On Tuesday, United States President Donald Trump and US Legal professional Normal Pam Bondi evaded questions from reporters on a recent government review in regards to the accused intercourse trafficker and convicted intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the US Division of Justice (DOJ) concluded that Epstein died by suicide in 2019 in a Manhattan jail cell. Nevertheless, questions are coming from right-wing conspiracy theorists, a lot of whom are a part of Trump’s MAGA [Make America Great Again] base, who’ve lengthy posited extensively circulated conspiracy claims that Epstein was murdered as a result of he possessed sexually compromising materials on highly effective figures and a “consumer listing”.
Here’s what we learn about how the Epstein case is inflicting a MAGA cut up.
Why have MAGA conspiracy theories about Epstein resurfaced now?
A memo, launched on Monday by the Justice Division and the FBI said {that a} authorities evaluate had discovered no proof that Epstein had a particular “secret consumer listing”.
The memo additionally reaffirmed that Epstein had died by suicide, stating, “This conclusion is per earlier findings, together with the August 19, 2019 post-mortem findings of the New York Metropolis Workplace of the Chief Medical Examiner, the November 2019 place of the US Legal professional’s Workplace for the Southern District of New York in reference to the investigation of federal correctional officers chargeable for guarding Epstein, and the June 2023 conclusions of DOJ’s Workplace of the Inspector Normal.”
Nevertheless, right-wing People and on-line sleuths have lengthy posed conspiracy theories that the federal government coated up the reality of Epstein’s dying. The page views memo has sparked these again into motion.
Apart from the memo, the DOJ launched a video on Monday of Epstein’s jail cell on the night time he died, displaying that nobody entered Epstein’s jail cell throughout that night time. Within the video, nonetheless, the time code jumps by one minute and two seconds simply earlier than midnight, additional inflaming the conspiracy theorists.
What did Trump say to reporters about Jeffrey Epstein?
Throughout a White Home Cupboard assembly on Tuesday, a reporter requested Bondi in regards to the lacking minute on the Epstein jail video.
The reporter mentioned, “The memo launched yesterday on Jeffrey Epstein, it left some lingering mysteries, and one of many greatest ones is whether or not he labored for an American or international intelligence company. Might you say why there was a minute lacking from the jailhouse tape on the night time of his dying?”
Trump jumped in, asking, “Are you continue to speaking about Jeffrey Epstein? This man’s been talked about for years”, with clear frustration.
“Are folks nonetheless speaking about this man, this creep? That’s unbelievable,” Trump added earlier than asking Bondi if she needed to “waste time” answering the query.
Trump shut the query off, saying, “I imply, I can’t consider you’re asking a query on Epstein at a time like this, the place we’re having among the biggest success and likewise tragedy, with what occurred in Texas,” referring to flash floods that roiled the southern US state over the weekend, killing 109 people. “It simply looks as if a desecration,” Trump added.
Whereas campaigning for the presidential election final yr, nonetheless, Trump had mentioned he would launch recordsdata associated to Epstein.
Bondi instructed the reporter that she had no information about Epstein being an “agent”. “We will get again to you on that,” she mentioned.
She added that the jail digital camera system was previous – “from 1999”. “Each night time, the video is reset and each night time ought to have the identical minute lacking. So we’re in search of that video to launch that, as properly, displaying {that a} minute is lacking each night time. And that’s it on Epstein,” she mentioned.
What occurred to Epstein?
Born and raised in New York, Epstein was a millionaire financier identified for associating with socialites, politicians and celebrities. He died in a Manhattan jail cell on August 10, 2019.
In 2005, Epstein was accused of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old lady after her dad and mom reported it to the police. This led to the police talking to extra women who got here ahead to make comparable allegations. Finally, in 2008, Epstein pleaded responsible to a cost regarding a single sufferer. He spent 13 months in jail on a work-release programme, which allowed him to go away jail to go to work throughout the day and return at night time.
In 2019, he was charged with intercourse trafficking by federal prosecutors in New York.
