What’s Needed Next in the Epstein Case

Demonstrators near a press conference at the US Capitol on November 18, 2025. Bryan Dozier/NurPhoto via AP

Like many reporters, I’ve spent time over the past week or so dipping in and out of the massive trove of Epstein papers released by the Justice Department. There’s a search function. Pop in a name or phrase, and a group of documents appear. (You can do this at home.) That’s how I came across an FBI list of famous people that notes if their names appear in files containing “salacious information.” (Donald Trump, Prince Andrew, Harvey Weinstein, yes; Bill Clinton, Larry Summers, Alan Dershowitz, no.)

And an email from Woody Allen to Epstein with a jokey reference to Epstein spending money on “your women or should I say girls.”

And this email to Epstein from a redacted source who observed Trump being really classy about future wife Melania:

But the most disturbing document I encountered—and I only looked at a minuscule percentage of the millions of pages—was an 86-page memo prepared in late 2019 by prosecutors in the US attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York, which earlier that year arrested Epstein on federal sex trafficking charges. The subject heading was “Investigation into Potential Co-Conspirators of Jeffrey Epstein.”

This document was removed from the Justice Department’s Epstein files website sometime after Thursday and before Sunday following news reports that mentioned it. But it can be found in an outside archive that was set up. (The Woody Allen email above was also removed.)

The memo, declaring that “Epstein created a vast network of underage victims—as young as 14—in locations including New York and Palm Beach,” described the investigation this office conducted before and after Epstein’s arrest in July 2019. That probe included interviewing 24 women who were minors when they were abused by Epstein.

The accounts, which are summarized by the prosecutors, are harrowing, as these women recall their encounters with Epstein and how he sexually abused them. What adds to the horror is that most of the women recount how Epstein used them to recruit other girls. He turned minors into traffickers. Here’s how one put it:

Another woman noted that Epstein didn’t even pretend that the girls being recruited were of age:

The assorted tales are horrific, with Epstein targeting girls as young as 13 and Ghislaine Maxwell playing a central role in the predation.

This woman maintained that soon afterward, while she was still 14, Epstein began sexually abusing her.

These stories go on for two dozen pages, with allegations of heinous conduct on the part of Epstein and Maxwell. Then there’s a section of summaries of interviews with 14 women who say they were sexually assaulted by Epstein when they were over the age of 18.

It’s an appalling assembly of accounts, and I’ll spare you the details. But the point of the memo was not to chronicle Epstein’s and Ghislaine’s crimes but to examine if there were other prosecutions beyond Maxwell’s then-pending case that the US attorney should pursue.

For years, the Epstein scandal has prompted an assortment of conspiracy theories. He was using sex and underage women to blackmail people. He was setting up honeytraps. He was in league with the CIA or Israeli intelligence. And adherents of QAnon bunk have viewed Epstein as the central figure in the cabal of elites, pedophiles, and Satanists running the world—when not engaging in Eyes Wide Shut perversion—that Trump had been heroically combatting.

The recently unveiled files and previously released documents do detail his many relationships with rich, powerful, and influential people around the world: Bill Gates, ex-Prince Andrew, Norwegian diplomat Terje Rød-Larsen, Steve Bannon, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Google co-founder Sergey Brin, powerhouse lawyer Brad Karp, Noam Chomsky, former British ambassador Peter Mandelson, Elon Musk, New York Giants owner Steve Tisch, Dubai businessman Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, public relations powerhouse Peggy Siegal, and others.

These records illuminate plutocratic rot—an environment in which Epstein’s money and schmoozing won him pals in the highest echelons of the upper crust who ignored his sexual crimes or happily looked the other way when confronted with signs he was a miscreant. Trump included. We see instances in which some of his powerful and well-connected BFFs had reason to suspect or know what this pedophile was up to—though they now insist they had no idea.

There are hints that Epstein might have sought leverage over a few of his buds due to knowledge he possessed about their personal conduct (or misconduct)—including billionaires Les Wexner, Leon Black, and Gates. But there’s yet no clear evidence he operated a blackmail or sexual entrapment operation or was part of a QAnonish conspiracy of baby-eating sex traffickers.

