MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Bombards Trump Admin Over Epstein Backflip — With Receipts
MSNBC host Rachel Maddow bombarded members of President Donald Trump’s administration over their claim that the so-called “Epstein Files” contain no “client list” with video receipts showing they said the opposite for months.
Deceased sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein has been the subject of many a conspiracy theory, none of which were quelled when Attorney General Pam Bondi’s office ostentatiously released a set of thick Epstein binders in March that angered even supporters for their insufficiency.
Over the course of several months, some Trump officials tried to climb down from their Epstein conspiracy perches even as estranged DOGE czar Elon Musk very publicly tried to implicate Trump in them. Then the Trump Justice Department dropped a bombless bomb Monday when they claimed there actually was no client list, and no “Epstein Files” worth releasing.
On Monday night’s edition of MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show, the host opened the hour with a marathon rundown of art installations mocking Trump, which segued into a piece that plays a Trump/Epstein video clip on a loop.
With meticulous citations, Maddow then highlighted the administration’s reversal on the “client list” — with a heavy implication that the flip-flop has something to do with that video of Trump “at a party with the late millionaire pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, to whom President Donald Trump was, in fact, a friend”:
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST: That plaque is on yet another new sculpture, I think, deliberately designed to be as ugly as possible. It`s got a gold spray-painted ivy and a gold spray painted eagle, and a gold spray painted TV. And in these images, it looks like the TV is off but in situ. This sculpture actually has the TV playing stuff. The TV apparently is battery-powered, and it runs a constant loop of video clips of Trump doing his signature dance, where he looks like he`s doing something rude with each hand.
And these clips that play on a loop on this sculpture, they include a little squib of video of Trump kind of doing that dance at a party with the late millionaire pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, to whom President Donald Trump was, in fact, a friend.
Because for our sins, with everything else going on, you know, with Trump today restarting the total economic chaos of random, scattershot tariffs on every country in the world other than Russia, with the U.S. government in its infinite wisdom under Donald Trump getting us back into the measles business, which we had basically eradicated, but now we`ve got the biggest measles outbreak we`ve had in more than 30 years, with President Trump saying he was, quote, not notified of the decision to cut off U.S. military support shipments to Ukraine. He said he was not notified and he issued no instruction to do that, raising the obvious question of okay, then, if you as president didn`t make that decision, who made that decision.
With Trump literally paving the Rose Garden and putting this picture of himself up in the White House, in the room with all the portraits of the first ladies. I mean, this is what he put up, right? I mean, in the middle of everything else, large and small, that we are contending with, there really is a Jeffrey Epstein-Donald Trump subplot in our lives now in which this footage exists and in which the Trump Justice Department put out a statement today saying, never mind all the things we ever said and hyped and screamed about the late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Turns out it`s all nothing and people should stop asking us about it.
Headline, “Trump administration acknowledges lack of evidence from Epstein documents. After months of promising big revelations, Attorney General Pam Bondi acknowledges a lack of evidence for a host of conspiracy theories,” including a, quote, “client list”.
Trump`s Attorney General Pam Bondi, in fact, not only said there was a Jeffrey Epstein client list that Trump had ordered her to review and release to the American people. She not only said there was a Jeffrey Epstein client list, she said that she had it in her possession on her desk.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN ROBERTS, FOX NEWS HOST: One of the things that you alluded to, and this is something Donald Trump has talked about, the DOJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein`s clients? Will that really happen?
PAM BONDI, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: It`s sitting on my desk right now to review. That`s been a directive by President Trump. I`m reviewing that. I`m reviewing JFK files, MLK files. That`s all in the process of being reviewed, because that was done at the directive of the president from all of these agencies.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: Yes, it was a directive of the president. The Epstein client list is sitting on my desk right now, says Donald Trump`s hand-picked attorney general. A new statement today from her department, the U.S. Department of Justice says there — there is no Epstein client list. The systematic review revealed no incriminating client list, according to today`s DOJ memo.
These guys have been hyping the whole Epstein conspiracy theory for years. I mean, this is this is the guy who Donald Trump appointed to be deputy director of the FBI.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAN BONGINO, FBI DEPUTY DIRECTOR: I`ve already told you the Epstein story. Let`s just say a friend who knows about something. If you`ve heard the story, he was on the plane With Clinton. Clinton with the Epstein thing, and he said, I`m out of here, daddy oh.
I told that story quite a few times. So I know a lot about this story. There are a lot of people who know old Jeff, a lot of people. So it`s kind of weird, like this client list is about to come out. Everybody got quiet all of a sudden.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: I know about this story, a lot — says the podcaster who Trump named to be deputy director of the FBI.
Now, today. Knock, knock, knock, FBI, what`s up with that? Today, according to the FBI and the Justice Department, there is nothing at all to this Jeffrey Epstein story. Please stop talking about it. There will be no further information released. Client list? What client list?
We will not be talking about this anymore. There will be no further information. You should stop talking about this. Except maybe if it is raised, you know, on the gold spray painted television sculpture on the national mall. Maybe you could learn something about it there. But otherwise, now that Donald Trump is the head of the U.S. federal government, we`re just — (THROWS UP HANDS) — no.
Watch above via MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show.
