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John Mearsheimer: Liberal Delusions & How NATO Led Ukraine Down the Primrose Path
Glenn Diesen
Jul 31 2025

John J. Mearsheimer is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, where he has taught since 1982. Prof. Mearsheimer discusses his book "The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities" and how NATO has been leading Ukraine down the primrose path.



Hi everyone and welcome back. We are joined today by Professor John Merchimer. So thank you again for coming
back on the program. Glad to be here Glenn as always. So you wrote uh the book the great the
delusion uh liberal dreams and international realities which is a
fascinating book as it tends to question the entire postcold war world order. I
was wondering if you can explain u what the liberal delusions are and u was
there a specific moment when you felt that the liberal worldview had gone too
far in terms of u organizing US foreign policy.
Well, as you remember, the Cold War ends in 1989. Uh, and then uh in uh 1991, December of
1991, uh the Soviet Union collapses and disappears and we enter what's generally
called the unipolar moment. So the United States is the only great power on
the planet and it doesn't have to worry about great power politics because there
no there is no other great power on the planet. It's just the United States. So
for the first time in our history, we're free to pursue an ideological foreign
policy. We don't have to worry about real polyik. We don't have to worry about the balance of power because we
are supreme. Anyway, we adopt this policy called liberal hegemony starting
in the early 1990s as I said and I believed from the get-go that we were
going to get ourselves into a lot of trouble that this was a policy that was doomed to fail. Uh I think throughout
most of the 1990s uh the evidence pointed in the other direction. It made it look like I was
wrong. uh we managed foreign policy in a rather uh subtle and sophisticated way
even though I think we were pursuing a boneheaded policy. Uh but then in the early 2000 things began to fall apart.
Uh and then I would argue that between 2000 and 2018 when the book was
published um liberal hegemony collapsed and uh the United States found itself in
one disaster after another. So in a very important way, Glenn, what I was trying to do was examine this liberal foreign
policy, which I call liberal hegemony, which began in the early 1990s, and then
try to explain to the readers what the major cases were uh and why I thought
the policy was doomed to fail from the get-go. Yeah, this u the rhetoric from the 90s I
thought thought was fascinating because we could expand an anti-Russian military alliance which would strip Russia of
influence in Europe yet it was referred to as a democratic community. So if the Russians would oppose it, it was because
they feared democracy. And the same as China, the assumption was that if we could pull them into this US-led
economic system, they would become more benign. We would have our democratic peace. But uh how can you explain that?
We didn't really pay attention though to their their concerns because if you listen to Beijing and Moscow, they fear that they were being contained. Uh
it seemed to have been dismissed very much just as a cold war mentality. Does this fit into the liberal delusions?
Well, let's just talk about NATO to begin with. There are three really big
cases here that you want to talk about. uh one is the Bush doctrine and what we
did in the Middle East and this of course all revolves around 911 and the invasion of Iraq. So the Middle East is
one case we should talk about. Second case we should talk about is China and
the policy of engagement which you briefly described and then the third big case of course is NATO expansion. So
let's focus on that to start. Uh it's very important to understand that in the
1990s when NATO expansion got going uh
remember Bill Clinton makes the decision to expand NATO in 1994
and the first trunch of expansion which brings in Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic is in 99.
Uh but when it starts in the 1990s and even through much of the 2000s, the
early 2000s, it's not aimed at containing Russia. Uh it's very hard for
people to understand that in the context of 2025 given all that's happened since
the Ukraine crisis broke out in 2014. People find it hard to believe that NATO
expansion wasn't designed to contain this evil Russia. But it wasn't. You
want to remember that in the 1990s Russia was a basket case. It was
economically in a disastrous situation and in no way was Russia a threat to go
on the offensive uh against Ukraine or in Eastern Europe. Uh it just was not in
the cards. So when the Clinton administration started the whole process,
uh what they were interested in doing was taking this giant zone of peace uh
that existed in Western Europe and expanding it eastward to cover Eastern
and Western Europe. Uh they didn't want to bring the Russians into the alliance.
There's no question about that. But they were not interested in containing the Russians. They understood full well that
the Russians were unhappy with NATO expansion. Clinton did everything he
could to assuage Boris Yeltson's concerns.
He thought Clinton thought that we could expand NATO and at the same time
maintain good relations with the Russians. Just very important to understand that this was not an
anti-Russian move. Again, the the Clinton administration did not want to
bring Russia into the alliance and that's because Russia would have been a powerful actor inside the alliance and
the United States wanted to run NATO and therefore it wanted to keep the Russians out. But we were not trying to contain
the Russians. We were trying to make Europe whole and we're trying to make
Europe peaceful. And that meant making Eastern Europe look like Western Europe.
So to put it in more specific terms, we were trying to spread democracy
eastward, liberal democracy. We were trying to spread institutions eastward.
This is why we were moving NATO and the European Union eastward, right? because
building institutions and incorporating countries institution into institutions
is part of the liberal enterprise. And then furthermore, we were trying to
spread capitalism. We were trying to get everybody in Eastern Europe hooked on capitalism integrated into the American
dominated world economy. And of course, institutions facilitated this. So this
is what liberal hegemony was all about. But of course, as you know very well,
Glenn, the Russians were deeply upset about NATO expansion from the beginning.
Uh Clinton could try to assuage the concerns of Borne Boris Yelson, but it
just didn't work very well. And it didn't work very well with other Russian leaders as well. And they protested, but
there was nothing they could do to stop it because Russia was so weak. So in 1999 you get the first trunch of
expansion as I said and the Russians complain bitterly but can't do anything about it. Then you get the second big
trunch in 2004 and again the Russians complain bitterly
and you know Putin is now in control in Russia. Since 2000, Putin has been in
charge and he's deeply upset as was Boris Yeltson with NATO expansion. But
Putin can't do anything in 2004. So you have another big expansion in 2004.
Then in April 2008, we go to NATO bringing Ukraine into the
alliance and Georgia as well. Uh and this is what leads to the catastrophic
situation that we're now in, right? Because the Russians by 2008
have reached a point where they think they can stand up to the Americans. And Putin says after the April 2008
Bucharist NATO summit where we say Ukraine will be brought into NATO, Putin says this is not happening. This is an
existential threat to Russia. We will not allow it to happen. So this is the
first time NATO faces real resistance. So the question we want to ask ourselves
is what does NATO do in the face of Russian opposition? And the answer is we
double down and we basically think we can shove NATO expansion down Russia's
throat and there's just nothing they can do about it because they're so weak. we could do after 2008 what we did in 1999
and what we did in 2004. But of course that proves not to be the
case. This is a very different situation. And you have a major crisis
that breaks out in 2014. This is when the Russians take Crimea as
you well know and the civil war on the Donbass breaks out. This is 2014.
I want to emphasize that between 2008 and 2014,
even though we doubled down and we were expanding NATO so as to bring in
Ukraine, we were not doing that with the thought in mind that we had to contain
Russia. That was not part of the program. There may have been a few
people in the bowels of the establishment who were thinking in those terms, but that's not the way
policymakers were talking as best we can tell from the available evidence.
After 2014, after February 22nd, 2014,
when the major crisis breaks out in Ukraine, we do 180 degree turn and all
of a sudden we're painting the Russians and Putin in particular as a really
serious threat to Europe that has to be contained. So it's just important to
understand that it's in 2014 that containment of Russia gets linked
to NATO expansion. That is not the case before 2014. I want to make one further
point on this and that is a lot of the planning documents from the 1990s are
now publicly available and it's very clear from those documents that uh the
Americans understood the policym establishment understood that bringing Ukraine into NATO was a very special
case and you were really asking for trouble if you brought Ukraine into
NATO. American policy makers understood that Ukraine was probably a bridge too
far. And of course, in April 2008 at the NATO Bucharest summit, when we say that
we're going to bring Ukraine into NATO, it's perfectly clear that all our fears
were justified. But again, just to repeat myself because it's very important. Instead of backing off and
trying to accommodate the Russians, we believe that we can shove NATO expansion
into Ukraine down their throat. And we find out on February 24th, 2022 that we
were wrong. We can't shove it down their throat. They will not accept it. And here we are today in the middle of a war
that has gone on now for over three years because of our unwillingness or
our inability to accept the fact that this would be NATO expansion that is an
existential threat to Russia. this inability to appreciate the fact
that the Russians seize this as an existential threat, it appears to be somewhat at the heart of this conflict
because when you hear well certain yeah politicians, media or even speak with
them, you get the impression that they they do genuinely believe many of them that Russia shouldn't have any concern
whatsoever about NATO expanding on its borders, any weapon systems. Um
but uh again this is why your articles and books kind of stood out especially in 2014 you had this article in foreign
affairs with the title why the Ukraine crisis I think it was is uh the west's
fault again this is something like waving a red flag in front of you many
of the political establishment but it was very hard to for many people to appreciate that uh this could be a that
the Russian security concerns were legitimate. And uh again in 2015 you
made this um speech which was very must have been seen millions of times in which he argued that the United States
