possibly most active, pedophiles in American history. They are not pressed on the issue.

Democrats should be all over the airwaves and social media remarking about Epstein. Their goal should be to thwart the media's determination to ignore the issue, now that other matters are more pressing, more topical.

Most of us (warning: cliche ahead) weren't born yesterday. Trump and Epstein were close. There are photographs of them together and lewd birthday letter sent from Donald to Jeffrey including the line "may every day be another wonderful secret." The A.G. had perhaps 1,000 FBI employees flagging the files for Trump's name, she informed the President that his name was in them, and they've resisted with the power 

The possibility of disclosure of those files justifiably frightens, though far less than it would if the media and Democrats hadn't decided they constitute yesterday's news. Those files aren't going to release themselves, after all, and Republicans will not oblige Democrats by drawing attention to them.

That's why members of Congress such as Adelita Grijalva and Seth Moulton are critical. The former is suing House Speaker Johnson. The latter, speculating, is what, oh, probably around half of Americans believe- that Donald Trump has been involved, directly or indirectly, with underage females. If it's not true, everything Epstein can be released by Congress, if Johnson doesn't continue to run interference for the President. He can prove Moulton a liar. Challenge him to do so.

Johnson is not going to budge without application of pressure, by Democrats. Leaving it to the media to explore whether a President was involved in multiple and heinous felonies will be fruitless.  Moulton lacks hard-core proof but the evidence is all around us, in front of our noses, and as likely as the Arizona sun on a July afternoon. (Cliche alert.) We weren't born yesterday, though Johnson, Trump, and Bondi wish we were. 

And by all means, Democrats, do not allow the "White House ballroom" or the "Trump Ballroom" to gain currency with the public. It's the Epstein Ballroom. 

                   

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