The US legal professional in Manhattan additionally prosecuted Epstein’s former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell – daughter of the disgraced media mogul, Robert Maxwell, who died in 1991 after being accused of stealing from staff’ pensions within the UK. Ghislaine Maxwell was accused of being Epstein’s co-conspirator in his sexual abuse scheme. Maxwell was convicted in 2021 and is at present serving a 20-year prison sentence that she acquired in 2022.
In January final yr, some 950 pages of court documents pertaining to allegations towards Epstein had been made public. These documents contained accounts by Epstein’s victims saying that they noticed distinguished figures, together with musicians, teachers and politicians in Epstein’s firm from Michael Jackson to Invoice Clinton.
The inclusion of a reputation within the recordsdata doesn’t point out there are any allegations towards the person, and the people listed in these recordsdata weren’t Epstein’s purchasers.
What do conspiracy theorists consider about Epstein’s dying and why?
Theories that Epstein’s dying was coated up by the federal government – in response to some, as a result of he was a spy for unknown companies – have been floating round in right-wing circles all through the six years since his dying.
In 2022, FBI brokers searched Trump’s Mar-a-Lago membership and residence as a result of the Nationwide Archives needed to make sure Trump didn’t have any categorized paperwork taken throughout his first time period as president.
Lower than a day later, far-right web character Jack Posobiec made options of a conspiracy when he posted on Telegram: “We now know the decide who signed off on the Mar-a-Lago raid was Jeffrey Epstein’s lawyer. Don’t query it!”
This declare was deceptive, nonetheless, as a result of whereas Federal Justice of the Peace Choose Bruce Reinhart had certainly represented staff of Epstein, native press reported that any Justice of the Peace decide would have signed off on the raid and Reinhart was simply the one who was obtainable.
Shut Trump aide and FBI director Kash Patel had additionally solid doubts on the conclusion that Epstein died by suicide earlier than Trump appointed him to guide FBI. FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino has additionally expressed comparable doubts up to now. In 2023, Patel, addressing the then-leaders of the FBI, mentioned on a YouTube present, “Put in your huge boy pants and tell us who the pedophiles are.”
In Could this yr, Patel and Bongino each modified their positions to the US authorities’s conclusion: that Epstein died by suicide.
Why has Legal professional Normal Pam Bondi come beneath strain now?
Bondi has spoken in regards to the Epstein recordsdata up to now and is seen as having stirred up curiosity and expectations of revelations amongst conspiracy theorists.
Throughout an interview with Fox Information in February, Bondi was requested, “The DOJ could also be releasing the listing of Jeffrey Epstein’s purchasers, will that basically occur?”
She responded, “It’s sitting on my desk proper now to evaluate.”
Additionally in February, political commentators and far-right influencers had been invited to the White Home and introduced with paperwork titled “The Epstein Recordsdata: Section 1”. Bondi then launched these paperwork, which didn’t include something revelatory in regards to the Epstein case. Nevertheless, she additionally mentioned that she had delivered a “truckload” of proof in regards to the Epstein case to the FBI.
Monday’s memo, which said that the “listing” Bondi has been promising to launch didn’t exist, was the ultimate nail within the coffin of disappointment for critics inside MAGA. On Tuesday, Bondi denied that she had been speaking a few “consumer listing”. As a substitute, the “listing” she was referring to was the Epstein case file. “That’s what I meant by that,” she mentioned.
On Tuesday, Bondi additionally mentioned that the 1000’s of movies concerning the Epstein case, reviewed by US intelligence, couldn’t, the truth is, be launched to the general public since they contained little one sexual abuse. “Little one porn is what they had been. By no means going to be launched, by no means going to see the sunshine of day,” she mentioned.
What are the conspiracy theorists saying now?
Following the federal government memo on Monday, far-right personalities expressed additional disappointment.
The ‘lacking minute’ within the Epstein video
Conservatives, together with social media character Robby Starbuck, raised questions in regards to the video posted by the DOJ on Monday in on-line posts.
