Yesiree, Bob. Nothing says “transparency” like the government sneaking out a red-hot memo on the Fourth of July Weekend making it clear that years of shocking claims about a Jeffrey Epstein client list was all fiction, including the part in February where Attorney General Pam Bondi said the list was on her desk.
Or not.
Even with the Trump Administration cavalcade of cosplayers’ constant fascination with salacious gossip and conspiracy theories, the Epstein debacle rises to the top of “can’t make this stuff up.”
This happened: The nation’s most famous and furious right-wing-nuts have salivated over the Jeffrey Epstein scandal, practically from the day it broke. While the story hails back to 2005, when Epstein was first tabbed by police for some of his horrific sexual crimes, the story burned white-hot when the Miami Herald in 2018 published a series of stories, closely examining parts of the scandal.
Interest in the story has revolved around the sordid details about Epstein’s crimes and the rich and famous people associated with him.
But the far-right fascination has been about allegations that the government conspired for years to protect Epstein from his own crimes and criminal behavior. In addition, the conspiracy theory has extended to include efforts by the government to protect a cadre of rich and famous people who participated in Epstein’s sexual crimes.
The most alluring part of all this melodrama, for the wing-nuts, has been the determination to make public the so-called “client list.” It’s believed — desperately — to connect the rich and famous pals of Epstein to prostitutes and sex-assault victims.
Trump’s acolytes, and Trump himself, have fanned the flames of this controversy for years, and especially this year.
Newly minted Trump Attorney General Pam Bondi, a bastion of credibility and legal prowess, could not stop herself from promising to make public all the dirty details of the Epstein case, and she was going to be naming names.
During a Fox News interview in February, she not only confirmed that the “client list” existed, having been shrouded in secrecy for years by the Biden administration, but that the list was “sitting on my desk” for her to review and prepare for release to the public.
“It’s a new administration and everything is going to come out to the public,” she said. That was after an episode of White House cosplay where clueless Bondi scripted a “Clue” episode for select influencer wingnuts to come for “secret” folders revealing juicy secrets and, probably, a secret decoder ring.
As it turned out, there was nothing new in the secret folders, and the wingnuts turned on Bondi’s fraud.
Now, those wild, whacky wings-n-things are calling for Bondi’s resignation for revealing yet another version of the “truth” and “facts.”
No client list. Never existed, despite what was on her desk, and what a vexed Elon Musk said about Trump being on the list, after his very public break-up with the president in May.
She has become the enemy of the crazy people as she hid behind a holiday weekend news dump and the White House Kween of Kredibility, Karoline Leavitt.
Leavitt clarified for media dunces, including the rare Trump skeptic at Fox News, that when Bondi said she had the client list on her desk, she meant she has some other stuff there, which was really raunchy but offered no new information about the Epstein case.
That “truckload” of Epstein evidence the Biden White House was hiding? Just stuff. No story here. Move along.
Bondi, like so many members of the Trump Cosplay Cotillion, spent what little credibility she was able to muster by making it through her oath when she was sworn in.
Since then, just like Trump, it’s been nothing but a gushing river of political lies, half-truths, propaganda and disinformation from one of the most important parts of the U.S. government.
She’s getting a big dose of hate, from those she thought were friends, for dishing up lies she didn’t know would come back to haunt her so viciously. Yet, like Bondi, her new nemeses have for years eked out sustenance living on “but her emails” and “but Hunter’s laptop.” Finally, fresh meat.
Who would have guessed that the same woman who lied and schemed as the Florida attorney general would become such an disreputable beacon of bull, angering the right, the left and all of those who pay even marginally close attention to what she says and does?
We all did.
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Bondi has proven to be an incompetent attorney and someone who is in no way experienced enough for the high stakes position she now holds. She is an embarrassment.
It is little wonder Trump picked her.