AILSA CHANG, HOST:
Who would have thought that a suicide in federal lockup during President Trump's first term would be a major speed bump six years later in Trump's second term? But the death of disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein back in 2019 is now causing turmoil in MAGA world. Many in Trump's base are furious about his administration's handling of the Epstein files. NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas has been looking into all of this and joins us now. Hi, Ryan.
RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Hi there.
CHANG: Can you just remind us why the Epstein case is getting so much attention now, years after his death?
LUCAS: Well, the immediate trigger here is the Justice Department and FBI memo from last week that said that Epstein did indeed kill himself. He wasn't murdered, as some conspiracy theorists think. It also said that there is no Epstein client list, that he wasn't blackmailing associates. But importantly, it also said that no further information would be made public. And that last bit in particular really did not go down well with many in Trump's MAGA base who want these files made public so they can see and judge for themselves. Even Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson has called for transparency on this. Here he is this week speaking with right-wing podcaster Benny Johnson.
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MIKE JOHNSON: It's a very delicate subject, but we should we should put everything out there and let the people decide it.
LUCAS: Johnson has since said that he was misquoted, but that's the tape.
CHANG: OK, and why has this, of all the things, been such a sticking point?
LUCAS: Well, there are a couple of reasons, but to a certain extent, it's because Trump and some of his top lieutenants now, including FBI Director Kash Patel, have themselves, over the years, pushed some of the conspiracy theories that we've heard around Epstein. So they set certain expectations about the Epstein files, and by that, I mean expectations of what's in the files as well as expectations for transparency.
CHANG: OK, let's start with what they have said in the past about Epstein.
LUCAS: So they've said a lot, so there are plenty of examples. Patel, for example, spent a lot of time during the Biden administration making media appearances on conservative podcasts, sometimes talking about Epstein. Here he is talking to Benny Johnson in 2023 about a purported Epstein client list.
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KASH PATEL: What the hell are the House Republicans doing? They have the majority. You can't get the list? Put on your big boy pants, and let us know who the pedophiles are.
LUCAS: Another example is an exchange that Patel had with right-wing media figure Glenn Beck, again in 2023. Here's Beck asking Patel about Epstein.
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GLENN BECK: Who has Jeffrey Epstein's...
PATEL: Black book?
BECK: ...Black book?
PATEL: FBI.
BECK: But who? That is - that - I mean, there's...
PATEL: That's under direct control of the director of the FBI.
LUCAS: Now, just a reminder, Patel is right now the director of the FBI. And right now, the FBI and the DOJ say there is no Epstein client list. But Patel isn't the only one who pushed these sorts of conspiracy theories. His No. 2 at the FBI, Deputy Director Dan Bongino, used to be the host of his own podcast, a very popular one, particularly with folks on the right. And Bongino used the enormous reach of that podcast to promote conspiracy theories about Epstein and his associates. Here's a snippet of Bongino from last September.
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DAN BONGINO: Folks, the Epstein client list is a huge deal because it speaks to an enormous problem we have in this country. It is that there is a connected class of insiders that feel that they can get away with anything because they can.
CHANG: OK, Ryan, what have both Patel and Bongino said now that they sit in the top jobs at the FBI and have overseen the review of all these files?
LUCAS: Well, they've boasted publicly that Epstein died by suicide, knocking down the conspiracy theory that he was murdered. They haven't addressed the other issues, though - things like a client list or the fact that nothing else has been released. But Patel did speak to podcaster Joe Rogan last month - so well before the department put out its Epstein memo - and Patel pushed back on the idea that he would hide anything.
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PATEL: Do you think that myself, Bongino and others would participate in hiding information about Epstein's grotesque activities? Or do you think we would also participate in not prosecuting people we had evidence to prosecute people on? But the problem is, there's been, like, 15 years of people coming in and creating fictions about this that doesn't exist.
LUCAS: Now, he didn't say anything about his own potential role creating fictions about this.
CHANG: Right. OK. Well, I mean, isn't some of the anger now among Trump supporters because of promises this administration has actually made about transparency on this very exact issue?
LUCAS: I think that's right. Yeah. Trump himself, of course, did say during the campaign that he was in favor of releasing Epstein's purported client list. And once he was back in office, his attorney general, Pam Bondi, promised transparency on this. She hyped the release of a first batch of Epstein files in February. Everything in that batch, by and large, turned out to already have been known. She took some heat over that. But Bondi's own public statements have certainly contributed to the blowback that we've seen. And I'll point you specifically to an interview that she did with Fox News in February, in which she was asked about Epstein. Here's how that went.
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JOHN ROBERTS: And this is something Donald Trump has talked about. The DOJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients. Will that really happen?
PAM BONDI: It's sitting on my desk right now to review. That's been a directive by President Trump.
LUCAS: Now, Bondi now says she was referring to the Epstein files in general, not a client list, specifically, but that clip of tape has been played over and over in the past few weeks because what she says directly contradicts the final conclusion from the Justice Department that there is no such client list.
CHANG: Exactly. OK, so where does all this go from here?
LUCAS: Well, the president has asked the attorney general to produce any and all pertinent grand jury testimy (ph) - testimony subject to a court approval on Epstein. Bondi has said she's ready to do that. A judge will have to sign off. So we shall see whether those materials, even though it going to be just a slice of what the investigation found, will silence the demands for transparency.
CHANG: That is NPR's Ryan Lucas. Thank you, Ryan.
LUCAS: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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