Like Donald Trump, I appreciated TV attorney Perry Mason and, of course, Detective Colombo. Most recently, I have been watching “Criminal,” the international police procedural. “Criminal” is about the painstaking, sometimes harrowing, interrogation of suspects—taking place in the room itself or behind the glass as other officers witness the cross-examination. It is fascinating to watch the lying and the many, often varied attempts to get to the truth of the matter.
Maybe watching those TV shows set me up to fall so deeply into the bizarre world of our most recent and so very important Department of Justice cover-up.
In case you have been too busy making a living and trying to live your life, President Donald Trump rewarded Pam Bondi for her undying loyalty and made her our attorney general. Then she and the president, doubling down on incompetency and political malfeasance, made Todd Blanche, once Donald Trump’s personal attorney, her second in command.
Unless you have just returned from months camping out in the wilderness, you are probably aware that no matter the series of emergencies Donald Trump has declared, the Jeffrey Epstein-Ghislaine Maxwell sex-trafficking scandal has refused to go away. Perhaps you remember all those campaign promises Donald Trump made about transparency. Well, MAGA and Joe Rogan certainly remember.
For the longest time, the combined forces of QAnon and MAGA were hoping the Epstein files would reveal the names of the mostly wealthy and powerful Democratic pedophiles. They, of course, were hoping to finally get Bill Clinton. Surely there might be some Democrats, but more likely Epstein’s group included men of all political persuasions, foreign and domestic, reaching as far up as Buckingham Palace.
Putting aside for the moment the likelihood that he himself was in the files, Donald Trump knew most of all that he needed to win a second term if he did not want to end up in jail. So, pleasing MAGA was central to the mission. And Donald often promised that if they gave him another shot at the presidency, the Epstein files would be released during his very first days. Of course, Donald Trump makes promises like others breathe. And it helps that he hardly ever remembers what it is that he’ has promised—and almost never keeps those promises. But this time around, he failed to appreciate how truly dedicated the far right was to its conspiracy theories. He just did not appreciate the fact that the image of those Democratic bigwigs flying to Epstein Island for Epstein’s underaged girls was permanently burned in their brains.
Time and again, the White House has stumbled in its efforts to silence its MAGA critics and born-again influencers, made worse by the fact that there were still a bunch of journalists trying hard to unearth the parts of the Epstein-Maxwell story that had not yet been told. Even The Wall Street Journal chipped in on July 17, 2025, with the news that after rigorously downplaying his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, at Ghislaine Maxwell’s request, Donald Trump had sent a risqué birthday card to him on his 50th. The Journal described some typewritten text, framed by a magic-marker-like outline of a naked woman with breasts and Donald Trump’s signature in place of pubic hair.
According to Snopes, the text consisted of the following:
Voice Over: There must be more to life than having everything.
Donald: Yes, there is, but I won’t tell you what it is.
Jeffrey: Nor will I, since I also know what it is.
Donald: We have certain things in common, Jeffrey.
Jeffrey: Yes, we do, come to think of it.
Donald: Enigmas never age, have you noticed that?
Jeffrey: As a matter of fact, it was clear to me the last time I saw you.
Trump: A pal is a wonderful thing. Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret.
And to prove the point, he did indeed sue The Wall Street Journal for $20 billion. But it did not take long for someone to find a small trove of similar black-marker doodles that Trump had sold at charity auctions. One more attempt to drive a stake into the Epstein story had failed, and the call for providing the files increased.
Just maybe, the White House finally figured out that it was time to release something. The Hill reported:
President Trump said Thursday he was directing Attorney General Pam Bondi to release relevant grand jury testimony in the case of sex offender and disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, a move that comes after his supporters for days pressed the government to produce more information in the case.