was leading Ukraine down the primrose path suggesting some of it was well
intentioned but it would destroy Ukraine. How
why or how how did you see this? because now 10 years of course what you said would happened happened but uh and you
wrote that the end result would be Ukraine getting wrecked. Uh is this um
solely because Russia had to defend its uh I guess fight for its survival or how
how do you see this? Uh, great question. And I think the way
to conceptualize this is to emphasize the distinction between liberalism and
realism. As I said to you before, Glenn, when the Cold War ends and we, the
United States, end up as the unipole, we're the only great power on the planet. So, we do not have to worry
about realist logic. We do not have to worry about the balance of power. The United
States is free to act according to the dictates of liberalism, which we do. And
many people are arguing, including President Clinton, that uh realism is no
longer relevant for understanding international politics. So when we begin to expand eastward
toward Ukraine, we believe that real polyik is dead and
that we are a benign liberal hegeimon. I
cannot tell you how many times I have heard important people in the foreign
policy establishment say that Russia had nothing to fear from NATO expansion
because we were a liberal and benign hegeimon. Mike McFall has told me that
he told Putin this on a number of occasions and I believe that Mike McFall believed this. The problem is that from
a Russian point of view, the world was being viewed through realist lenses.
From a Russian point of view, the United States was a behemoth. It ran an
alliance that had been a mortal enemy during the Cold War. And the United
States was marching that alliance up to Russia's doorsteps. From a Russian point
of view, this was all seen through realist lenses. From an American point
of view, realism was dead and it was seen from a liberal perspective.
So, you had this real clash of uh let's
call them ideologies for lack of a better term. you had this real clash of ideologies or world views that was
destined to lead to huge trouble because the Americans simply couldn't put
themselves in the shoes of the Russians. I always found this amazing. I used to say,
"Can't you understand why from a Russian perspective NATO expansion into Ukraine
looks threatening?" You know, realism 101 tells you that's the case. This of course is why George
Kennan opposed NATO expansion in the 1990s and many others like Bill Perry
who was the secretary of defense opposed NATO expansion. They were thinking about it in a realist from a realist
framework. They were basically saying that if you're the Russians and you see NATO marching up to your doorstep, this
is going to cause huge problems. But the vast majority of people in the foreign policy establishment just were not
thinking about how international relations works in those terms, in those
realist terms. They viewed it more in liberal terms. This is why we were not
really interested in containing Russia until 2014. And this is why American
policymakers could argue that the Russians have nothing to fear. The United States is a benign hegeimon. For
a realist like me, it's crazy for people to talk like that. That's just not the way the world works. But if you're a
thoroughgoing liberal and you believe that liberalism is the dominating ideology in international politics now
that the cold war is over with, you don't think in those terms. You think that a country like the United States
and NATO uh are benign actors on the world stage. So you had this complete uh
mismatch in world views and both sides you know ended up as a result in a major
crisis in 2014 and then in a major war in 2022.
This is the often the well the dark side of the liberal theories. If you assume that um it's internal characteristics of
states that dictate their behavior, you would assume that some actors are inherently good, some are inherently
aggressive because when you post um which you have done in uh well in in
your articles as well where you say well let's put oursel in the shoes of the Russians. If if did the Russians or the
Chinese were establishing military bases and uh putting up their missiles in Mexico, uh would the United States not
react in the same way? And usually the response one would get was well we it can't be compared because again as you
suggest we are benign. So these are good versus good weapons versus bad weapons effectively. So it becomes very
difficult to put yourself in the shoes of the opponent. I guess you know in the struggle between liberalism and realism
the Europeans they strike me as very constructivist as well. They fear that the language you use socially constructs
a world. So they there's a it leaves an assumption that mere realist analysis is
somehow immoral. If you say that the Russians should be concerned about NATO and its borders, you are effectively
normalizing cold war thinking. And so the best thing you should do is not say
it. So you should not put yourself in the shoes of the opponent because you might legitimize this idea of a real
politic that this is something we haven't overcome yet. Uh but it does take me to the another argument we often
hear with Ukraine which is Ukraine has the right to join any military alliance
it desires and um it should be allowed to choose its own security arrangements
which sounds awfully moral uh because it suggests sovereignty. It if you don't
accept this it suggests Russia should have a say over Ukraine. Uh however, if
you translate this into actual politics, it led to the destruction of Ukraine. So how how would you redefine I guess
morality uh from a realist perspective? And well, I agree with everything you
said, you know, when you talk about Ukraine having the right to choose its
own foreign policy and therefore to join any alliance that it sees fit to join.
It's a very attractive argument from a liberal point of view because as you well know, liberals place a high premium
on rights. Uh so if you say that somebody has a right as a sovereign state or a country has a right as a
sovereign state uh to join NATO, there's a certain intuitive attractiveness to
that argument. I fully understand. But again, in the real world,
realism basically frames how people think about
international politics. And from a Russian point of view, what they want to
know with regard to Ukraine joining NATO is how that affects their security. The
Russians are interested in their security. The Ukrainians are interested
in their security. The Americans are interested in their security. This is just the way the world works. It makes
perfect sense. Every state should want to maximize its security. Well, from the
Russian point of view, they may think that Ukraine has certain rights, but
from the Russian point of view, what's most important is their security. And
Ukraine exercising its so-called right to join NATO threatens their security.
And by the way, they think it threatens their security in an existential way. We
cannot underestimate that. You know, many people in the west will say, "Oh,
it's Ukraine joining NATO is not an existential threat to Russia." Well,
they may not think it is, but the Russians think it is. And it's what the Russians think that matters. They think
it's an existential threat. So, I believe that if you are Ukraine,
you have to take into account Russian thinking on the matter of you Ukraine
joining NATO. And if you don't, you're going to get yourself into really deep trouble.
And I think many Ukrainians initially understood that. But as time went by, the number of Ukrainians who understood
that logic seemed to diminish. And uh what happened is that the West and the
Ukrainian foreign policy establishment both came to the conclusion that Ukraine had this right and Ukraine could just do
whatever they want. And Ukraine, excuse me, NATO, by the way, we want to emphasize, has an open door policy. it
can invite any country that it wants into the alliance and the Russians don't have a veto over that. That was their
thinking. Well, the Russians simply refuse to accept that logic and the end
result is that Ukraine is in the process of being destroyed. This is a travesty.
It's just hard to believe how terrible this is for Ukraine. And this is all a
result of the fact that we in the west believed that Ukraine had a right to
join NATO and NATO had a right to invite Ukraine into the alliance. And if the
Russians didn't like it, that was just too bad. They had to accept it. And we
acted on that basic logic. And the end result is we have played a central role.
may be the central role in destroying Ukraine. Well, if NATO had negotiated some kind
of a security system in Europe with the Russians uh based on mitigating the
security competition, of course, this could have taken uh Ukraine away from being a front line. But it seemed that
when NATO said, well, we have an open door policy, Ukraine has been invited.
um it wasn't possible for Russia to discuss anymore with NATO because a decision had been made and instead uh
the pressure had then to be put on Ukraine not to accept this offer which
is why I guess you end up with a war. But now that we're in this three plus years since the Russian invasion or more
than a decade since again 2014, how do you end the Ukraine war from a realist
uh view? because uh uh it's I I I don't hear any constructive thoughts coming
out of uh the European capitals especially the the main argument is
still well Ukraine has a lot to fear now from Russia which I wouldn't disagree with they certainly do but so NATO still
has to be um on on the table and uh
Russia will just have to accept this you know just yeah don't don't bend the knee
to the Russian and keep insisting on this that this is the moral thing to do.
So I guess from the realist perspective, how how do you end the Ukraine war?
Well, from an American perspective, uh I'm principally concerned about the rise
of China. Uh I'm principally interested in containing China, not interested in
fighting a war with China, but I want to make sure that China does not dominate Asia uh the way that it would like to.
Uh, and from my point of view as a realist, what I'm interested in doing is putting an end to the Ukraine war as
quickly as possible. Uh, so that the United States can pivot to Asia fully
and so that the United States can have better relations with the Russians. At this point, it's hard to imagine us
having good relations with the Russians, but hopefully we could have better relations. Uh so if I'm the United
States, I'd go to great lengths to shut down the war uh with a negotiated settlement and that means accepting the
main Russian demands and there are three of them uh in my opinion. Uh one is that
NATO I mean that Ukraine has to be neutral. That means it cannot be a NATO
and there cannot be western especially American security guarantees. Has to be
a truly neutral Ukraine. Number two, Ukraine has to disarm somewhat uh at
least to the point where it does not have significant offensive capability that could threaten Russia. And number
three, Ukraine has to accept the fact that it has lost Crimea and those four
Oblas in the eastern part of Ukraine that the Russians have already enexed.
So those are the three principal demands. And if I'm Donald Trump, I would accept those demands. I'd go to
great lengths to work out a deal uh accepting those three main demands. And