That’s what these prosecutors were probing: Were crimes committed beyond Epstein’s and Maxwell’s own felonies?

This memo indicates they unearthed no grand conspiracies beyond Epstein and Maxwell constantly scheming to traffic women and girls for themselves. The memo notes that only one of the witnesses they interviewed said she was trafficked by Epstein to other men. The name of this witness is redacted but it’s obviously Virginia Giuffre, the most prominent Epstein victim, who at one point claimed that Epstein and Maxwell instructed her to have sex with Prince Andrew, modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel, Dershowitz, and others. (Brunel died by suicide in 2022 after being arrested in France for sex crimes involving minors. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, no longer a prince due to his association with Epstein, denied Giuffre’s allegations but settled a lawsuit she filed against him. Giuffre later said she may have been wrong about Dershowitz. She died by suicide last April.)

In the memo, the prosecutors said they had been “unable to corroborate [Giuffre’s] accounts of being ‘lent our' to other men for sex,” writing they had confirmed her “account of being recruited by Maxwell, being sexually abused by Epstein, and recruiting other minor girls to provide paid sexualized massages to Epstein at his Palm Beach residence.” They stated, “No other victim has described being expressly directed by either Maxwell or Epstein to engage in sexual activity with any other men.” Does this mean they found no wider trafficking scheme? Did they look hard enough? Was their investigation comprehensive and thorough?

The memo, though, shows that the prosecutors were keenly interested in certain associates of Epstein, including Brunel, Mountbatten-Windsor, whom they were trying to interview, and corporate chieftain Wexner, whose close relationship to Epstein helped the pedophile become filthy rich. And the memo detailed three episodes involving other men that the US attorney’s office examined in its search of crimes to prosecute.

One of their witnesses—who had been abused by Epstein while an adult—told them that in 2011 or 2012 Epstein had instructed her to massage Black in Epstein’s residence. She said that after she started giving Black an ordinary massage, Black initiated sexual contact, and she ran out of the room. She complained to Epstein, who laughed it off. (Black has been publicly accused of rape in three cases, and he has denied the allegations.) Another time, she said, Epstein instructed her to give a massage to banker Jes Staley, who during the massage forced her to touch his genitals and then raped her. After she complained to Epstein, he said it was up to her to decide whether to have sex with Staley. (Early last year, Staley said he once had consensual sex with a woman on Epstein’s staff and had been unaware of Epstein’s monstrous activities.)

Another woman interviewed by the prosecutors—who was abused by Epstein when she was a minor—said that he instructed her to give Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein a massage when they were in Paris. At the start of the massage, she claimed, Weinstein ordered her to take her shirt off. She refused, Weinstein got angry, and she left. She told Epstein about this, and he apologized for putting her in that position.

The last 18 pages of the memo are mostly redacted, but the revealed portions indicate this section presented evaluations of possible prosecutions. The earlier passages suggest the prosecutions considered included potential cases against Black and Staley. But as we know, no charges were filed against them.

For years, survivors and others have been wondering why no other prosecutions beyond those of Epstein and Maxwell have occurred in the Epstein case. Beyond that question, there are other matters in this scandal that have not been sufficiently probed, including Epstein’s financial dealings and many of his interactions with bold-faced names in politics, business, and academia. Look at Lutnick, who seems to have lied about his relationship with Epstein.

Criminal prosecutions can serve as the means for revealing the truth. But the goal of prosecutors is to develop cases they can win in court—not to provide a full and complete accounting of a scandal. If they don’t indict a suspect, the public is left in the dark. It seems the assistant US attorneys in New York went looking for crimes but concluded they did not have strong cases to file.

There are many elements of the Epstein case that may not be prosecutable. But the public still deserves to know what happened in these instances. One example: What was Lutnick’s relationship with the sex criminal? And there are still questions about Trump’s interactions with him. This is where Congress could play a role by mounting a bipartisan and comprehensive investigation of Epstein. Such an inquiry could examine whether the prosecutors in New York reached the right conclusions about the other cases and the absence of a wider network of sex trafficking.   