Of course, speaking of scams, pretty much everyone knows that witness testimony before grand juries are shrouded in secrecy. So there was little possibility the grand jury’s testimony in the Epstein case would see the light of day. Meanwhile, MAGA politicians, worried about the midterms, realized it was time to prove they were still as vigilant as ever. Politico pointed to the problem:
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on Monday appeared to send a pointed message to President Donald Trump: If the Department of Justice does not release more information on disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, his supporters will no longer stand behind him. Without naming Epstein, the Georgia Republican on social media said the president is ‘dangling’ only bits of information to his supporters despite promises during the 2024 campaign that his administration would be transparent with the public. ‘If you tell the base of people, who support you, of deep state treasonous crimes, election interference, blackmail, and rich powerful elite evil cabals, then you must take down every enemy of The People …If not,’ she continued, ‘The base will turn and there’s no going back. Dangling bits of red meat no longer satisfies. They want the whole steak dinner and will accept nothing else.’
Do you think Marjorie Taylor Greene already knew Kash Patel and Pam Bondi had dispatched a thousand FBI agents to scan, locate, and tag every mention of Donald Trump in the thousands of pages of the Epstein files the Department of Justice had compiled over the decades?
The New York Times put it this way:
There was a single goal in mind: find something — anything — that could be released to the public to satisfy President Trump’s supporters. Justice Department officials diverted hundreds of F.B.I. employees and federal prosecutors from their regular duties to go through the Jeffrey Epstein files at least four times — including once to flag any references to President Trump and other prominent figures …
But after devoting countless hours to the project, working at times around the clock searching databases, hard drives, network drives, cabinets, desks and closets, the bureau and the department finally acknowledged this month that they had little to show for their efforts. They came to realize, for instance, that there was no specific ‘client list,’ which previous investigators had known years ago …
The expansive and ultimately fruitless effort to scrutinize the files reflects the obsession within the Trump administration and Mr. Trump’s political base with Mr. Epstein — a fixation that several top administration officials helped fuel themselves before they entered government. The review appeared to be nearing an end in mid-April, shortly before Attorney General Pam Bondi briefed Mr. Trump that he was mentioned in the files.
Still, by reaching the same conclusion that other inquiries had come to — namely, that Mr. Epstein killed himself in 2019 and that no evidence existed to charge other people with trafficking young women — the document review has created deep fissures among the president’s followers, who have found themselves not knowing who or what to believe about a story that they have been fed for years …
On Tuesday, Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, drove the most recent stake into the heart of the Epstein conspiracy theory, reiterating the findings of the department memo this month indicating that the F.B.I.’s review had not turned up any additional culprits, ‘This Department of Justice does not shy away from uncomfortable truths, nor from the responsibility to pursue justice wherever the facts may lead,’ Mr. Blanche wrote on social media. ‘The joint statement by @TheJusticeDept and @FBI of July 6 remains as accurate today as it was when it was written.’
[Emphasis added.]
I guess it is up to me to remind The New York Times that their report relies on the testimony of the Department of Justice and that neither they nor any other independent observer was given the opportunity to go through the thousands of papers. But on a roll, the DOJ doubled down and issued the following press release:
The Trump administration had delivered its message. Here is how NPR reported the story:
The Justice Department and the FBI have found no evidence that disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein had a ‘client list’ or that he blackmailed prominent associates. The conclusions are included in a two-page memo outlining the ‘exhaustive review’ the department conducted of the Epstein files in its possession. The memo also states that after a ‘thorough investigation,’ the FBI found that Epstein died by suicide, which aligns with previous department conclusions.
But NPR could not help itself and went on to remind its listeners:
The findings contradict past statements from Attorney General Pam Bondi about an alleged list of Epstein clients. And it’s unclear if the memo will tamp down on the continued public skepticism about Epstein’s case, particularly his suicide.
With the categorical claim that there was nothing to be learned from the departed Jeffrey Epstein or the voluminous files, the focus turned to the convicted Ghislaine Maxwell and, with it, the compelling need to figure out what she might say. On July 22, 2025, ABC reported that the administration wanted those answers:
ABC wrote:
Attorney General Pam Bondi said Monday that Deputy Attorney Todd Blanche will meet with Ghislaine Maxwell, the convicted associate of deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, sometime in the ‘coming days.’ ‘President Trump has told us to release all credible evidence. If Ghislane Maxwell has information about anyone who has committed crimes against victims, the FBI and the DOJ will hear what she has to say,’ Blanche said in the statement posted by Bondi on X.