by the way, I think that agreement would be in Ukraine's interest. I think
Ukraine has a deep-seated interest in ending this war as soon as possible and
the only way to end it as soon as possible with an agreement is by accepting Russia's main demands. So I
think this is in Ukraine's interest as well as in the United States's interest. And again, as I said, we would then we
meaning the Americans then be able to pivot to Asia where we could focus on containing China. Now,
the problem that we face here uh is first of all, the Ukrainians won't accept this deal. Uh there's no way
they're going to give up that territory. Uh and I think it's extremely unlikely
that they will uh be willing uh to go along without some sort of security
guarantee uh and disarming. I don't see them doing that either. So I I I find it
hard to imagine the Ukrainians accepting u those uh demands, Putin's demands.
Furthermore, I find it hard to imagine the Europeans accepting those demands because I think the Europeans have a
vested interest in seeing the war go on. And the reason is they want to keep the Americans in Europe. Uh I actually
believe European leaders greatest fear is not uh the Russians. They don't worry
that much about a Russian threat. They engage in threat inflation, but it's mainly rhetoric. Uh their greatest fear
is the United States will leave Europe. Uh and if the United States remains committed to an ongoing war in Ukraine,
even if it's at a reduced level, the Americans remain in Europe. So I don't think you're going to get the Europeans
to go along with a deal either. So even if the Americans um want uh to cut a
deal, I don't think the Europeans or the Ukrainians are going to cut that deal. That's a deal on Putin's terms. So I
think Glenn, the sad truth is that this one is going to be settled on the battlefield. That's what my sort of
realist framework tells me. Uh you're not going to get a negotiated settlement. And then the only
interesting question is do the United does the United States pull out of Europe for the most part? Does it pull
its troops out? Uh, and that's a serious possibility uh because of the need to pivot to Asia.
And we don't want to lose sight of the fact that there's also the whole Middle East mess, right? Because the United
States is joined at the hip with Israel. We give lots of weaponry to Israel that
could be used by the Ukrainians or and more importantly could be used in East
Asia to deal with the Chinese. Uh and uh we have all sorts of military
assets deployed in the Middle East and so forth and so on. So the United
States if you really think about it from a grand strategic point of view is involved in three areas of the world.
One is East Asia, two is Europe, Ukraine, and three is the Middle East.
And it's in our interest to greatly reduce our presence in the Middle East and in Europe and to focus on East Asia,
but we're unable to do that. It's really quite remarkable the situation we are
in. Uh we are deeply involved in the Middle East. There's no evidence that
that's going to change. And we are deeply involved in Ukraine. And if you look at what Trump is doing for all his
talk about ending the Ukraine war, improving relations with the Russians, and reducing our presence in Europe, uh
he's not done much of anything on those three fronts. Uh so, you know, we're
pretty much back where uh we were when he entered the White House on January
20th of this year. You know, this is uh you know, this is
what I thought was the great hope of Trump. uh the ability to pull out of the Middle East and Europe. Again, this is
what he was communicating as well during the campaign. Um, but you said of course
as an American, but if you were a European or advising the Europeans, what would you do in this uh position that
Europe's in now? Because as you said, there's this dilemma if uh the Europeans kind of need the United States to remain
in Europe as a pacifier to prevent security competition between the
Europeans, but also to um elevate the relevance of Europe, I guess. But the more Europeans attempt to pull in the
Americans into Europe, be it through perpetuating perpetuating the war in Ukraine or through this horrible trade
agreements which you know anything to keep the Americans there, then the Europeans will become economically
weaker um more unstable and uh overall it will
become less and less relevant and the US will lose further interest in Europe. So what is uh what what would you advise to
the Europeans at this point as we're stuck in um economic decline and uh
again we're now almost in a direct war with the world's largest nuclear power.
If I were the Europeans, I would do the opposite of what I think they are doing.
Uh I'd go to great lengths to shut down the war in Ukraine, get the best possible deal for Ukraine.
uh and then at the same time improve relations with Russia uh and do that
with the thought in mind that good relations with Russia and good relations with China are essential for European
economic growth. Uh I'd go to great lengths of course not to antagonize the
Americans uh and do everything I could to keep the Americans in Europe. But if I were a
European, I would accept the fact that it is likely that the Americans will
leave Europe in good part. Uh I think you can make an argument that uh Trump
is a bit of an anomaly and once Trump is gone uh we can go back to business as
usual. Uh, I wouldn't put a lot of stock in that argument, but it would be an argument I'd pay some attention to, and
I'd go to some lengths uh to have or I'd go to great lengths to have good relations with the Americans uh in case
things do improve once Trump leaves. But, uh, if if I'm the Europeans, I'm
not betting a lot of money, uh, on American support down the road. The
United States is basically a rogue elephant. I think most European leaders understand
that uh behind closed doors. Uh they won't say it publicly. Uh although
occasionally it pops out. But you know, is the United States really a trustworthy ally anymore? If you're a
European, do you want to put all your chips in that basket? I don't think so. Uh the United States looks like it's an
irresponsible state. Donald Trump does not look like a leader that I'd want to, you know, place a lot of reliance on.
So, if I'm the Europeans, I'd think about improving relations with the Russians, shutting down the Ukraine war
uh and rebuilding uh economies.
Well, this all sounds like common sense, but do you think it's uh the liberal delusion that prevents us from pursuing
what is essentially common sense? Because the the realist analysis you present now, they used to be normal and
uh acceptable. But these days as I mentioned before it's seen as being deeply immoral and even a betrayal of
betrayal of our liberal values that uh you know this would lead to the break up
of the political west which is the foundation of liberal hedgemony and it would mean causing up against Russia
which is an authoritarian power. Is is is this what's preventing us from doing it this liberal delusions about how the
world works? I don't know whether it's liberal delusions or just plain delusions.
Uh when I listen to European leaders speak uh about the Ukraine war, I I
think they are by and large delusional. Uh I don't understand fully why that is
the case. Uh but uh
it's just sort of hard to understand why uh
why European leaders are just not more hardheaded uh about uh what's going on
here. Uh it could be Glenn that my basic point that the Europeans worry more than
anything else about the United States leaving Europe and uh therefore they
think that it's important to keep the Ukraine war going and keep the Americans in the fight is what's driving this
train. And uh uh one could argue if that's true that's not delusional. That
makes good strategic sense. the Europeans have a goal here, which is to keep the Americans in Europe. Uh, and
they're doing what's necessary to make that happen. So, you could make that argument. U, I think it's a wrongheaded
argument. I think the Europeans are delusional. Uh, but, uh, but who knows?
I think one of the interesting questions is what happens over the next 10 years
as the elites uh who you know came of age in the
unipolar moment pass on and they're replaced by a new set of elites who are
not uh consumed with this uh liberal view of the west as the good guy uh and
who understand that the west is in trouble and that you know uh significant
uh changes have to be made in the way Europe does business. Uh I think it's
going to be very interesting to watch that because we we are at a plastic moment in history. Uh just very
important to understand that. Uh the unipolar moment is over. uh and uh we're
now in a multi-olar world and that's slowly but steadily becoming very clear
to everyone and we're not only in a multi-olar world but if you look at what's happening
inside European states and even the United States is you have a huge amount of
immigration into these societies uh and uh there's just a lot more uh
change taking place inside of these states uh than was the case uh in the
past uh or in the recent past. And I think that given that you know Europeans
don't make large numbers of babies and they're probably going to end up importing lots of people uh I think that
what happens inside the various European states uh is going to be a source of
friction, a source of real trouble. uh these states are not uh states that have
a rich history of absorbing immigrants in a smooth way. Uh even the United
States which has a rich history of absorbing immigrants uh has not had a
smooth ride all along. All you have to do is look at uh immigration into the
United States from about 1830 1835 up till 1924 when we shut the gates. Uh
that's when all the European uh immigrants came in. Uh it was quite
messy process. Immigration is very hard to manage. And what I'm saying is there's going to be a lot of immigration
into Europe. Uh there already has been, but there's going to be more in the future. and how that's handled is uh
going to be a very uh tricky issue. Uh and uh so I think inside states, you
know, we're at a plastic moment and I think in terms of international politics, we're at a plastic moment. Uh
just talking about the pivot to Asia and what that means. It's looking at what's going on in the Middle East, thinking
about, you know, what's the future of relations between Russia and Europe.
Leave Ukraine out. what's the relationship uh look like between Russia on one side
and Europe on the other? Uh doesn't look very good to me moving forward. And uh
so uh I think there's a lot up in the air. Just as a last question for I guess
concluding remarks in why why do you think liberal hedgeimony was always
doomed to fail? It does appear that it's failed now that NATO is contributing greatly yeah to the destruction of
Ukraine. We're now very much complicit in genocide in the Middle East. Uh it
just well there's no hedgeimony anymore. It doesn't seem very liberal. Uh it's, you know, it's a bit like the Holy Roman
Empire ended when it wasn't Holy, it wasn't Roman and it wasn't empire. So,
but but why was it doomed to fail from the beginning from your perspective?
Well, I think the best way to answer that question is to talk about the
relationship between liberalism on one hand and nationalism and realism on the other hand. Uh I think talking about
those three ideologies and how they relate to each other tells you a lot about what went wrong. Uh, as I said
