President Donald Trump questioned how uproar from his administration’s handling of the investigation into late disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein could die down, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The Journal reported late Wednesday that Trump — who socialized with Epstein before saying he fell out with him prior to his 2006 arrest — wanted to know why people were fixated on convicted sex offender. He argued that many don’t understand that Palm Beach in the 90s was a different time.
Trump also told allies that he was concerned about his friends being mentioned in the files, according to the Journal, citing people familiar with the comments, while he was worried about the documents being doctored against him. The outlet previously reported that Attorney General Pam Bondi and her deputy informed Trump that his name was in the Epstein files in May.
White House officials also told the Journal that they had underestimated how important the issue would become — as Democrats and a handful of Republicans have repeatedly pushed for the release of all files related to the case. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), who is leading an effort in the House to ultimately force a vote on making documents public, has claimed that he and other GOP lawmakers have been threatened by the White House and Republican leaders for defying their wishes.
Meanwhile, disagreements and finger-pointing have exacerbated the administration’s response to the issue, according to the Journal, as Bondi has complained that FBI leadership was “trying to destroy her” in leaking private information, while other officials believe that the FBI and the Justice Department mishandled the saga.
The two agencies brought the Epstein investigation back into the national spotlight after they released a memo in July, which concluded that Epstein did not keep a “client list” of public figures. It also confirmed that he had died by suicide while awaiting his trial in 2019. At the time, the DOJ said it would not be releasing further documents, prompting outrage from some of Trump’s most staunch loyalists.
“This may be the worst managed PR event in history,” Ty Cobb, who led the Trump White House’s response to a special counsel probe into Russia in 2017, said. “You’ve got multiple mouthpieces, and they’re all covering their own a– now.”
In a statement to the Journal, Bondi said: “Our only priority is to continue working together with the FBI to make America safer by ensuring murderers and violent criminals face the most severe justice.” She added that FBI Director Kash Patel and his agency have “worked tirelessly with my agencies and state partners.”
Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for the White House, said Cobb had a “debilitating diagnosis of Trump Derangement Syndrome.”
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