Blanche also said that the joint statement from the Justice Department and FBI on July 6 — which stated they would not release any additional files on Epstein and that they determined there was no Epstein ‘client list’ – ‘remains as accurate today as it was when it was written … Namely, that in the recent thorough review of the files maintained by the FBI in the Epstein case, no evidence was uncovered that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties,’ Blanche said. He added that up ‘until now, no administration on behalf of the Department had inquired about her willingness to meet with the government.’
The statement comes as a growing chorus of lawmakers have called for Maxwell to testify about her relationship with Epstein, and while the department is actively opposing Maxwell’s efforts to appeal her conviction for conspiring with and aiding Epstein in his sexual abuse of underage girls.
David Oscar Markus, the appellate counsel for Maxwell, confirmed to ABC News that they are in talks with the government. ‘I can confirm that we are in discussions with the government, and that Ghislaine will always testify truthfully,’ Markus said. ‘We are grateful to President Trump for his commitment to uncovering the truth in this case.’
[Emphasis added.]
Irony times a million. Congratulating Donald Trump, potential third party, for his deep commitment to the truth while Pam Bondi dispatches Todd Blanche to see truth-telling Ghislaine. Bondi and Blanche are, of course, the two chief DOJ officials who continue to relentlessly punish/prosecute Kilmar Abrego Garcia for resisting their attempts to deny him his habeas corpus rights—that is, after illegally deporting him to a Salvadoran hellhole. Then, most recently, they pressured him to falsely admit to their trumped-up charges of having trafficked juveniles by threatening to send him to Sudan.
Of course, the best possible person to send to test Ghislaine’s veracity and the quality of the information she might offer about Jeffrey Epstein is Maurene Comey, the Southern District of New York prosecutor who worked on the Epstein case. But, hard to believe, she was abruptly fired on July 16, 2025:
Boy, was that bad luck. As CNN notes:
Maurene Comey, a federal prosecutor in Manhattan and the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey, has been fired from her job in the Southern District of New York, according to people familiar with the situation … Maurene Comey was a lead prosecutor on the investigation and prosecution of Epstein and his former girlfriend and accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell. Maxwell was convicted and is serving a 20-year sentence. She has appealed.
But, Abrego Garcia notwithstanding, Todd Blanche wants to reassure us of his unwavering determination to pursue justice:
Todd Blanche reminds us again that President Trump “has told us to release all credible evidence.” And he reassures us: “This Department of Justice does not shy away from uncomfortable truths.” OK, Todd, but just maybe there is someone else in the White House or the FBI or DOJ who is, in fact, shying away from those uncomfortable truths. Because the Epstein files they did provide to Congress prompted as many questions as they provided answers.
To be fair, not everybody was unhappy. According to FOX News, U.S. Rep. James Comer, the Republican chair of the House Oversight Committee told us the DOJ was cooperating “in good faith effort to produce files … [and] I appreciate the Trump administration’s commitment to transparency and efforts to provide the American people with information about this matter.” Then his committee spokesperson noted, “The production contains thousands of pages of documents. The Trump DOJ is providing records at a far quicker pace than anything the Biden DOJ ever provided.” And then the Oversight Committee announced the issuance of subpoenas to Hillary and Bill Clinton.
Turns out some well-prepared Democrats on the committee had their staffs cull through all 33,295 pages of the documents provided and announced that about 97 percent of what they got had already made been released to the public. About a 1,000 pages were flight logs.
So far as cover-ups go, this one was already in deep trouble. Yes, on the plus side for the White House, Jeffrey Epstein was no longer in the picture, either pushed or opted out. But, unfortunately, Michael Wolff was still around and appearing just about everywhere he could on YouTube podcasts. Yes, the Michael Wolff who, for some inexplicable reason, was invited time and again back into the Trump White House to write more books. Well, it just so happens that Jeffrey Epstein had hoped that Wolf would write a similar book about him.