when we were talking about NATO expansion into Ukraine, the Russians were thinking as realists and the
Americans and their European allies were thinking as liberals. And when you put
realism up against liberalism, realism wins every time. Uh,
furthermore, when you put nationalism up against liberalism, nationalism wins
every time. It's very important to understand that liberal hegemony was all
about interfering in the politics of other countries
for the main purpose of turning them into liberal democracies. You just want
to think about this. Liberal hegemony was all about spreading liberalism
across the planet, creating a globe that was populated by nothing but liberal
democracies. You remember when the cold war ends, Francis Fukuyama writes this very famous article called the end of
history. And the Fukuyama argument basically says that we in the west
defeated fascism in the first half of the 20th century. communism in the second half of
the 20th century and the future is all liberalism. States are going to turn into liberal
democracies and in an ex inexurable way. This is why Frank concludes at the end
of his essay that the future is going to be boring. It's going to be boring
because the world is populated by liberal democracies. Well, what that does is it leaves the
United States to think that it can spread liberal democracy all over the
planet and oftentimes at the end of a rifle barrel. But the problem is that
nationalism is going to get in the way because nation states, nation states,
that's the embodiment of the concept of nationalism. nation states resist other
states interfering in their politics and telling them what kind of political
system they can have. So you have the United States going into the Middle East with the Bush doctrine for the express
purpose of turning the Middle East into a sea of liberal democracies. We're
basically saying we can go in to the Middle East and we can interfere in the
politics of sovereign states and we can turn them into liberal democracies
because liberal democracy is the best possible political order for everybody.
And furthermore, Frank Fukyama tells us that this is inevitable anyway. Well,
when you think like that, it's not long before you run up against nationalism.
And nationalism is where countries say, "We are sovereign states and we'll
decide what kind of political system we have and we don't want you invading our
country and telling us what to do." So in a very important way, you see that
this liberal foreign policy ran up against realism
and it ran up against nationalism because this liberal foreign policy involves right pushing other countries
around in ways that might violate their security. And furthermore, and that's
where the realism comes in. And furthermore, it calls for interfering in the domestic politics.
It calls for challenging the sovereignty of other states and that brings
nationalism into play. And the best example just very quickly to highlight this is China.
The United States adopted a policy of engagement towards
China. Engagement is just another way of saying liberal hegemony. What was the
United States trying to do with China? What we wanted to do was we wanted to
turn China into a liberal democracy. We went to great lengths to help it grow economically. We wanted to get it hooked
on capitalism. We wanted to foster economic interdependence between China
and other countries. Furthermore, we wanted to integrate China into international institutions like the
World Trade Organization. And the widespread belief, Glenn, was that China would eventually become a liberal
democracy. And once it became a liberal democracy, we would all live happily ever after. But you have to put yourself
in the shoes of Chinese leaders in Beijing. First of all, they don't want
the United States turning China into a liberal democracy. The Chinese believe
that they'll decide what kind of political system they will have. And they don't want the American political
system. They don't want liberal democracy. So you get resistance from
China to this liberal hegemony that's based on nationalism. And then
furthermore there's the realist dimension to this. The Chinese much like the Russians
unsurprisingly fear American military power. They fear the Udipole. And as
China gets richer unsurprisingly it turns its economic might into military
might. Now all of these liberal hegeminists in the west say, "Why are
the Chinese doing that? They have nothing to fear from the United States. The United States is a b is a benign
hedgeimon." Well, if you're sitting in Beijing, just like if you're sitting in Moscow or you're sitting in Baghdad, the
United States doesn't look like a benign hegeimon. It looks like a serious
threat. Again, you see realist logic kicking in and you see nationalism
kicking in. The idea that we are sovereign states and we don't want the United States telling us how to do
business. As you know, when people start talking about the Russians involved in
getting involved in an American election, the whole Russia gate business, which of course was not true,
but Americans talked about uh Russian interference in the 2016 election. This
enraged Americans. Why? Because we thought the Russians were violating American sovereignty. I want to be
clear, they weren't, right? This is all a myth. But let's assume the myth was
true. The belief was that they were violating our sovereignty. This is
unacceptable. This is nationalism at play. It's nationalism inside the United
States. Well, unsurprisingly, other countries around the world think in the same way. So the bottom line, Glenn, is
that we adopted when the cold war ended this policy of liberal hegemony which
was basically a liberal theory of how to deal with the world and it ran into
realism and nationalism and it ultimately failed.
I think it's important what you said there that because it's not as if it's liberal democracies only west and the
rest of the world are nationalist that this is also yeah within the west that is the the United States and yeah also
has nationalism. So it is uh and I think ignoring this is also part of the reason
why we have this uh populist revolt now. Um but uh again this liberal delusion I
think this is why well at the moment Beijing is watching NATO in war with
Russia. They're watching the attack on Iran and still it's uh argued that they
should not fear anything that we're all benign. It it seems a bit like crazy town for them but uh I guess yeah that
hits the core. Um yeah, if I can make one more point, Glenn,
just on your comment about the fact that the Americans were thinking very much
like nationalists. What's interesting is that during the unipolar moment when we were pursuing
this liberal foreign policy, there's all sorts of evidence that we were thinking
very much according to the logic of nationalism. uh although we would never acknowledge
this and the best example of this is Matteline Albbright and her famous or
infamous comment that the United States is the indispensable nation that we
stand taller and we see further. If you think about that and and remember
Mattaline Albbright is a liberal of the first order. I mean, if there's anybody
who embodies liberal hegemony, it's got to be Matteline Albbright. But
at the same time, she's a first order nationalist. Listen to what she's saying. We, meaning the United States,
we are the indispensable nation. There's the word nation,
nationalism. We stand taller. We see further. This is
the chauvinism that invariably lies at the heart of any nationalism, right?
Virtually every country believes that it is the chosen people, right? We are the
city on the hill, right? That's nationalism. So here you have Maline
Albbright, right? This card carrying liberal who's also a card carrying nationalist. And what Maline Albbright
is is that she's a liberal nationalist. This is a term that we used to use when
I was in graduate school to describe Max Vber. He was a liberal nationalist.
Right? Maline Albbright is a liberal nationalist. But she does not understand
or she did not understand the nationalist dimension of her identity.
She didn't understand that she was a nationalist and that others in the world
think in terms of nationalism as well as liberalism. So that means you have to be
extremely careful when you start talking about interfering in the politics of
other countries because nationalism again is such a powerful force.
I guess there's a danger of ignoring realism because uh I think it was in
Raymond Aaron uh he he wrote in the 1960s that the idealist uh believing
that he has broken with power politics uh exaggerates its crimes and this is when you have the the the liberal
assumption fueled with the the realist or nationalist realities
and uh yeah I think It's uh very relevant to see the conflicts which we're involved in today.
Well, but the thing is Glenn, mo just building on your point, most people think that realists are wararm mongers,
right? Th this gets back to your point about social constructivists who see realists as the uh principal cause of
all our troubles in the world. And if only the realists would go away, we'd live happily ever after. The fact is
that realists like you and realists like me and realists like George Kennan and
realists like Raymond Arone have a very healthy sense of the limits of power.
That's why we would not have favored NATO expansion into Ukraine and we would
have avoided this giant catastrophe that we're now facing because realists understand yes power matters but there
are limits to what you can do in international politics because other states will balance against you.
Liberals on the other hand tend to cut in the other direction. You know it's
the whole idea that we the Americans, we the West, we're the good guys. We can expand here, there, and everywhere. And
people will understand that we're benign because we're liberal. And they liberals
do not have a healthy sense of the limits of military power. And they end
up pursuing a very ambitious agenda to boot. You want to remember that liberal
hegemony is all about turning the entire planet into a body of states that look
like the United States. That's our goal. We want to make everybody look like us and we're willing to do it at the end of
a rifle barrel. This is going to end up with a lot of forever wars. This is very
foolish. And of course, realists argue against that. So my bottom line here is
that you'd have fewer wars if realists were in charge than when liberals were
in charge. And furthermore, with regard to Ukraine, if the realists had been in
charge, Ukraine would be fully intact today in all likelihood
inside its pre204 borders. But instead, the country is now
a dysfunctional rump state and is going to remain a dysfunctional rump state
because the west and the Ukrainians did not act according to realist logic.
Professor Mshimemer, thank you so much. Uh it's uh no I think it's very important um uh yeah insights because I
even have debates with people these days in ASCO if we could go back to 2014 not
pursue this regime change in Ukraine so they would have kept all their population Crimea you know avoid this
war should we have done it it's like well it was the right thing to do so so I think this is the yeah
the question yeah what perhaps it would have been much more peaceful if the realist would have decided that politics
back then. So, thanks again for your time and letting me pick your brain. My pleasure, Glenn. I enjoyed it
thoroughly.

