Prompt 2025 – The Washington Post

The Washington Post Newsletter
Asking the big questions about Washington and beyond.

By Philip Bump, Columnist

“What’s going on with my ‘boys’ and, in some cases, ‘gals?’” a frustrated President Donald Trump groused on Truth Social over the weekend. The cause of his frustration: A revolt among typically allied commentators over his administration’s handling of the case around billionaire Jeffrey Epstein, who died in federal prison in 2019 awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges.

For years, MAGA circles had hyped the existence of a client list that would implicate a web of Epstein’s powerful friends, while also calling into question whether Epstein’s death had been a suicide.

Instead, the FBI and Justice Department announced that no such list existed and that Epstein had indeed killed himself.Now, top members of Trump’s administration, including Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino, are being berated in right-leaning media circles for either not releasing more information or overhyping what had existed. How does the president get out of this mess? I discussed the question with my colleagues James Hohmann and Megan McArdle.— Philip Bump, columnist…

Philip Bump: Which do you think is true: That there were never any secret files about the disgraced financier in the first place or that the administration is now trying to keep them under wraps? Or neither?

James Hohmann: Whatever or whoever is actually in the files aside, there’s a pending cert petition in front of the Supreme Court on this case. No responsible U.S. attorney would release info that could upend Ghislaine Maxwell’s conviction. Trump’s team painted themselves into this corner though, so I don’t exactly feel sympathy for the dog that caught the car. I hope the files get released — whatever exists.

Philip: Right — but the administration didn’t say “we can’t release the files because of SCOTUS.”

Megan McArdle: I suspect that the files got to Bondi’s desk and turned out to be … well, boring is not the right word. But not the exciting conspiracy she had imagined. There’s a sort of a Catch-22 here: Releasing files that do not validate the conspiracy would simply convince people they were in on the conspiracy.

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Prompt 2025 from The Washington Post