Armed with many a tale that Epstein told him along the way, Wolff has allowed Epstein to speak from beyond the grave, including spreading the news that Epstein and Trump were very—yes, very—close buddies for more than a decade, hunting together, even sharing very young women, girls even. Wolff told Joanna Cole of The Daily Beast that Trump and Epstein had created their very own “pussy club” to celebrate their bond and shared impulses, betting on who could first bed Princess Diana. Wolff revealed the previously under-appreciated connection between Epstein and Melania.
As more evidence about the deep, sustained relationship between Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein surfaced, and as the clamor for even more transparency and accountability swelled, it became more and more critical to make sure which story, and to shape any such story, Gislaine Maxwell might tell once she got the chance. By the way, one of the tidbits Michael Wolff offered was the possibility that it had been Ghislaine Maxwell’s team who had tipped off The Journal about the Trump sketch for the Epstein birthday book. A shot across the bow, Wolff suggested, and the hard-to-ignore message that Ghislaine had the power to make Donald Trump’s life miserable. And notice that there were very compelling reasons to negotiate.
Now, before I dive deep into the details of Todd Blanche’s intervention on behalf of Donald Trump, I need to remind you of some basic facts. Gislaine Maxwell was serving a 20-year sentence in the FCI prison in Tallahassee, Fla., having been unanimously convicted of conspiracy to transport minors with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, transportation of a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, and sex trafficking of a minor.
Meanwhile, as The New York Post reported, Judge Paul Englemayer ruled on the transcripts:
A Manhattan federal judge on Monday denied the Trump administration’s bid to unseal grand jury documents in the case against dead sex predator Jeffrey Epstein’s accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell. US District Judge Paul Engelmayer said the transcripts revealed ‘next to nothing new’ — in a scathing decision that ripped the Justice Department for overhyping the files, going so far as to suggest it was all a ‘diversion.’
Then Judge Engelmayer reminded us of the jury’s ruling:
These days I am, more than ever, so very grateful that my father shared his love of the Marx Brothers with me. And I still think Duck Soup’s “Hail Freedonia” offers much of what “The Star-Spangled Banner” lacks for insight:
If any form of pleasure is exhibited,
Report to me and it will be prohibited.
I’ll put my foot down; So shall it be
This is the land of the free.
The last man nearly ruined this place,
He didn’t know what to do with it.
If you think this country’s bad off now,
Just wait ’till I get through with it.
Well, if anyone fits in seamlessly with the never-ending absurdity of the Marx Brothers, it is Todd Blanche. It is an indication of how desperate they are at the White House to drive the Jeffrey Epstein story from the headlines that they actually thought it a good idea to share the Blanche/Ghislaine interviews. Was it Trump or Gabbard or JD Vance or Bondi or Katherine Leavitt who imagined that Blanche and Ghislaine could actually convince us that this is all much ado about nothing?
Well, here we go as the curtain rises on Ghislaine Maxwell facing off against Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, Acting Associate Deputy Attorney General Diego Pestana, FBI Special Agent Spencer Horn, and Deputy U.S. Marshal Mark Beard. I do not mean to be cruel, but it sometimes seems as if Todd Blanche imagines that he has been sent to do a puff piece for People Magazine. Meanwhile, Ghislaine Maxwell—a practiced liar, a masterful seductress, and someone who has successfully manipulated hundreds of young women—quickly realizes that the spirit of Jeffrey Epstein has sent her a quartet of all-time male suckers. And it doesn’t take long for her to realize that if she cooperates and gives them the gift they are there to get (ironically, the get-out-of-jail card for Donald Trump), perhaps she will get one as well, as well as the pardon no one before ever believed possible.