There are some extraordinarily weird issues in regards to the video of Epstein’s cell that Pam Bondi’s DOJ launched as proof nobody killed him. First, a full minute seems to be lacking from the video and secondly, it does NOT seem like the identical cell because the photograph launched on Jan 5, 2020.… pic.twitter.com/xW3GhU6a8N
— Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) July 7, 2025
Allegations of a authorities cover-up
Far-right influencer Jack Posobiec posted on X: “We had been all instructed extra was coming. That solutions had been on the market and could be offered. Unbelievable how completely mismanaged this Epstein mess has been. And it didn’t should be.”
We had been all instructed extra was coming. That solutions had been on the market and could be offered. Unbelievable how completely mismanaged this Epstein mess has been. And it didn’t should be
— Jack Poso 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) July 7, 2025
Alex Jones is one other conspiracy theorist who has spent three years in federal chapter court docket after households of victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting gained $1.3bn in two defamation fits in Connecticut and Texas towards him. He had unfold conspiracy theories that the capturing was a hoax. Now, he’s participating with extra conspiracy theories.
He wrote on X on Tuesday: “Subsequent the DOJ will say ‘Truly, Jeffrey Epstein by no means even existed’,” deeming the memo’s findings “excessive sickening”.
Trump ally and one other conspiracy theorist, Laura Loomer, additionally wrote on X: “Pam Blondi [sic] is overlaying up little one intercourse crimes that happened beneath HER WATCH when she was Legal professional Normal of Florida,” including that Bondi “must be fired”.
Pam Blondi is overlaying up little one intercourse crimes that happened beneath HER WATCH when she was Legal professional Normal of Florida.
Throughout Blondi’s tenure as Florida’s Legal professional Normal from 2011 to 2019, Jeffrey Epstein’s flight logs surfaced, a lot of his victims filed lawsuits, and…
— Laura Loomer (@LauraLoomer) July 8, 2025
Epstein’s ‘hyperlinks’ to Trump and Steve Bannon
Final month, billionaire Elon Musk, a former Trump ally claimed in a now-deleted publish that Trump was named in Epstein recordsdata, which stay sealed. He later expressed regret for the social media jabs he made in the direction of Trump, however this week, he made an extra sequence of posts alleging that the federal government is withholding materials about Epstein.
“How can folks be anticipated to place confidence in Trump if he gained’t launch the Epstein recordsdata?” Musk posted on Tuesday. In a reply to a different publish, Musk additionally alleged that “Bannon is within the Epstein recordsdata”, referring to former White Home adviser and Trump aide Steve Bannon.
Musk didn’t present proof for this, and Bannon’s title is just not within the recordsdata that had been launched in January 2024. Musk and Bannon have clashed in the past over the H-1B visa programme that brings international employees to the US.
Final month, the connection between Musk and Trump nosedived over Trump’s tax-and-spending invoice, known as the “One Massive Lovely Invoice”.
What was Trump’s relationship with Epstein?
Trump’s title does seem within the Epstein recordsdata launched in January 2024, however he’s not accused of something. Right here is the context.
Johanna Sjoberg, one of many many ladies who’ve accused Epstein of sexual abuse, talked about a 2001 incident when she boarded a aircraft with Epstein and some others in Palm Seashore, Florida. Sjoberg mentioned that Virginia Giuffre, one other girl who sued Epstein for abusing her at his properties in Florida, New York, the US Virgin Islands and New Mexico, was additionally current on the aircraft. Giuffre later accused Epstein and Prince Andrew of the UK of sexual abuse however died by suicide earlier this yr.
The aircraft was unable to land in New York attributable to a storm and was pressured to land in Atlantic Metropolis and visited one among Trump’s casinos. Sjoberg mentioned that Giuffre was underage on the time of this incident, and that Sjoberg was requested if she was allowed into the on line casino. “I didn’t know something about how previous you needed to be to gamble legally. I simply knew she couldn’t get in due to an ID problem, so she and I didn’t gamble,” Sjoberg answered.