Harry Litman: MAGA FINALLY CAVES on EPSTEIN FILES?

"Harry breaks down a breaking development in the Epstein File saga. The Justice Department has agreed to share with the House Oversight Committee documents from the Epstein investigation. " 

Source:Talking Feds With Harry Litman with a look at Jeff, Don, and Pam. Perhaps you can tell for yourself who is who.

From Talking Feds With Harry Litman

From CNN: 

"The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform intends to make public some files it subpoenaed related to the Jeffrey Epstein case, though it will first redact them to shield victims’ IDs and other sensitive matters, a committee spokesperson said Tuesday.

The panel is expected to start receiving materials from the Justice Department on Friday, though it appears the public release will come some time after that. The spokesperson said the committee would work with the Justice Department on the process.

“The Committee intends to make the records public after thorough review to ensure all victims’ identification and child sexual abuse material are redacted. The Committee will also consult with the DOJ to ensure any documents released do not negatively impact ongoing criminal cases and investigations,” the spokesperson said.

Many Republicans have called for more transparency surrounding the case and the release of records related to the matter – and the issue has roiled the House... 

From CNN

The New Democrat has been thinking about this story for about a month now (give or take) which is why we haven't weighed in on this at all, except from what you see on our members social media pages, including the official page for The New Democrat on Threads and Twitter. But if you want to know what I think about this, I'll tell you anyway and I have a slightly different perspective from what you see from other commentators who also want to see the Epstein files as well. 

When you think of Donald Trump's base, at least if you took a stereotypical view of his base, you would think his voters are nothing but rural, country bumpkins, who are Anglo-Saxon-Protestants, who only live in the smallest towns in America. And that's a part of his base, no question.

But there's another part of DJT's base, including in New York City... Manhattan, even, out in Los Angeles as well, who also like him, or at least his lifestyle and how he presents himself to the public. And those folks are about as white-collar, well-educated, upper class, metropolitan, professional celebrity types, who are more interested in someone's cultural "brand" and how they appear in pop culture, then anything to do with their morality. These are people where bad boys and bad girls are considered cool. And honest, hardworking people are considered to be so "old school" and so "yesterday" with this professional celebrity community. 

Thanks to Donald Trump and his political reality TV and professional celebrity movement that he personally launched 10 years ago, along with social media, we are way past the days when a sex scandal, and adulterous affair... having kids with your mistress, when you are married, even a serious criminal scandal, can bring down 1 politician. Especially if that politician has a loyal following. 

Professional celebrities today are more popular. when they have a bad boy or bad girl image and have been involved in criminal activities, even have done time in prison, then they would be if their records are completely clean. I think we are going to see that with Sean Combs and others as well and before Mr. Combs. The current President of the United States, is literally a convicted felon, who if he wasn't reelected President, would probably be getting ready for 2 different criminal trials and looking at serious prison time. Who only ran for President in 2024, to tay out of prison and get back at his political opponents.

The speculation (and I'm sure it's true) is that the reason why President Trump doesn't want his Attorney General Pam Bondi, to release the Epstein files, because he knows he's all over them and it would be very embarrassing for him. Even though there's probably nothing in them that could probably incriminate him of anything relating to Jeffrey Epstein. 

But my point is, for reasons that I've already laid out, is Donald Trump literally has nothing to lose here in releasing them. He's already the most unpopular 2nd term President, at least in the television and internet age. People who dislike and hate him now, won't dislike and hate him more after those files are released to the public. 

When the far-right of the Republican Party was talking about "family values", morality and character, the need for these things in our government, that was just something they used to attack Democrats. That's not what they care about. Someone could literally be a convicted felon, a serial liar and adulterer... if that person is on their side and represents their political values. And Mr. Trump's professional celebrity base, would probably just view him as a bigger "rockstar" and "badass", after the Epstein files are released. 

The main lesson from Watergate that both Republicans and Democrats have failed to learn the last 50 plus years, that once a bad story is about to break, or has broken, is that the worst thing that you can do is to try to cover it up. What you do, is what a good lawyer would do in court: get the bad information and evidence about your side out, before the opposition and the media does it for you. Get ahead of the story and put your own spin on it, before you lose the narrative of it. 

As long as The White House and Trump DOJ try to cover up this story, the longer it will be in the news, along with the slowing economy, rising prices, everything else that has gone wrong since Donald Trump became President again. And that's not where you want to be going into an election year. So of course they should release the redacted portions of the Epstein files to Congress and the public as soon as possible. 

You can follow me on Threads.

You can also see this post on WordPress.