Let’s start with the newly imagined origin story of her relationship with Jeffrey Epstein:
Page 10 GHISLAINE MAXWELL: And then in April 15 of 1991, I came to New York, but, I can’t remember for what reason — what business reason, but there was a business reason — something to do with my dad at that time. And a girlfriend of mine who — an American, told me I — I — I had broken up with my long — I’d been engaged, getting my — the very long-term boyfriend and we’d broken up. And she said, I’ve got — you know, as your girlfriends do, I’ve got a guy for you to meet. And I was like, who is it? And she goes, it’s – he’s been dating my sister. You’ll love him. He’s looking for a wife. I’m edging towards 30. I don’t need to tell you guys, that’s a very important moment for a girl to, like, think about important things. And sure, I’d be happy to meet him.
[Emphasis added.]
Where is Groucho Marx when you need him? The perfect cupid story: Jeffrey Epstein is looking for a wife and I am getting to that age.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: … We are in 1991. I met him at his offices in — on Madison Garden. And I think the most memorable thing I can think about that is he was wearing a tie, which he didn’t often do. It had a giant, seemed like a ketchup stain on it. So I was like, wow, okay. And that was how we met … I knew nothing about him — he just invited me to come and have tea, and I was like tea, that’s English … And I found him very engaging and that was that.
Page 18: TODD BLANCHE: No, that’s helpful. Thank you … you’re now in the ’90s and you’re friends with Mr. Epstein … What — what happens with your relationship?
Two DOJ guys, an FBI agent, and a U.S. marshal, and no one knows how to conduct an interrogation? Then Blanche takes an almost creepy interest in where Ghislaine sleeps when she is accompanying Epstein and what exactly happens when they share a bed. On to Page 21:
The interview continues:
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Heart condition.
DAVID MARKUS: Heart condition.
TODD BLANCHE: A heart condition. Okay.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Which meant that he didn’t have intercourse a lot, which suited me fine, because I actually do have a medical condition, which precludes me having a lot of intercourse.
TODD BLANCHE: So what — what was your understanding of his heart condition and why that prevented him from having intercourse regularly?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: I don’t know. I mean, he liked other forms of sexual activities. TODD BLANCHE: Well, let’s come back. We’re going to obviously spend some time — a lot of time on the actual conduct he was accused of. So we’ll –
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Okay …
Like the bones spurs that spared Donald Trump the jungles of Vietnam, we have now been told she and Epstein both have a medical condition, which could mean they couldn’t really have done what the world believes they did. She is now several steps closer to trading in the bars of her cell for some fresh air and green grass.
TODD BLANCHE: — until around ’96. At that time, you — I believe you said that he was basically your life, like you were with him pretty regularly.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Well, I — no.
TODD BLANCHE: Okay.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: So I never was with him regularly.
TODD BLANCHE: Okay.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: That is one of those misnomers.
TODD BLANCHE: Okay.
Yes, Todd Blanche OKs the misnomer. You might be thinking, well, if she wasn’t with him much, how exactly could she be guilty of continually providing him with young women?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: And so I also know now, which I didn’t know at the time, was that he saw lots of other women. And I know that now, because I can see — can see it from the flight logs and I know it now because I can see from the emails.
TODD BLANCHE: So, you know from the case –
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Yes, not from –
TODD BLANCHE: — that what happened.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Yes, I didn’t know –
TODD BLANCHE: You didn’t know that along the way.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: I contemporaneously, I absolutely did not know.
TODD BLANCHE: So, okay — so just – and we’re going to spend time on everything you’re talking about, but just to kind of close out the big picture of your relationship. So we’re now in the late ’90s, continue on with, again, staying high level to the extent you can, about your relationship with him.
[Emphasis added.]
Imagine her delighted sex-trafficker face when the second in command at the DOJ suggests she stay “high level to the extent you can.”
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: The way that I thought of myself, or the way that I think is the best way to explain how I view my role, was as a general manager. Because each property, to me was like a — a hotel. So the ranch was very challenging, because not only that, but it had BLM land, so to help maintain your BLM, you have to have cattle and I love animals. And so the first thing, horses. And so I wanted it, if you’re going to have a ranch, I like authenticity. And so I don’t think you should have a ranch if you’re not going to have the things that make it special.
