What’s the deal with the Epstein thing?

Trump’s Maga base is in an uproar and not buying the president’s explanations on the late paedophile investor

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Activists' message projected on the Department of Commerce headquarters in Washington DC. Trump’s problems started when the Justice Department and FBI published a memo concluding there was no “client list” and “credible evidence” that Epstein “blackmailed prominent individuals as part of his actions”, and that he had died by suicide. PHOTO: AFP

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Leon Hadar

Published Mon, Jul 21, 2025 · 05:00 PM

US PRESIDENT Donald Trump has been commanding his supporters to move on with their fixations over the disgraced financier and registered sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein.

They need to stop pushing the “Jeffrey Epstein hoax”, the president has said, as his administration’s handling of the files relating to the late paedophile investor continues to divide the Make America Great Again (Maga) base. He implored his supporters on social media not to “waste time and energy on Jeffrey Epstein, somebody that nobody cares about”.

But then during the election campaign, Trump promised to release the so-called “Epstein files”, which have been central to ongoing conspiracy theories since the disgraced financier died by suicide in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges. He was found hanging in a New York jail in August 2019.

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