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As I tried to think of a drawing for today that might reflect what I am writing about, I thought of Pam Bondi sitting on all the Epstein Files. I realized I have never drawn Bondi: her hair and upturned nose are her defining features, as is her pointing finger. Instead of sitting, I chose to make her standing in defiance.
A newsy missive from me this morning. Mostly due to important Epstein stuff.
In her letter this morning, Heather Cox Richardson reports on a major story developing concerning what we know about Epstein’s activities and the Trump administration’s apparent cover-up. I suggest you read her letter today, but I will try to summarize here.
Beginning in 2010, U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) under Obama was conducting an investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s activities not just in sex trafficking but in drug trafficking, money laundering and prostitution. In 2015, it was almost complete and they were ready to handout indictments.
Then the investigation disappeared.
Fast forward to February 23 of this year, Daniel Ruetenik, Pat Milton, and Cara Tabachnick of CBS reported: “A leading Senate Democrat is calling on the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to provide information on a long-running — and long secret — investigation into possible drug trafficking and suspicious financial transactions involving Jeffrey Epstein and 14 alleged co-conspirators. CBS News first reported Monday on the existence of the case, based on a heavily redacted 69-page DEA memo found in the Epstein files.”
Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said: “It appears Epstein was involved in criminal activity that went way beyond pedophilia and sex trafficking, which makes it even more outrageous that [Attorney General] Pam Bondi is sitting on several million unreleased files.”
“I am concerned that the DEA and DOJ during the first Trump Administration moved to terminate this investigation in order to protect pedophiles.”
On February 25th Wyden wrote to Terrance C. Cole, administrator of the DEA, to ask for the unredacted files in this investigation. They had been marked unclassified. Cole was about to release the files, and Todd Blanche, Deputy Attorney General and Trump’s former personal lawyer, may have stepped in to stop it. Efforts to obtain the files from the DEA were consistently referred to the DOJ. Wyden wrote Blanche:
“Your alleged interference in this matter is highly disturbing, not just because it continues the DOJ’s long-running obstruction of my investigation, but also because of your bizarrely favorable treatment of Ghislaine Maxwell, one of Epstein’s closest criminal associates. I should not have to explain the significance of the fact that Epstein was a target of [this high-level DEA] investigation. It suggests the government had ample evidence indicating he was engaged in large scale drug trafficking and prostitution as part of cross-border criminal conspiracy and that Epstein was likely pumping his victims, including underage girls, with incapacitating drugs to facilitate abuse. I am at a loss to understand why you are blocking further investigation of this matter.” Noting that the document in the files was “clearly marked as ‘unclassified’ at the top of every single page,”
Wyden noted: “There is absolutely no reason to withhold an unredacted version of this document from the U.S. Congress.” He added: “In order to assist my investigation into this matter, I demand that you immediately authorize the release of this document.”
This should be front page news. Guess why it isn’t: Trump’s War. When the war started, the NY Times made it front page news (as it should have) and got rid of all the fluff it tends to have on the right side of the homepage. The fluff is back, much to my annoyance. Now it’s time to make this Epstein Scandal equally important and stop featuring every single miltary detail of the war.
It is interesting that this story is coming from CBS News. It makes us understand that while the ownership of major news outlets (CBS, Washington Post, soon perhaps CNN) have recently come under control of Trump lackies, there are still journalists in these outlets trying to do good work to uncover the truth.
The other updates I was working on last night before I read Heather’s piece this morning:
The Pentagon has asked the White House for $200 billion for Trump’s war. The Washington Post writes: “The funding request is likely to stage a major political battle in Congress, as public support for the effort remains tepid and Democrats have been sharply critical.”
Senate Republicans on Wednesday blocked a measure that aimed to rein in Trump’s power to wage war against Iran without congressional authorization. The 53-47 vote against taking up the measure f