[admin]

Scott Ritter: Trump-Medvedev Dangerous Nuclear Rhetoric
Glenn Diesen
Aug 1 2025

Scott Ritter is a former Major, Intelligence Officer, and UN Weapons Inspector. Ritter makes the point that language matters, and the dangerous escalation in rhetoric between Trump and Medvedev elevates the risk of nuclear war.



Transcript

[Glenn Diesen] Hi everyone and welcome back. We are
joined again today by Scott Ritter, a
former US Marine, a major, and a UN
weapons inspector. So welcome back to
the program.

[Scott Ritter] Thanks for having me.

[Glenn Diesen] So Trump was expected to withdraw the US
from the Ukraine war and also improve
bilateral ties with Russia. Indeed, it
looks looked as if he was on the path to
doing this. But now
Trump has made this his own war, but
bilateral relations are also seemingly
going from bad to worse. And one of
these things which you have picked up in
an article is the the language which
is rhetoric which is heating up
that is some yes strong words
from Trump against Putin. Putin has
really responded, but now we see the
former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev
and President Trump
exchanging some not very subtle threats
which includes, yeah, reference to
nuclear weapons. Again, you wrote an
article with the title Trump and
Medvedev's dangerous exchange of words.
I was wondering if you can elaborate,
what words have been exchanged, and also
what is the significance of this?

[Scott Ritter] You know I'm not a diplomat. I'm a
former marine, and I'm not known for
being much of a wordsmith and am a pretty
direct speaker. But when I was with
the United Nations, a very experienced
Russian diplomat kept pressing on me
the importance of words. She said
words matter. When you use a
word, the the language, the meaning,
it's all important. And that seems to
be reflective of all Russians,
not just him, that when the Russians
use words, they matter. The
language matters. And I bring that up
because we had this exchange that took
place between Donald Trump and Dmitry
Medvedev. You know, sometimes people they
have a tendency to say it's just the
internet, it's just social media [shit]
posting, you know, there's a
bad word, so I won't use it, but you
know. So don't read too much into
it. Except that one of the participants
is a former Russian president and words
matter.

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump

I don’t care what India does with Russia. They can take their dead economies down together, for all I care. We have done very little business with India, their Tariffs are too high, among the highest in the World. Likewise, Russia and the USA do almost no business together. Let’s keep it that way, and tell Medvedev, the failed former President of Russia, who thinks he’s still President, to watch his words. He’s entering very dangerous territory!

Jul 30, 2025, 10:00 PM

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump

Remember, while India is our friend, we have, over the years, done relatively little business with them because their Tariffs are far too high, among the highest in the World, and they have the most strenuous and obnoxious non-monetary Trade Barriers of any Country. Also, they have always bought a vast majority of their military equipment from Russia, and are Russia’s largest buyer of ENERGY, along with China, at a time when everyone wants Russia to STOP THE KILLING IN UKRAINE — ALL THINGS NOT GOOD! INDIA WILL THEREFORE BE PAYING A TARIFF OF 25%, PLUS A PENALTY FOR THE ABOVE, STARTING ON AUGUST FIRST. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER. MAGA!

Jul 30, 2025, 6:09 AM

You know, President Trump posted on his
truth social media platform a post
that was sort of critical of both Russia
and India, and mocking. You know,
basically I think Trump is coming face
to face with the reality that the
threats that he's put on against Russia
are having zero impact. Even Lindsey
Graham, who has been one of Trump's, you
know, dominant advisors, when it
comes to how to put pressure on
Russia, acknowledges that Russia is
pretty much sanction-proof, that Russia
has made itself immune to the
impact of US sanctions. And the
president has come to
the similar conclusion. He said these
may not work against Russia. But the
idea was to do secondary sanctions
against the people who bought Russian
oil. Well, China is just not
playing that game. India,
you know, has always been sort of
sitting on the fence, but it doesn't
appear that India is going to 100% buy
in. There is some talk that India is
looking at additional sources, but
the the Indians, you know, aren't, you
know, giving the United States the
result that they wanted. And so
President Trump has mocked the
dead economies of both Russia and India,
indicating that if they continue to
operate in this fashion that they won't
have business with the United States, and
the United States will conspire to kill
their economies. And he then went on to caution Dmitry
Medvedev, who's been critical of Trump's
threats over the last couple of days,
weeks, to say, you know,
"you're entering very dangerous grounds."
Well, what does that mean? "Dangerous
grounds?" I think here we get an insight into
how much the Russians follow
Donald Trump, and follow the United
States, and follow our policy
formulations.
We have a president who has openly
embraced the the concept of regime
change, decapitation strikes through
military action in Iran. He has talked
about how he could have
targeted the Iranian president, the
Iranian supreme leader. He praised,
early on, the Israeli efforts to achieve
this decapitation. And the Israelis,
in designing their Iranian attack, made
reference to the Nasrallah effect,
meaning their assassination of Hassan
Nasra, the head of Hezbollah,
combined with this pager attack against
Hezbollah intermediate leadership. The
combined effect was to collapse
Hezbollah's political sustainability and
led to Hezbollah withdrawing from the
conflict against Israel.
Netanyahu, in talking about the Iranian
action, made reference to the Nasrallah
effect, saying that we're doing the same
thing early on.

Now what does
this have to do with the president of
the United States? We're looking at the
reality. There's a couple things the
American people need to come to
grips with. One, that the notion
that this president was seeking the
bettering of relations with Russia is an
absolute fallacy. The president has
never been seeking better relations with
Russia. The president has been seeking
relations defined by American supremacy
OVER Russia, American superiority OVER
Russia. That what the president wants
isn't to treat Russia as an equal, but
to treat Russia as subservient. That
the betterment of relations is
contingent upon Russia YIELDING to
American demands about Ukraine,
YIELDING to American economic
imperatives. You know, we've seen
the president lash out against brics
and the supposed dd-dollarization
taking place in brics. You know
that this is all indicative of the fact
that what the president wants is a
Russia that recognizes AMERICAN
SUPREMACY. And that's not the Russia
he's confronted with. The Russia that he's
confronted with is the exact opposite. A
Russia that is presenting America with
RUSSIAN SUPREMACY, especially when it
comes to the issue of Ukraine, that
Russia will do whatever it wants in
Ukraine. There's nothing the Americans
can do to stop them.

I think you're also looking at the fact
that Russia is largely immune to
American economic pressures, and that the
American military isn't up to the task
of dealing with the Russians. This is
something that I think has come crashing
home to Trump. And so what happens is
I believe that Trump becomes very
vulnerable to arguments that say, you
know, we don't have to match the
Russians conventionally. We have nuclear
supremacy, and If needed, we
could just take the Russian leadership
out, collapse the Russian
intermediate leadership, and lead to the
collapse of Russia as a
whole. The Nasrallah effect applied to
Russia writ large. This dates back to thinking that
existed in the 1980s during the
presidency of Ronald Reagan, where
talk was given about launching a
decapitation strike using Trident
missiles launched from Ohio class
submarines,
Persian 2 missiles based out of West
Germany, B-52s armed with air
launched cruise missiles. The combined
impact of all these would be that within
12 to 15 minutes of launch, Russian
leadership would be eliminated, and
the majority of Russia's
strategic ability to hit the
United States would be eliminated.

Dmitry Medvedev
@MedvedevRussiaE
Trump's playing the ultimatum game with Russia: 50 days or 10… He should remember 2 things:
1. Russia isn't Israel or even Iran.
2. Each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war. Not between Russia and Ukraine, but with his own country. Don't go down the Sleepy Joe road!
10:33 AM · Jul 28, 2025

Dmitry Medvedev
@MedvedevRussiaE
Trump issued a theatrical ultimatum to the Kremlin.
The world shuddered, expecting the consequences.
Belligerent Europe was disappointed.
Russia didn’t care.
12:11 AM · Jul 15, 2025

Medvedev reminds Trump about dangers of ‘walking dead’
TASS RUSSIAN NEWS AGENCY
31 Jul, 03:06

"Perhaps he should recall his favorite films about the walking dead and think about how dangerous a ‘dead hand’ can be, even one that doesn’t exist in nature," Dmitry Medvedev wrote

Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev © Yekaterina Shtukina/POOL/TASS

MOSCOW, July 31. /TASS/. Deputy Chairman of Russia’s Security Council Dmitry Medvedev has issued a pointed warning to US President Donald Trump, urging him not to ignore the peril posed by those he labels "dead." Medvedev’s comments come in response to Trump’s recent remarks about the Russian economy, as well as his criticisms of Medvedev himself, which he shared via his Telegram channel.

"Regarding the so-called ‘dead economy’ of India and Russia and the warning about ‘entering dangerous territory’ - perhaps he should recall his favorite films about the walking dead and think about how dangerous a ‘dead hand’ can be, even one that doesn’t exist in nature," Medvedev wrote, adding a laughing emoji.

The term "dead hand" harks back to Cold War-era nomenclature in the West, where it referred to the Soviet nuclear deterrent system known as Perimeter. This system was reportedly designed to ensure a guaranteed retaliatory strike in the event of an attack on the USSR.

Earlier, Trump had disparaged the economies of Russia and India on Truth Social, labeling them "dead," and had also directed critical remarks toward Medvedev.

The belief then is that the Russians
would back down, confronted with
the real likelihood of their
total destruction if they continue the
conflict. Fortunately, that never
happened. One of the reasons why that
didn't happen is that Russia
put in play a concept known as
"The Dead Hand," or "THE PERIMETER SYSTEM." A
lot of people think that it's fake. It's
not fake. I know it's not fake because
when I was a weapons inspector in
Vodkens, we came face to face with
the modified SS25s. They were used as
part of the perimeter system. Instead
of having warheads on top, they would
have a sophisticated communications
module, they would broadcast the launch
codes so that if the Russian leadership
was taken out, all of Russia's
surviving nuclear weapons would be
launched against the United States
automatically. That's why it's called
"The Dead Hand," meaning, you
may have killed them, but the dead hand
is going to launch the missiles.
Medvedev alluded to The Dead Hand. He said,
"What are you talking about? "Dangerous grounds." Are you
threatening us?" And he said, "You
know, you might want to take a look at
"The Walking Dead." That's a TV series
about sort of a zombie
apocalyptic world, where everything,
society, has been largely
destroyed, and people are running around as mere
survivors. And he mentioned The Dead Hand.
Now he said The Dead Hand doesn't exist, because Russia hasn't
officially acknowledged the existence of
The Dead Hand, but it does exist. Words
matter. Dmitry made this statement
for a reason. He's letting the president
know that the fantasy that exists in his
head, the fantasies that's being sold by
his advisers, is just that, a fantasy.
And the consequences of seeking to act
on this fantasy, by threatening Russia,
will be apocalyptic in nature.

