Trump administration officials are perplexed, as many people are, by House Speaker Mike Johnson’s claims that Donald Trump was an FBI informant in the case against Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in 2019 while awaiting trial on charges he sexually abused and trafficked scores of underage girls. The president and Epstein had a well-documented friendship.
Really whether he did or didn’t inform on Epstein is the least interesting and important part of the entire story. The more important question is whether the part about him outbidding Epstein on a mansion to money launder for Russia is true or not, and likewise on whether Epstein tried to blackmail him. The accusation that Trump informed on him was based entirely on Epstein believing he had from the sounds of it entirely based on the timing of his arrest. If we assume Epstein was wrong about that and it wasn’t Trump that turned him in I don’t think that really fundamentally changes anything at all. You still have Trump and Epstein having a falling out over Trumps other crimes, and events still play out in exactly the same fashion.
That the president was in bed with the Russian mob and by extension Russian intelligence has long been known. They were neck deep in all sorts of his ventures, like signing up pre-lease agreements for different buildings so he could get financing, all sorts of money laundering at his casinos, propublica did a whole podcast and all this stuff in detail in the first term. Partially with information fed to him by the Russian mob as well to take out their rivals.
That birthday letter from the president is basically saying both he and Epstein were blackmailers. And the Russians as much as said that the Israelis are not the only ones with the Epstein info now and insinuated it is on the president as well, via press conference medvedickhead gave a month or so back.
What seems clear is he is so thoroughly implicated in all of this that even with total control of the FBI he cannot write himself out.