TODD BLANCHE: So were you — were you paid by him along the way …
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: I — I — my memory is that I got paid $25,000 a year to begin with. That’s my memory. I may be wrong … I just want to hit something on the head right now. There’s a tremendous amount of reporting that said that I had a –
LEAH SAFFIAN: A trust fund.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Thank you. A trust fund. I have never had a trust fund, at any time. DAVID MARKUS: So how did you live, did you live with — with — I mean, $25,000 is not enough to live on.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: No. So I had — during this period of time, the secret — secret, the Serious Fraud Squad had come to see me, in relation to my father’s passing, and to establish whether I had been involved in any way with his business or with any shenanigans … I was never involved in any of his business, whatever, so I was free.
TODD BLANCHE: And were you — so, but your — you know, obviously your — your father and your family had a lot of businesses. Did — is it because the money, whatever money or whatever equity was in the businesses, just stayed with your other family members?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: No, there was no money. So my father was never attached to money. He was born a peasant, a real one. Dirt floor, no shoes, no clothes — some clothes, but not, you know, sorry, I don’t mean to say — nothing. And he never — he was never into that. I mean, there were things that he had his extravagances, he loved his boat and his plane. So obviously you need money for that. But there was no, nothing else. And there was not a single penny that came to any of us at any time, ever …
[Emphasis added.]
The only peasant with a boat and a plane.
TODD BLANCHE: Okay. So — so when you are talking about your life with Mr. Epstein in the ’90s … you’re very different financially …
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Absolutely.
TODD BLANCHE: — meaning he’s giving you money, he’s paying for your — when you fly, he – I assume pays for your flights.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Yes …
TODD BLANCHE: … I interrupted you when you were saying how you were functioning as a general manager. You helped with the New Mexico ranch. So did — did your role with him continue like that for many years or for how long?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: So I continued — in 2000 — well, in — by 1999, our relationship had foundered. In –
TODD BLANCHE: Why?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: I — well, two reasons: We were never sleeping together again. So we stopped having sexual relations in 1999. Not full sex. Sorry, just to be clear. Didn’t mean that we didn’t still share a bed bedroom sometimes or whatever. He had another girlfriend.
TODD BLANCHE: He had what?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Other girlfriends. definitively knew that it was over after 9/11, actually, because we were both in New York and I don’t know, were you in New York on 9/11? I mean, 9/11 … And it was a scary time if you were in New York. You didn’t know, I didn’t know, nobody knew what was going on. And he was in 71st Street and I was in 65th Street, my house. And he wouldn’t see me at all. Asked me, his mum, who I’m very close to, who’s in hospital at Lennox Hill, just asked me to look after her. And then I knew, as anyone did at that time, if you’re not going to be there for someone in 9/11, you’re never going to be there. So for me, that was the line’s end. And he had another English girlfriend actually, from 2000.
[Emphasis added.]
Are we paying Todd Blanche’s salary as Ghislaine Maxwell bullshits her way around him? It turns out for Ghislaine that the rapist and abuser Jeffrey Epstein’s great failure was that he failed her 9/11 test. Had any of these MAGA guys read the testimony of those women who testified against her? These are the folks who fired Maurene Comey, the woman who prosecuted Maxwell and knows more than anyone about exactly what she really did.
TODD BLANCHE: Okay. So — so go ahead. So what — what — at that point, when you say you realized kind of it was over?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Well, I mean, I’m talking about the — the — I had had, there was a — I had wanted to get married and have children. And Epstein had encouraged me to believe that that would — I don’t know about the — certainly by the mid late ’90s, I knew the marriage part was never going to happen. I had believed that maybe in ’96, ’97, ’98 maybe, but then I realized it wasn’t that. But I did think that we might have a child, which is what I had really wanted. And I realized –
TODD BLANCHE: Give or take, 2001.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: So we stopped having physicality. I mean, that doesn’t mean we weren’t friends. I certainly did stay, sometimes, in his room. I mean, friends with benefits, if you will, just not sex. Sorry. And I started dating.