Yeah. The Dead Hand comment kind of
stood out to show how serious
the situation is.

But do the
Russians think have a reasonable
concern that uh the US could be planning
such a decapitation strike or is it
likely? because I think many looked with
some concern when uh the United States
uh attacked Iran in the middle of the
negotiations and uh again for the
Russians a month earlier they or two
weeks or something they had also this
attack on their own nuclear deterrent
which in which it was a bit ambiguous to
what extent uh Trump would have been
aware of this. Um again there were
similarities with the tactics of
importing drones and uh and do do you
think this is something they they are uh
concerned about and preparing because
I mean the the sweeter the tone from
Trump at the same time he's uh he he he
tends to be a bit deceptive so the at
least the trust is uh very much gone now
but uh do you see this as a
as a possible thought that Trump now has
this decapitation strike.
Yeah,
I I see it as a pos because there are no
other alternatives if you're going to be
trying to bully Russia. What are you
bullying Russia with? Your conventional
military power, it's non-existent.
Um, your ability to uh sustain Ukraine
as a viable proxy to wear down Russia,
not happening. Uh, your ability to
economically strangle Russia, not
happening. So if you've
built a policy formulation that is
dependent upon Russia bending the knee,
the only thing left is to intimidate
Russia using the threat of nuclear war.
Um, and I believe that that is what this
president is doing. And I believe the
Russians are fully cognizant of this.
And Demetri Midv's uh response on X, the
citation of the dead hand is proof
positive. He's not going to make that
mention out of the blue. Words matter.
And so for the former president who is
cognizant of what the dead hand is to
mention it means that he's basically
been cleared to put the president of the
United States on notice that don't even
think about it. We will knock the living
daylights out of you. You may kill us
but we'll kill you too and all that will
be left is a walking dead type scenario.
Well, all of this uh well heated
rhetoric is of course in the context of
the United States or Trump putting a a
new deadline on the Russians that is uh
warning Russia it had to end the war
within 50 days which was then adjusted
down to 10 days and it kind of makes the
question what what happens in 10 days
because it's it's uh there's only three
possible options. One is uh further
sanctions, but as you said, it's very
limited impact this is going to have and
it could make Trump look weak. The
second will be to send more weapons, but
how much more weapons could be sent? And
the third would be something more direct
uh such as what people like Lindsey
Graham might like or uh or you know
something like a decapitation strike.
But uh how how is Russia reacting to
this though this u this 10 days besides
you know the outbursts from uh President
Meda?
Well last night we saw a a very heavy
strike against Kiev
that made use of not only the Giron
drones but according to some reports uh
13 Ecander M were fired against a single
target uh in Kiev. Um, that's
escalation, not deescalation. I think
what the Russians are saying is, "We
could care less about what you're
saying. Uh, we are going to do what we
need to do to win this war on our
terms." And, um, you can be damned. Um,
it's pretty much the Russian response.
U, I don't think the Russians are going
to engage meaningfully with Donald Trump
on on these issues. Uh, you know, what
what what can Trump do? I mean, he
already recognizes his policy is going
to fail. So, um, and you know, the the
legislation being pushed through the
Senate, uh, isn't 500% tariffs as
Lindsey Graham was demanding. It's the
ability to go from zero to 500. Zero,
which means the president has the
latitude to do nothing. And so what I
see is that the president, you know,
hasn't committed to a specific number or
any number against Russia. Um I think
he's hopeful that the Russians will
respond um by saying, "Oh, no. We we
don't want these secondary sanctions.
You know, we'll um let's let's get back
to the negotiating table."
You know, I can't predict the future,
but I don't imagine the Russians are
going to yield on on this issue. I don't
imagine the Russians um I don't imagine
the Chinese or the Brazilians yielding
the Indians. We never know. Um but I I
think at the end of the day, you know,
Donald Trump has to be careful about
boxing himself into a corner here. An
overreiance upon failed policy uh only
invites total failure. So I I think you
know once again Trump will get into the
business of extensions
uh etc. I don't think we're ready for
war just yet. Um, but the fact is, as
you pointed out, when confronted with
absolute failure on all other fronts,
does the president admit failure or does
he seek so-called victory by
uh promoting a scenario that he's been
told um could lead to an American
victory.
I always u make the point to people in
the west that uh one of the things that
has annoyed Russia the most over the
past 30 years um something that by the
way Sergey Lavrov keeps mentioning at
least over the past 20 years uh with
yeah many times has been um the the
death of diplomacy and he yeah
throughout the years he's all he's made
the same comment many times which is
that we no longer All after the cold
war, we stopped sitting down talking
about competing security concerns
looking for compromise and solutions.
Instead, uh he always argues that after
the cold war, the west abandon diplomacy
in return for a language of ultimatums
and threats. This is what Lavrov always
says and this is something that they
will never accept. again many times has
made this comment and uh so yet again
here it is this uh language of
ultimatums which is uh end the war 10
days or you'll get your yeah punishment
ambiguous what this means but uh the
whole thing is kind of strange because
if you want to end the war it shouldn't
it have a component with the United
States and Russia it's uh Trump seems to
still take himself out of the America
out of the equation as if this is only a
conflict between Ukraine and uh Russia.
Yeah. I mean that's unrealistic. Uh you
know Trump wants to make sure that
when this war gets finished
uh on terms that he helps negotiate that
he gets full credit for ending the war
but nobody links him to the beginning of
the war. That this isn't Donald Trump's
war. Um it very much is his war
especially now when he's made it so uh
directly. Um
again the tr the president's boxing
himself into a rhetorical corner. Um
he's leaving himself no no way out. Uh
what happens when sanctions fail? They
will fail. What happens when Russia
calls the bluff which they are already
doing? Uh do you admit failure? Do you
admit you're bluffing or do you are you
trapped? Do you now have to pursue some
sort of face saving gesture? Um but
there is no face saving gesture. I mean
you heard Christopher Donahghue mention
a possible um you know face saving
gesture uh you know an attack against
Keningrad as if the Russian exclave
there wasn't part of mother Russia and
Russia wouldn't treat it as part of
mother Russia. Um I mean the we we are
literally entering the realm of you know
insanity. Um where
you know political pride is creating the
conditions for thermonuclear
annihilation.

Well, how do you see the Russophobes
that Trump has surrounded himself with
as being part of this new influence,
this new approach to Russia, or was it
always deceptive? Because during the
election he was making comments that his
mistake in the first administration was
to have people like Bolton there. He
referred to him, I think, as a bit of an attack dog. So,
bad cop to his good cop perhaps? But
he also seems to be pursuing what
they're advocating for.
How do you make sense of the team he's
putting up around him?

It doesn't make any
sense from a policy standpoint, or
foreign policy standpoint, or a
national security policy standpoint.
It does make sense from a domestic
standpoint, because
Russophobia has infected the entire
United States. I mean, frankly speaking,
we're talking low single digits in terms
of the percentages of Americans
who actually know anything about Russia,
and understand the truth about Russia.
You can get higher percentages when you
ask, do you want a nuclear war
with Russia? You get a higher percentage
of people saying no. But then you follow
up with the question, is Vladimir Putin evil?
Yes. They don't even know who he is.
They don't know anything about him.
They've just been conditioned,
a Pavlovian response. Putin evil, Putin
bad. And when you have this kind of
environment, then it's easy to sell
failed policy because most people aren't
going to view it as a policy failure,
because they aren't conditioned to think
of US-Russian relations as being
peaceful in nature. They're conditioned
to think of them being confrontational.

So I think we're in
a very
dangerous territory, and something has to
be done to change the domestic political
imperative surrounding bad policy on
Russia. There needs to be a political
cost to be paid by this president before
he'll pay attention. Otherwise, we're
just going to find ourselves one day
waking up to
nuclear missiles being launched, and
wishing we were dead.

My last question is uh do you think
Trump really understands Russia? Because
when he makes these arguments that the
Indians and the Russians have a dead
economy, the Russians have more
losses than the Ukrainians. And
the solution to the war apparently is
European peacekeepers supervising an
unconditional ceasefire.
It's just a lot of misses,
which creates a lot of
concern that he doesn't actually
understand the conflict.

