Will the ghost of Epstein finally bring down King Trump?
Though he's usually a master of controlling the narrative, none of Trump's normal distraction techniques seem to be working now. Indeed, at this point we should probably rename the Streisand effect the Trump-Epstein effect because the president's repeated insistence that there is NOTHING TO SEE HERE EXCEPT A VERY NASTY WITCH-HUNT only has people scrutinizing his dealings with Epstein more carefully. From South Park to Scotland to billboards in Times Square, Trump can't escape his past association with Epstein.
Over the past couple of weeks, a lot of new information has come out about just how close Epstein and the president were. On 17 July, for example, the Wall Street Journal reported Trump allegedly sent Epstein a 50th birthday card in 2003 with a drawing of a naked woman and a message which said, in part, 'may every day be another wonderful secret.' Trump denied writing the card and filed a $10bn lawsuit against the rightwing paper and its owner, Rupert Murdoch, a day after the outlet published the story.
Trump's lawsuit clearly didn't scare off the Journal because, on Wednesday, it published a new report stating Trump's name appears 'multiple times' in justice department files about Epstein. On Wednesday CNN also published newly uncovered photos and video footage of the two men together, including one of Epstein at Trump's wedding to Marla Maples at the Plaza hotel in New York in 1993 and footage from a 1999 Victoria's Secret fashion event. Then, on Thursday, the New York Times confirmed that Trump's name appeared on a contributor list for a book celebrating Epstein's 50th birthday, as the Journal first reported, along with a number of other well-known Epstein associates including Leslie Wexner, then the owner of Victoria's Secret. The Times further reported that in 1997 the president had written a note calling Epstein 'the greatest!' in a copy of Trump: The Art of the Comeback.
While none of these new bits of information are evidence of criminal conduct on Trump's part, the president's furious reaction to anything Epstein-related, along with his administration's sudden U-turn on its promise to release damning evidence related to possible Epstein clients, certainly makes Trump look like he's got something to hide. And it's not just Trump, of course. The sudden flurry of reporting about Epstein means that a lot of powerful men, including Bill Clinton, who the Journal says also sent a birthday letter to the disgraced financier, have been having a bad couple of weeks.
The big question now is this: will the renewed interest in Epstein blow over in a few more weeks or could this deal a serious political blow to Trump and his lackeys? Trump is nicknamed the 'comeback kid' for good reason: the man has an uncanny ability to shake off scandal. Still, nobody is completely untouchable; could the ghost of Epstein be the thing that finally topples King Trump from his throne? While that's obviously an impossible question to answer, there are a few ways this could all play out.
The first, and the best-case scenario for Trump, is that interest in Epstein organically fizzles out. That seems unlikely to happen given how furious the president's base are; more than a third of them disapprove of how he's handled the Epstein files, according to a poll from Quinnipiac University. The New York Times calls this 'perhaps the most intraparty discontent Mr Trump has experienced as president'. The Democrats have also seized on the issue as a way to fight Trump and will probably do their best to keep it in the news. While the Democrats are normally placid, they have been very much been on the offense with the Epstein files.
Another way (perhaps the most likely way) this could go is that the Trump administration brokers some sort of deal with Ghislaine Maxwell, the only person involved with Epstein who is in jail right now, in which she releases enough carefully curated information about the sex-trafficking case for Trump's base to be satisfied, allowing the president to move on from the matter. The deputy US attorney general has met with Maxwell twice this week to see if she might have 'information about anyone who has committed crimes against victims'. While Maxwell's lawyer has said Trump's Department of Justice has not offered clemency, Maxwell is rumored to be seeking a pardon. One can certainly imagine a situation in which she 'cooperates' in a way that is mutually beneficial to her and Trump.
The third scenario, which may be wishful thinking, is that Trump can't contain the fallout over the Epstein files and the scandal massively hurts the Republicans in the midterms. One GOP senator has already warned that 'this is going to be an issue all the way through next year's election.'
Another possibility is that Trump continues his distractions until one actually sticks. The gen Z Democratic congressman Maxwell Frost has joked that the 'White House is about to drop proof of aliens' to stop people talking about Epstein. Joke or not, there's certainly a non-zero chance of that happening. And if it's not aliens, maybe Trump will start a nuclear war to shut us all up.
Whatever happens with Trump and Epstein, however, I think it's worth stressing that this case is about far more than the president. It's about scores of vulnerable girls who were exploited by powerful men and let down by the justice system and parts of the media, which didn't pursue the story for years. I can't help but notice how many Democrats only seemed to develop a passionate interest in the Epstein files when it became politically expedient for them to do so. Epstein's countless victims deserve far better than that.
In 1965, 18-year-old Choi Mal-ja fought back against a man who she said was trying to rape her and bit off part of his tongue. Guess who prosecutors thought was in the wrong? Choi was sentenced to 10 months in prison, suspended for two years, while her alleged attacker got a lighter sentence. After being branded a criminal for 61 years, Choi, now 80, has finally received a formal apology from South Korean prosecutors.
Surrogacy is booming and, thanks to many celebrities using surrogates to build their families, it feels like it has become normalized. However, surrogacy is an incredibly complex ethical issue and we should not minimize the physical and mental health risks that it entails.
'Washington rejected offers from the United Nations and family planning organisations to buy or ship the supplies to poor nations,' sources told Reuters. Instead the US government will spend $167,000 to burn them all.
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A new study 'suggests that vitamin D supplementation may be a promising, low-cost strategy to support brain development while reducing racial disparities', according to a write-up in The Conversation.
This gender-based preference feature was first introduced in Saudi Arabia in 2019. Competitor Lyft introduced a similar option in 2023.
I keep seeing this ridiculous obfuscatory 'stalking' language across multiple different media outlets. Let's be very clear here: Palestinians are being deliberately starved by a US-backed Israel. They are not being 'stalked' by anything except US-funded drones.
In a recent Instagram post the kids' entertainer and all-around good egg, wrote: 'To anyone asking to work with me who hasn't spoken out about Gaza: Thank you for the request. I'm not comfortable working with anyone who hasn't spoken out about Gaza.' This follows a huge harassment campaign by pro-Israel extremists against the entertainer.
The likelihood of this happening is slim, but the whole charade shows you how many lawmakers think their job is to suck up to Trump rather than serve their constituents.
Meet Leonardo da Pinchy: a New Zealand-based cat who can't stop purr-loining people's underwear – along with the occasional cashmere sweater. Leo da Pinchy's owner, Helen North, now spends a lot of time on a neighbourhood WhatsApp group and Facebook page asking people: 'Are these your undies?' North told reporters she hopes her cat burglar grows out of his dastardly ways soon: 'I don't want to do this for like, 15 years. This is a lot of admin.' Good thing da Pinchy is so cute, because he sounds like a real mew-sance.
Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist
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