TODD BLANCHE: Okay.
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: And I met someone that I fell very much in love with in 2003. His name was Ted Waitt. Ted Waitt, you may know as the founder of Gateway, the computers. And we had an amazing relationship that ended in — went on until 2010, I think. And I was with Ted from that time.
TODD BLANCHE: Did you meet him through7 Mr. Epstein?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: No. Well, indirectly, I suppose you could say so. No, they’d never met. I was at a dinner where I met Ted, but it wasn’t — I was with President Clinton. President Clinton was my friend, not Epstein’s friend. And Epstein had flown him and there was a dinner and Ted came to the dinner. So I guess, indirectly, through Mr. Epstein, because it was with his plane, but I’d have been there anyway without him. I had — was not the –
DAVID MARKUS: Was Epstein on the plane when you guys flew?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: On that trip, yes. Well, yes. They — that, yes.
TODD BLANCHE: So when you say the — the dinner was — was where?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Hong Kong …
TODD BLANCHE: … so in the time that you’re dating, that you’re with him to 2009, are you still working for Mr. Epstein during that time?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: So his — so it’d be true to say that Jeffrey tried very hard, he tried very hard to — to keep me to working for him, because this is a complex operator. I’m not talking about anything untoward, just the sheer size of the projects. I’m talking the construction projects, the houses, the staff. It’s a — it’s a really significant job. And I ran all the properties, the staff in the properties, the management of the properties that — and all the construction. And we’re talking tens of millions of dollars for the island alone …
TODD BLANCHE: Okay. So in that time period, what happens next with — as far as your relationship with Mr. Epstein?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: I don’t have one with him …. I certainly went to his house once, for sure, maybe twice. But I was not seeing him. The only time that I was in touch with him was when the things happened. Like things, I mean, in the press that affected me or when the CVRA case was filed and there was like rubbish that went out, because I needed information.
Because I didn’t know — I didn’t know anything about what was happening and I needed his help. A, to under- — I — I– well, that doesn’t sound right. Let me rephrase that. I don’t mean his help. I meant to have answers, so that I had an ability to defend myself, that’s what I’m talking about. I’m not talking any- —
[Emphasis added.]
You wouldn’t know it by anything Todd Blanche said, but she is talking about the 2004 Federal Crime Victims Right Act (CVRA) and the 2006 Florida grand jury proceedings that ended with only a single charge of solicitation of prostitution against Jeffrey Epstein. Todd Blanche lets the “rubbish” charge melt away and return to their relationship:
TODD BLANCHE: So when does that relationship change? So — so you’re working — you talked about when your — the physical relationship stopped and then you’re still working for him, or with him managing his properties and being — serving as like a general manager. You then start your own relationship with another individual from — with Ted from 2003 till 2009 or ’10. At what point in that whole period is there like more of a break, where you’re no longer acting as his general manager?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL: So I — I wanted to have a full break when I started dating Ted. And he was clever. I — I — I suppose it would be true to say that I sort of viewed Mr. Epstein, at that point, as sort of family, if you will. Like someone I could rely on. And I should have had more confidence in myself. I can see that now. But at the time, given everything that had happened in my life, I thought that it would — and I saw how he was with other people like Eva, who seemed to be very comfortable with him, and I thought this would be — and he always said, I was like family. So he worked hard to make — maintain a relationship with me. He was generous with me. He let me use the plane, for instance, which was very generous, he would check in with my mum …
It is time to wrench ourselves away from the Ghislaine/Trump cover-up and return to the real world of sex traffickers and their victims. Here is an excerpt from the government’s June 22, 2022, sentencing memorandum that followed her conviction in United States v. Ghislaine Maxwell:
Just something to keep in mind as you watch the White House and some MAGA news outlets begin to suggest that Ghislaine Maxwell has suffered enough and might very well deserve a pardon.
Come back next week for Part Two of “The Ghislaine Maxwell/Donald Trump cover-up.”