Well, he doesn't understand the conflict,
and he most certainly doesn't understand
Russia. He doesn't know Vladimir Putin.
He claims to have mastery of all
three things, but he knows nothing.
And this is the danger. I mean,
normally you want somebody who's smart
enough to be able to discern that they
have insufficient knowledge, and
therefore try to empower themselves with
knowledge and information, by seeking out
expert advice before moving forward
aggressively on complex as fraught with
danger as these things are. But this is what
happens when you elect a narcissist, an
egomaniac as president of the United
States. He believes sincerely that he
knows best. I mean, this colors
everything he does. He's a classic, you
know, sociopath when it comes to
malignant narcissism.
But it's a very dangerous
situation. There's no easy way to
describe this. I can't craft
words together that'll make people feel
feel good about this. You should be
scared to death, because we have a madman
as the president of the United States
who is creating the conditions in his
brain that will
legitimize nuclear war against Russia.

So one more final
question. How do you see this
war ending now? A peaceful
settlement, I guess, is out the window.

This war ends with either a complete
Russian victory or global annihilation.

Yeah. Well,
let's hope Trump doesn't go for
the latter. It's such a disappointment
though. I think so many people threw
their weight behind Trump on the
promise of ending the forever wars.
I did.
Ending the Ukraine war.

And I
believed in it after I gave him 100 days.
Yeah.
And I've been taking a lot of heat,
because "You supported him."
Well, he's the president of the United
States. Who doesn't want the president
to succeed? Because the president's
success generally translates into
success for the nation. And who wouldn't
want peace with Russia? Who wouldn't
want a president promoting peace?
But you know, after 100 days, you
just were confronted, just as we are
today, with the reality of this man.
And none of the good things that I
thought were going to happen are
happening. Nor are they going to
happen unless something fundamentally
changes. He needs to clean house on his
advisers. He needs a whole new slate of
advisers. Unfortunately, that's not
going to happen. It's also concerning
the aggressive language
which he has employed in the domestic
politics, and kind of got
away with. It doesn't really transfer
well to the international politics, not
just against Russia, but the
whole spat between the Russian Medvedev
and Trump now. Now you also
see the same thing referencing
India, and is very angry with them and
you know they're being punished for
trading with Iran, they're punished for
trading with Russia. The assumption
being that if you cut yourself off from
all the other major powers, and you'll
only be dependent on the one that's
actually threatening you and bullying
you. Even the countries
who, like India, really wants to
have a close and good relationship with
the United States is now being
alienated. I think that as you say,
words matter, and it's
shocking that they're being used so
lightly. But here we are. So
yeah, thanks again for your time, and
yet again, I would very much recommend
your substack and your article. So
thanks again.

Thanks for having me.

[admin]

[SPECIAL] - Scott Ritter : Trump deploys Nuclear Subs to Russia over Social Media Rift
Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom
Streamed live 100 minutes ago

[BREAKING NEWS SPECIAL] - Scott Ritter : Trump deploys Nuclear Subs to Russia over Social Media Rift

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump

Based on the highly provocative statements of the Former President of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, who is now the Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, I have ordered two Nuclear Submarines to be positioned in the appropriate regions, just in case these foolish and inflammatory statements are more than just that. Words are very important, and can often lead to unintended consequences, I hope this will not be one of those instances. Thank you for your attention to this matter!

Aug 01, 2025, 10:53 AM

Transcript

Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here
for Judging Freedom. Today is Friday,
August 1st, 2025.
Welcome to this special edition of
Judging Freedom with my dear friend and
colleague Scott Ritter. Scott, thank you
for the double duty this week.
There's no better person on the planet
for us to turn literally to explain the dangers, the
significance, and the idiocy
behind what President Trump ordered
today. What did he announce that he did
today, and what did he order and what
is the significance of it?

[Scott Ritter] What did the president do today? Well,
what the president did today is deploy
two of the most lethal strategic nuclear
assets in the American arsenal. Or at
least he claims to have deployed. I think
we will touch upon this later. Ohio
class submarines, launch ballistic
missile capable submarines armed with
trident nuclear solid fuel
missiles. Each one tipped with multiple
thermonuclear warheads. He has said
that he has ordered them deployed into
the appropriate areas in
response to a Russian tweet from
Dmitry Medvedev. This means areas where
the submarines missiles can target
Russia. This is extraordinarily
dangerous. You know, the United States
maintains
a permanent force of Ohio class
submarines on station. Two submarines at
least in each of the oceans, two in the
Atlantic, two in the Pacific. They're
on station where their missiles could
reach any of the
potential nuclear threats to the United
States of America. On occasion, we
deploy additional Ohio class submarines.
For instance, just recently an Ohio
class submarine was deployed into the
Indian Ocean close to Iran
where it's Trident missiles, armed
with W76-2 low yield nuclear weapons,
could be used against Iran if the
president so ordered. But we have four
nuclear armed submarines.

So, when he
said he's ordered two deployed, is
he talking about two additional
submarines to this, or is he talking
about redeploying
two submarines out of their
existing stations into
new deployment areas that make them
even more of a threat to Russia.
The tweet he's responding to is one from
Dmitry Medvedev, in which Medvedev sort of
mocked the president as
Medvedev is the former president of Russia,
who's the number two person on their
national security council,
who in recent years has been more
publicly bellicose than President Putin.
He's like the the bad cop to Putin's
good cop. And what did he do?

He picked a social
media fight with Trump, and Trump took
the bait?


Mean tweets. This is literally about mean
tweets. This is about Donald Trump
threatening to end the world as we know
it because of a mean tweet. But what's
even more outrageous is that Donald
Trump doesn't understand what Medvedev
tweeted. Medvedev was telling Trump to knock
it off with the dangerous threats, saying
that if you do this, America
can end up looking like the walking dead
because of the dead hand. The dead
hand is a reference to the perimeter
system, which is a defensive system put
in place by the Soviet Union back in the
1980s. So that if they were ever struck
preemptively by the United States -- A
first strike, by the way, the tactic to
be used in a first strike is to bring
Ohio class submarines close to Russia's
shores, fire off their Trident missiles
on a flattened trajectory to avoid
detection so you can strike the targets
quicker, which is what Trump just
actually appeared to order the US Navy
to do. So the dead hand now becomes a
factor, because if Trump is dumb enough
to launch an attack against Russia, the
dead hand, the perimeter system will
ensure that all of Russia's strategic
nuclear forces will be fired against the
United States even if Trump takes out
Putin, the National Command Authority,
etc. I know this is a fact. When I was a
weapons inspector in Votkinsk, there
was a missile crisis in March of 1990,
because the Russians were trying to get
three missiles out of the factory
without us turning on the cargo scan
x-ray system. Why? These weren't three
SS25 missiles. They don't care if we see
those. These were three modified SS25s, not
to carry nuclear warheads, but to carry
the radio equipment that's used to
broadcast the codes. They needed to get
these missiles out and deployed, and
ready, so that the perimeter system was
alive and well and living. The dead hand
is only defensive in nature. Trump
should feel no threat from this unless
he's planning on attacking Russia. This
is the insanity. This president doesn't
even know what he's doing. And he's
responding to a mean tweet from a guy
who's been mean tweeting for years now. I
mean, I think most people, you know,
view Dmitry Medvedev's tweets with sort of humor. Yeah, they hurt
sometimes. He's very good at what
he does. But he's not the president
of Russia. He doesn't command Russia's
military, nuclear forces. He doesn't
direct the Russian economy. He advises
Vladimir Putin, but he is not Vladimir
Putin. So to treat Medvedev as if his tweets
actually will translate into
action is, you know, childish behavior,
but in this case, dangerously childish,
because he's literally putting two US
nuclear submarines on a combat patrol
against Russia.

Let's read exactly what Trump
said. Chris has prepared a full screen.
This is from his truth
social, based on the highly provocative
statements of the former president of
Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, who is now the
deputy chairman of the security council
of the Russian Federation.

"I have
ordered two nuclear submarines to be
positioned in the appropriate regions
just in case these foolish and
inflammatory statements are more than
just that. Words are very important, and
can often lead to unintended
consequences. I hope this will not be
one of those instances. Thank you for
your attention to this matter.
Exclamation point."