Unfortunately, that cannot happen with a Congress controlled by MAGA Republicans who care most about protecting Dear Leader and scoring points against the Democrats. The House Government Oversight Committee, chaired by Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), is pursuing an investigation. But its recent move to subpoena Bill and Hillary Clinton was a signal this probe is more about partisan sniping than excavating the truth. (Clinton did have a relationship with Epstein and Maxwell that deserves scrutiny but not more so than the relationships of many other notable people with this criminal.)

The push to release the Epstein files was admirable and justified. But a dump of millions of documents—while millions are being withheld—does not satisfy the demand for accountability. Material needs to be evaluated. (There are plenty of documents with unconfirmed allegations that may or may not be accurate.) Witnesses need to be questioned. Poking through this massive pile is no substitute for a well-run and impartial full-scale investigation, especially when there can be no public confidence that the Trump Justice Department has honestly and competently handled the release of these materials. The survivors deserve not just a mountain of records but a full accounting.

Millions of documents do not mean millions of answers. Many raise new questions. Until there is a complete investigation important questions will persist. And you don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to know that there are many people who would prefer that.

Got anything to say about this item—or anything else? Email me at ourland.corn@gmail.com.

Art helps us to see and ponder our world, perhaps even to understand it. At times, culture can even impact politics. Shakespeare knew that. And the power of art was masterfully demonstrated last week when actor Ian McKellen appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and summoned the Bard to deliver a brilliant rebuke to Trump and ICE—and anyone who supports their cruel mass deportation crusade.

Egged on by Colbert, McKellen delivered a speech that Shakespeare apparently wrote for Sir Thomas More, a play by Anthony Munday and Henry Chettle. This was an amazing performance that everyone should experience. So I’m not placing this item in the version for premium Our Land subscribers. Savor and share it widely. (If you want to thank me by becoming a premium subscriber, please click here.)

Last week, Trump proved once more he is a crude misogynist. While he was taking questions from reporters in the Oval Office, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins asked him about justice for Epstein survivors. He responded that “it’s time for the country to get on to something else.” And then he attacked Collins:

You are the worst reporter…You know, she’s a young woman. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you smile. I’ve known you for 10 years. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a smile on your face. You know why you’re not smiling? Because you know you’re not telling the truth. You’re a very dishonest organization. They should be ashamed of you.

This rude behavior was nothing new for Trump. One reason he gets away with it is that reporters in the White House press pool have allowed him to get away with it. In a situation like this, the next question from a reporter should be, “Mr. President, why won’t you answer Kaitlan’s question? Why do you attack her instead of answering her question?” And if Trump were to respond as we can expect, the next reporter show put the same query to him. And so on and so on.

This ought to happen at every press briefing. It doesn’t for several reasons. Reporters often have their own agendas and need to ask a specific question for a particular story they are pursuing. And like many beat reporters, White House reporters must preserve a degree of access to do the job their editors expect of them. They must calculate how aggressive they can be. Also, these days the press pool is full of MAGA influencers and propagandists pretending to be journalists. Trump could escape a sticky situation by calling on one of them, and that person likely would undermine any efforts at solidarity. Still, this would be worth a try.

Remember, Kari Lake? She’s the twice-failed Arizona Republican candidate (for governor in 2022 and for US Senate in 2024) and a prominent election denier. Not only did she enthusiastically back Trump’s Big Lie about the 2020 election; she insisted that she, too, was robbed of victory in 2022, and promoted a variety of conspiracy theories about that contest.

Lake has not faded away. Trump rewarded Lake, a former television news anchor, for her Big Lie loyalty by naming her acting CEO of the United States Agency for Global Media, which oversees Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and other government broadcasting units that seek to disseminate news to areas of the world lacking press freedoms. In this post, Lake has attempted to dismantle VOA and the other outlets—an effort that has been stymied by ongoing lawsuits—while using this system to promote propaganda hailing Trump. She has also become a regular guest on far-right networks, including OAN, Fox, and Newsmax, where she has continued to push baseless claims of election fraud. 

And she’s been an asshole on X, acting like a MAGA troll more than a government official.

