Transcription
You're watching the Legal Breakdown. Glenn, Donald Trump obviously wanted to bury the Epstein investigation. And so he called on Pam Bondi publicly to start investigating Bill Clinton and a raft of other uh prominent Democrats, Reed Hoffman, JP Morgan Chase, uh bizarrely, I'm not sure if he's trying to have the bank investigated. In any case, he asked Pam Bondi to open up these investigations.
Pam Bondi uh respecting the separation of church and state between the White House and the DOJ immediately jumped to and said, "Of course." Uh I'm going to put the the tweet right here on the screen. Thank you, Mr. President. SDNY US Attorney Jay Clayton is one of the most capable and trusted prosecutors in the country. I've asked him to take the lead. As with all matters, the department will pursue this with urgency and integrity to deliver answers to the American people.
So, I don't want to bury the lead here. What is the purpose politically speaking of Donald Trump bringing in Pam Bondi to open up an investigation?
>> Brian, I hate to admit this, but this may be a successful attempt to shut down any materials being released by the Department of Justice to Congress and by extension to the American people. Why do I say that? Because one of the tried and true reasons for the Department of Justice to absolutely refuse to release any materials is because there's a pending criminal investigation. Now, mind you, all of this is absolute horseshit coming out of Donald Trump's administration and his consiliary attorney general Pam Bondi. We see right through this maneuver announcing that you now want Epstein investigated when all along you've been desperate not to have any information about Epstein disclosed publicly because it might come back to haunt Donald Trump. Now all of a sudden you are announcing I demand a full investigation now only into Democrats. We'll set that aside and circle back to it. But I'll tell you, if there were now court battles that were going to be waged, for example, if organizations started to file all kinds of FOYA, Freedom of Information Act, lawsuits demanding that Epstein files be released, the Department of Justice could actually plausibly, well, could actually walk into court and try to plausibly claim, "Judge, you know that a pending investigation is a tried and true reason that the courts will always accept when it comes to rejecting Freedom of Information Act demands that we, you know, we disclose evidence publicly. We can't because it would interfere in our ongoing investigation." Again, Brian, we see right through this ploy, this maneuver, this tactic, but it may actually win them some points if they have to go into court and try to convince judges not to make them disclose anything about the Epstein investigation.
>> All right, so it's worth asking here, what do we know about Jay Clayton, who is the US attorney who was tapped by Pam Bondi to oversee this thing? Is he gonna is he gonna run this investigation with the uh with the urgency and and the integrity that Pam Bondi promises?
>> Jay Clayton is a product of Wall Street. He was a corporate lawyer. He was the chairman of the SEC for a period of time in the first Trump administration. Donald Trump tried to install him as the US attorney in Manhattan, the Southern District of New York, and that got shot down in flames by the Senate. He, I don't believe, has ever been involved in prosecuting cases. We have kind of another version of Elena Haba or Lindsay Hallan at play. Um, so I'll tell you if Pam Bondi was under oath when she posted what you just read there about he's one of the most experienced and respected US. No, that's a flat-out lie. The man does not know his way around a criminal case. He has no experience. However, people may be surprised to know that Donald Trump did install him as an interim US attorney after Donald Trump took office during his second term. And I believe once his interim status lapsed after 120 days, the Southern District of New York uh judges, the federal district court judges um did not object to him continuing to be in that position until there was a Senate confirmation uh uh hearing. So he is still at the moment kind of the acting or interim US attorney in the Southern District of New York. It doesn't make him competent. It certainly doesn't make him experienced, never having prosecuted a case. He strikes me and has always struck me, including during the first term, as nothing but a Trump flunky.
