In Epstein furor, Trump struggles to shake off a controversy his allies
once stoked
[July 26, 2025]
By CHRIS MEGERIAN and ERIC TUCKER
WASHINGTON (AP) — Despite the sun bearing down on him and the sweat
beading across his face, President Donald Trump still lingered with
reporters lined up outside the White House on Friday. He was leaving on
a trip to Scotland, where he would visit his golf courses, and he wanted
to talk about how his administration just finished “the best six months
ever.”
But over and over, the journalists kept asking Trump about the Jeffrey
Epstein case and whether he would pardon the disgraced financier's
imprisoned accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell.
"People should really focus on how well the country is doing," Trump
insisted. He shut down another question by saying, “I don’t want to talk
about that.”
It was another example of how the Epstein saga — and his
administration's disjointed approach to it — has shadowed Trump when
he's otherwise at the height of his influence. He's enacted a vast
legislative agenda, reached trade deals with key countries and tightened
his grip across the federal government. Yet he's struggled to stamp out
the embers of a political crisis that could become a full-on
conflagration.
Trump faces pressure from his own supporters
The Republican president's supporters want the government to release
secret files about Epstein, who authorities say killed himself in his
New York jail cell six years ago while awaiting trial for sex
trafficking. They believe him to be the nexus of a dark web of powerful
people who abused underage girls. Administration officials who once
stoked conspiracy theories now insist there's nothing more to disclose,
a stance that has stirred skepticism because of Trump's former
friendship with Epstein.
Trump has repeatedly denied prior knowledge of Epstein's crimes and
claimed he cut off their relationship long ago. For a president skilled
at manipulating the media and controlling the Republican Party, it has
been the most challenging test of his ability to shift the conversation
in his second term.
Landing in Scotland offered no refuge for Trump. He faced another round
of questions after stepping off Air Force One. “You’re making a big
thing over something that’s not a big thing,” he said to one reporter.
He told another, “I’m focused on making deals, not on conspiracy
theories that you are.”
Republican strategist Kevin Madden called the controversy “a treadmill
to nowhere.”
"How do you get off of it?” he said. “I genuinely don’t know the answer
to that.”
Trump has demanded his supporters drop the matter and urged Republicans
to block Democratic requests for documents on Capitol Hill. But he has
also directed the Justice Department to divulge some additional
information in hopes of satisfying his supporters.
A White House official, who insisted on anonymity to discuss internal
strategy, said Trump is trying to stay focused on his agenda while also
demonstrating some transparency. After facing countless scandals and
investigations, the official said, Trump is on guard against the typical
playbook of drip-drip disclosures that have plagued him in the past.
It's clear Trump sees the Epstein case as a continuation of the “witch
hunts” he's faced over the years, starting with the investigation into
Russian interference during his election victory over Democrat Hillary
Clinton nearly a decade ago. The sprawling inquiry led to convictions
against some top advisers but did not substantiate allegations Trump
conspired with Moscow.
Trump's opponents, he wrote on social media Thursday, “have gone
absolutely CRAZY, and are playing another Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax
but, this time, under the guise of what we will call the Jeffrey Epstein
SCAM.”
During the Russia investigation, special counsel Robert Mueller and his
team of prosecutors were a straightforward foil for Trump to rail
against. Ty Cobb, the lawyer who served as the White House's point
person, said the president “never felt exposed” because “he thought he
had a legitimate gripe.”
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President Donald Trump speaks with supporters before departing on
Marine One from the South Lawn of the White House, Friday, July 25,
2025, in Washington. The President is traveling to Scotland. (AP
Photo/Alex Brandon)
The situation is different this time now that the Justice Department
has been stocked with loyalists. “The people that he has to get mad
at are basically his people as opposed to his inquisitors and
adversaries,” Cobb said.
It was Trump's allies who excavated the Epstein debacle
In fact, Trump's own officials are the most responsible for bringing
the Epstein case back to the forefront.
FBI Director Kash Patel and his deputy, Dan Bongino, regularly
stoked conspiracy theories about Epstein before assuming their
current jobs, floating the idea the government had covered up
incriminating and compelling information that needed to be brought
to light. “Put on your big boy pants and let us know who the
pedophiles are,” Patel said in a 2023 podcast.
Attorney General Pam Bondi played a key role, too. She intimated in
a Fox News Channel interview in February that an Epstein “client
list” was sitting on her desk for review — she would later say she
was referring to the Epstein files more generally — and greeted
far-right influencers with binders of records from the case that
consisted largely of information in the public domain.
Tensions spiked earlier this month when the FBI and the Justice
Department, in an unsigned two-page letter, said that no client list
existed, that the evidence was clear Epstein had killed himself and
that no additional records from the case would be released to the
public. It was a seeming backtrack on the administration’s stated
commitment to transparency. Amid a fierce backlash from Trump’s base
and influential conservative personalities, Bongino and Bondi
squabbled openly in a tense White House meeting.
Since then, the Trump administration has scrambled to appear
transparent, including by seeking the unsealing of grand jury
transcripts in the case — though it’s hardly clear that courts would
grant that request or that those records include any eye-catching
details anyway. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has taken the
unusual step of interviewing the imprisoned Maxwell over the course
of two days at a courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida, where her
lawyer said she would “always testify truthfully.”
All the while, Trump and his allies have resurfaced the Russia
investigation as a rallying cry for a political base that has
otherwise been frustrated by the Epstein saga.
Trump's director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, who just
weeks ago appeared on the outs with Trump over comments on Iran's
nuclear ambitions, seemed to return to the president's good graces
this week following the declassification and release of years-old
documents she hoped would discredit long-settled conclusions about
Russian interference in the 2016 election.
The developments allowed Trump to rehash longstanding grievances
against President Barack Obama and his Democratic advisers. Trump's
talk of investigations into perceived adversaries from years ago let
him, in effect, go back in time to deflect attention from a very
current crisis.
“Whether it's right or wrong,” Trump said, “it's time to go after
people.”
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