When the Washington Post fired hundreds of reporters in a devastating move for journalism last week, Lizzie Johnson, the paper’s correspondent in Ukraine, posted on X, “I was just laid off by The Washington Post in the middle of a warzone. I have no words. I'm devastated.” She noted she had been working in her car—because she had no heat, power, or water. Lake apparently thought this was funny, and she tweeted, “C’mon home! America has a ton of service and skills jobs. And, if you are really talented you can work in the high-paying trades! Time to do some honest work.”

After Bad Bunny’s spectacular, all-in-Spanish performance at the Super Bowl, celebrating Puerto Rico and reclaiming the word “America” for everyone in this hemisphere, John Kasich, the former Republican governor, applauded the show: “Love the halftime show, which celebrates the wonderful Latino culture.” Lake replied to him, “You really ARE a pussy.”

Lake is in charge of a government agency that is supposed to represent and advance the best American values overseas. No wonder she’s trying to shut it down.

Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man! I’m envious of filmmaker Judd Apatow (Knocked Up, This is 40). He got to spend months with Mel Brooks, and I can’t think of a better escape from our current troubles than hanging with Mel Brooks. Fortunately, for the rest of us, Apatow turned his time with this comedic master into a wonderful two-part documentary, Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!, which is streaming on HBO Max.

Brooks is the genius who brought us The Producers (film and Broadway show), Get Smart, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, Spaceballs, and so much more. Apatow chronicles his life from his early days as a writer for Sid Ceasar on the pioneering Your Show of Shows to The 2000 Year Old Man, the hit comedy album he made with Carl Reiner, to his decades-long movie-making career. Through all these years, Brooks was constantly zany and hyper-ambitious, while swerving between extreme cockiness and severe self-doubt.

He’s a fascinating funnyman, who strived to be silly while aiming to use comedy to probe the absurdities and dilemmas of life. His boundary-pushing Blazing Saddles, chockful of juvenile and risqué humor (farts, boobs, schlongs), illuminated the idiocy of racism. In other venues, Brooks poked fun at Nazis (“Springtime for Hitler”) and the Inquisition. Nothing was off limits for him—if it could provoke a laugh. He was driven to create moments of joy for the audience, be they clever or infantile. “I was born to make people laugh,” he says in the documentary. “So I do that.” And if there is one message he sought to convey with guffaws, it was a simple admonition: “Be kind to each other.”

Brooks has been a king (the king?) in the fraternity of Jewish comedians that has shaped American culture. There’s a scene in Young Frankenstein that captures the essence of Jewish humor. Dr. Frankenstein (Gene Wilder) and his assistant Igor (Marty Feldman) are digging up a dead body in a graveyard. “What a filthy job,” Frankenstein complains. “Could be worse,” Igor says. “How?” Frankenstein snarls. “Could be raining,” Igor replies. Thunder booms, and rain pours down. Yes, Brooks tells us, things can always get worse—and there’s something fundamentally funny about that.

Apatow penetrates the Brooks schtick. The documentary explores his early life personal difficulties. His improbable marriage to Anne Bancroft—well, improbable to everyone but them—is lovingly recounted. And Apatow doesn’t give short shrift to Brooks’ accomplishments as a producer of serious fare, including The Elephant Man (directed by novice David Lynch), 84 Charing Cross Road, and Frances.

Most of all, the film shares the delightfulness of Brooks. His joie de vivre is off the charts, whether he’s relishing the record-setting 12 Tonys won by The Producers or discussing the losses he’s experienced. A few years ago, Rob Reiner, Carl Reiner’s son, told me that every night Brooks came over to Carl’s house, and the two best friends ate dinner on trays in the living room and watched Jeopardy! Every single night, he said. I found that tough to believe. But Apatow shows us these nonagenarians in their chairs, side-by-side, chomping away in front of the television. After Carl in 2020 collapsed at home and died, with Brooks there, Brooks still came to the house to have his dinner in the same chair. He did that for months to feel close to his departed pal. This heartwarming example of deep friendship is as much of a gift to us as all Brooks’ punch lines.