But now he has been handed the Epstein investigation. But remember, only look into potential wrongdoing by Democrats. If if any Democrats had done something wrong, presumably contained within the hundreds of thousands of documents that already exist in the Epstein files, wouldn't they already be in there? Like like the Epstein the Epstein investigation would not have precluded the wrongdoing by any Democratic figures? This wasn't an investigation launched by or conducted by Democrats to seek out wrongdoing by Republicans. It was just a full-blown investigation to seek what had happened regarding all of the accomplices, everybody uh uh who is involved here. And so, wouldn't if there was wrongdoing, those people already exist within the files that the Trump administration refuses to release. You know, if there was all sorts of information about wrongdoing by Democrats, I would think the Trump administration would have disclosed it during the first administration when they were actually investigating Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell and they brought charges against those two. Of course, Ghislaine Maxwell went to trial and was convicted. And um Jeffrey Epstein was criminally indicted, but ended up dead in a jail cell before he could go to trial under what I I still think I will generously call mysterious circumstances. Now, especially he against the backdrop of us seeing emails released where Jeffrey Epstein was saying, you know, I got dirt on Donald Trump. You know, again, it doesn't it make his untimely demise all the more curious and suspicious? But look, if there was all kinds of stuff about Democrats in there, don't you think Trump would have released it during the first administration? Don't you think Pam Bondi and Company would have released it during the current administration? But now, of course, no, no, no. go after let let's claim that there's all kinds of Democrats in the files that have done all kinds of horrible things and investigate them while you know the message is not so subtle coming from Donald Trump. I don't want to hear a damn thing about any wrongdoing by a single Republican. You got it.
>> Pam >> Glenn, I got to ask, what about the glaring inconsistency of the fact that up until like yesterday, Donald Trump was railing about how all of this was a complete hoax and now not only is it a hoax anymore, but it's so serious that we have to warrant an entire new investigation at the hands of his DOJ.
>> Brian, nobody will ever accuse Donald Trump or those that he has surrounded himself with um with being consistent. I mean, it really is absurd that Trump has been yelling and screaming and posting that this is just another witch hunt. There's no there there, you know, it's all a Dem hoax. So, let's think about this. The Dems were yelling and screaming that all of these materials need to be released because what it will prove is that all of the Democrats are dirty. Well, wait a minute. Why would the Democrats be screaming to release everything that would make the Democrats look bad? And Donald Trump all the while now claiming it was a Dem hoax. But if now his Department of Justice starts to find all of this alleged evidence of crimes by Democrats, how does that compare to Donald Trump not having disclosed all that previously to make all the Dems look bad?
Brian, I happen to believe there's tons of incriminating evidence and information in the Epstein files that probably implicate both Republicans and Democrats. Perhaps it implicates titans of industry. Perhaps it implicates judges, maybe even Supreme Court justices. Who the hell knows? But all along, and I say this with no pleasure, um all along it looks like both administrations, the Trump administration and the Biden administration have had exactly zero appetite for holding accountable the folks who may be in the Epstein files that committed crimes. Because let's face it, if there is stuff in there that implicates rich, influential, powerful, well-connected politicians from either party or no party, independents, um Merrick Garland and Joe Biden did nothing about it. They didn't disclose anything. Trump didn't do anything about it in his first term. Didn't disclose anything. Trump didn't do anything about it and has been arguing the whole thing is a hoax up until today. So listen, it it frankly fills me with mourning for the nature of our government regardless of who's in charge, who holds the reins of power. If in fact there's lots of information about rich, influential, connected, powerful people in there having committed crimes against young girls and yet neither party had the the courage, had the morality, had the decency to pursue it, to wrestle it to the ground, and to expose it to public view even if there were no charges that could be brought. You know, that is a pretty sad commentary on our government's leadership regardless of party.
>> We'll leave it there. Uh for those who are watching right now, if you'd like to continue following along with not only whatever iteration of the Epstein files we're in right now, but all other legal news, please make sure to subscribe. The links to both of our channels are right here on the screen. It's a great way to support our work, great way to support independent media, and it's 100% free. Uh I'm going to put those links again right here on the screen. I'm Brian Tyler Cohen.
>> And I'm Glenn Kersner.
>> You're watching the Legal Breakdown.