CNN Host Says Trump DOJ Met With Ghislaine To ‘Collect Scalps — And Not An Orange One’

CNN’s Michael Smerconish theorized that Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s meetings with Ghislaine Maxwell are for President Donald Trump’s political benefit, arguing they are looking to “collect scalps — and not an orange one.”

In a conversation with CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig on Saturday, Smerconish floated his theory that Blanche’s recent meetings with Maxwell are an effort to collect potential names of Democrats who associated with late billionaire Jeffrey Epstein.

Smerconish argued that Trump could offer some kind of “clemency” to Maxwell, provided she gives him politically beneficial names. Honig offered more doubt over whether Maxwell’s statements will lead to any actual prosecutions, as she’s far too much of an unreliable witness.

Trump this week left the door open to pardoning Maxwell, saying he’s “allowed” to, but he hasn’t given it much thought.

“He is there to collect scalps and not an orange one,” Smerconish said about Blanche. “His mission is to come home with names that she’s prepared to name publicly. The higher place they are in progressive Democratic circles, the better. So that if she’s willing to say X, Y, and Z by name were involved with Epstein beyond just flying on the plane or visiting the island, then for Trump it’s the political win that he thinks he needs where he points in a different direction and maybe in that circumstance he cuts her some slack offering clemency.”

Epstein died in 2019 while being charged with sex trafficking. The Department of Justice/FBI released a memo concluding he committed suicide and denying theories about a list of high profile clients who took part in decades of abuse. The administration has since set up meetings with Maxwell, a longtime associate of Epstein’s, in the face of calls for more Epstein documents to be released.

Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years for “conspiring with Jeffrey Epstein to sexually abuse minors,” according to the Department of Justice.

While Honig doubted any actual cases will stem from Maxwell speaking with Blanche, Smerconish argued this DOJ could be very different from past administrations.

“In any other DOJ, I would agree with you that the idea of indictments flowing from this is preposterous,” he said.

Check out the exchange below:

MICHAEL SMERCONISH: Ready for my theory? He is there to collect scalps and not an orange one. His mission is to come home with names that she’s prepared to name publicly. The higher place they are in progressive Democratic circles, the better. So that if she’s willing to say X, Y, and Z by name were involved with Epstein beyond just flying on the plane or visiting the island, then for Trump it’s the political win that he thinks he needs where he points in a different direction and maybe in that circumstance he cuts her some slack offering clemency. Your thoughts.

ELIE HONIG: Good, so we partially agree, we partially disagree. So first of all, I do think that whatever names she names in that session, as having committed crimes, will come out eventually and probably sooner than later. I’m not sure where you are on this, but I don’t think there’s any way in the world DOJ actually prosecutes anyone based on that. Maybe there’s some sort of release or announcement, but look, I spent tons of time as a prosecutor dealing with cooperating witnesses. I don’t see any way DOJ comes to the conclusion that Ghislaine Maxwell is fully credible, fully reliable, somebody we want to invest in, somebody we want ask a judge to reduce her sentence, somebody want to indict based on her testimony and then call at trial as a witness. So it could well be that there’s naming of names, but no way is DOJ going to actually bring other indictments of this. So Michael, to your point, you know, we learned yesterday that Ghislaine Maxwell had been asked about 100 different names. That came from David Markus, Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyer. And I want to know, did she say any of those 100 committed crimes that she knows of? If she said none of them committed crimes, then I have serious questions about her credibility.

SMERCONISH: In any other DOJ, I would agree with you that the idea of indictments flowing from this is preposterous.

Watch above via CNN.