Would would Hegseth
understand what you just explained about
the power of these and how the Russians
would perceive the threat? Would Pete
Hegsth know that we already have four
underwater and and and are we adding two
more? Do we have two more to add or has
he just repositioned two of the four
that are already uh somewhere in the
seas?
I think we have 14 Ohio class
submarines. I mean, somebody can correct
me if I'm wrong, but I think it's 14.
And they go through a rotation. You
know, first of all, those four
submarines that are out there, it's a
minimum of four, two in each ocean. You
know, they go through rotations. And so,
they'll rotate back to their home port
for refitting. the crews have to go out.
Um, there are some that are cycling
through long-term refueling and
refurbishment. So, you don't have 14
able to be deployed at any one time. I
think you probably have somewhere in the
area of, you know, n six to nine Ohio
class submarines available for
deployment. Um, you'll have the four out
in the fleet out in the field. You'll
have two that are getting ready to come
out and replace two of the four. And
then you have surge capacity. Like I
said, sometimes they send an additional
submarine out to the Indian Ocean. Other
times they may choose to put three
submarines in each of the deployment
areas depending on what the world's
situation is. Um, but this is a standard
operating procedure, something that uh
Pete Hgsth should be cognizant of now
that he's the Secretary of Defense. He
should have been briefed on this by the
commanding general strategic command
whose job it is to run these uh
submarines. Um, the other thing that
we never announced the movement Ohio
class,
I was just going to ask you what is to
be gained by making an announcement like
this. Is he just trying to cause Putin
sleepless nights?
Well, I don't think Putin's going to
cause sleep. But to make this
announcement, first of all, it's
foolish. Uh, because all you're doing is
um giving credence to the legitimacy of
the dead hand. I mean, the dead hand
again only exists, it only becomes
viable if the United States launches a
preemptive nuclear strike against
Russia. And redeploying Ohio class
submarines close to Russia's shores
indicates that that's what you're doing.
So, you know, the Russians are going to
be doing something in return. This is
where it gets stupid because now they
have to do something in return.
Hopefully, they don't announce it and
make a big deal of it, but they do it in
a way that we detect it and we know what
they've done. Um, but the other thing
is, let's say I'm a Ohio class submarine
commander, a captain, and I'm out there
just minding my own business, and all of
a sudden I'm told that the president is
redirecting my submarine to a new
deployment area. Um, maybe even telling
me to target my warheads. I mean, we
don't know. Uh, all the all the warheads
should have been deargeted a long time
ago. Um, because we don't want
inadvertent launch. But what did the
president now say? Not only are we
redeploying them, but you're now going
to have a Russian city targeted to each
one of these uh uh warheads. Who knows
what's going through this man's head,
but the president did this publicly. So
now I'm the Russians. And I go, "Okay,
guys, start looking for an Ohio class
submarine moving." Because when Ohio
class submarine's on station, it's
sitting at the bottom of the damn ocean
and it ain't moving. It's avoiding
detection altogether. You don't want to
be moving this submarine because it can
become detected. Now, if I'm the
Russians, I'm looking for this thing.
The Russians has some very good
submarines. And if they locate it and
trail it now, they'll follow it to its
new deployment area. And if it makes a
threatening move, the Russians will sink
it immediately.
I mean, this is how dangerous this is.
He has put the lives of uh 19-year-old
sailors
uh at risk as well as senior everybody
on these subs.
Oh, yeah. There's not too many 19 year
olds on that submarine because submarine
nuclear submarines require people with
that have to go through some good
training. But you got some 20, 21 year
olds. You got a lot of 30 year olds. You
got a lot of 40-year-old men with
families and kids. Um, you know, th this
this is insanity. These are America's,
you know, most capable warriors um who
we never want to they we don't ever want
these guys to go into combat. They're
there for nuclear deterrence. They're
there to deter an enemy from carrying
out an attack against the United States.
Now the president has put them in a
place where they're not doing
deterrence, but they have now become the
perceived aggressors. This is insanity
in the extreme. Pete Hegath should be
advis the chairman of the joint chief
should be screaming his head off. I mean
every JD Van should be saying, "Mr.
President, no." But what we get, Lindsey
Graham, the perfume princess, out there
having an orgasmic response to the
president's toughness, you know, telling
his friends, the Russian people, Lindsey
Graham isn't friends with anybody in
Russia. Um, I can tell you nobody in
Russia is friends with Lindsey Graham.
But, you know, I mean, this is ridic I
apologize for the sexual reference
there. That was inappropriate. But, you
know, you just take a look at the way
this man's responding to these this this
dangerous absurdity on the part of the
president. It's idiotic.
This is going to raise your blood
pressure even more. Rather than
cautioning the president, my former Fox
News colleague, who now runs the
Pentagon, has reposted
on his own uh ex account President
Trump's nuclear post that I just uh read
to you. There it is on Pete Hegs's
official account. He reposted what
Donald Trump uh said. So, these guys are
enablers, Scott. But I I gotta ask you
something that I think is going to make
this worse. Is it true that within the
past several weeks, the United States
delivered uh nuclear armaments to Great
Britain? And if so, what did we send
there?
Well, it appears to be true. I mean I I
can't confirm it, meaning I haven't seen
the deployment order and I haven't seen
the miss, but I've read the media
reports and uh all indications are that
we have delivered uh B6112
um uh gravity bombs. These are the
basically it's the same weapon system
that we have deployed throughout NATO,
part of the NATO nuclear deterrence. Uh
we've now uh deployed these to uh to
Great Britain uh to to air bases there,
which means that uh we we now have a um
a nuclear deterrence outside of the NATO
hierarchy. That's what's interesting
here because in order for Great Britain
to receive American nuclear weapons
under the NATO umbrella, you have to
invoke the, you know, the the the NATO
nuclear uh advisory council and all
this. There has to be discussion and
things of this nature. This is a
unilateral deployment of the United
States to Great Britain, which implies
that this is about the United States and
Great Britain posturing as opposed to
United States strengthening NATO's
nuclear deterrence. Uh this is at a time
when Great Britain just did the
Northwoods uh declaration with France
where they've combined uh the nuclear
doctrines of France and Great Britain as
an independent outside of NATO uh
nuclear capability. This is when Great
Britain has extended its nuclear
umbrella into Poland. Um and now the
United States is attaching um its
nuclear force to to the British. I mean
we are literally people look at all this
stuff and they they're like, you know,
oh that's not a big deal. Let's not blow
this out of proportion. If you go back
and read Barbara Truckman's fantastic
book, um, The Guns of August, it's about
the leadup to August 1914, the beginning
of World War I. Especially in the month
of July, all the things that were
happening, the people went, "Yeah, but
it's just mobilization." Yeah, we're
just doing this. No, there will never be
a war. Nobody wants a war. And then
boom, World War I. Right now, we are
moves are being made right now that if
they're not stopped and reversed are
going to lead to a general nuclear
exchange between the United States and
Russia. This is the direction we're
heading. And I want to remind your
audience that the CIA said last year
there's a greater than 50% chance that
there will be a nuclear war between the
United States and Russia during the last
months of the Biden administration. What
the Biden administration was doing, as
provocative as it was, pales in
comparison to what this administration's
doing. We're above 50% right now, Judge.
We're heading into extraordinarily
dangerous territory.
What do you think uh is going on in the
Kremlin as we speak as a result uh of
all of this?
Dismay. Dismay. I mean, first of all,
the Kremlin right now, I believe, is,
you know, trying to
bring an end to the Ukraine conflict uh
without creating an even greater
conflict. And so, this is always a
delicate diplomatic balancing game. Um,
and then you have this president making
threats. I mean, we we still have the
August 8th deadline coming up. The 10
days expires. What's going to happen on
August 8th? Steve Whit flying to uh to
to to Moscow to meet with his Russian
counterparts. Are threats going to be
issued? And now in that environment
where we're supposed to be actually
trying to calm each other down, the
president deploys two nuclear submarines
uh you know, in response to a mean treat
from uh Demetri.
the the the good news here, and I know
I'm going to get in trouble here from
people, but um thank God there's one
mature, responsible adult in the room,
and that's Vladimir Putin. You know, is
he perfect? No. Does he walk on water?
No. But I'll tell you what, he doesn't
do any of the garbage that Trump's
doing. And I believe Putin will do that
which is necessary to ensure Russia's
security interests without being
provocative. if you saw his uh his his
his discussion today about Ukraine um
very levelheaded um you know saying the
doors open for peace don't look don't
blame us it's Ukraine saying they don't
want peace you know it's United States
that's doing the we're ready for it but
there are realistic conditions that have
to be met um you know trying to just
calm things down lower lower the
temperature and um I think he's going to
continue this way this this man is not
suicidal he didn't spend a quarter of
century getting Russia out of the ashes
to where Russia is today. This nation
where Russians are actually proud of who
they are and what they are and what
they've become. He didn't do all this
just to throw it away in a in a blinding
flash of nuclear insanity. Um and I and
think that was what was behind Dmitri
Mviet's, you know, mean tweet. What he
was telling the president of United
States is calm down, take a chill pill
because the things you're talking about,
the way you're talking can only end with
a nuclear apocalypse. And if you think
for a moment that you can preemptively
strike our leadership because we're not
playing the game in Ukraine the way you
want to play, we have the dead hand. And
the dead hand will take you out. That's
not provocative. That's just a statement
of fact. And it, you know, hey Tulsi, if
you're watching, talk to the guy. Brief
him on the perimeter system. Brief him
on the dead hand. And if you need help,
call me. I'll come in and back you up.
But this guy needs to have some hard
facts put on the table in front of him.
I don't think I don't think I don't
think he listens to anybody.
Telsey Gabbard is the only one that will
tell him what he doesn't want to hear,
but the others are all yesmen around
him. However,
yeah. Yeah. Pete Hex retweeted. That's
that's the biggest indication of the
syphy that you can come up with.
Correct. Correct. President Putin did
release a statement very brief
to the point and manifesting
what you said the adult in the room. All
disappointments arise from excessive
expectations.
In order to have a peaceful resolution,
it is necessary to have substantive
conversations
and not in public. He gets it. He gets
it that Donald Trump is just bravado on
steroids.
Yeah. And well, the other thing is
public public
posturing like this boxes you into a
corner. I mean, what what is the
masculine statement that he's trying to
make by deploying these nuclear
submarines? Because this is this is
alpha dog territory here. So, now that
you've done it, do you back away? Do you
back off? Do you pretend you didn't do
it? Do you admit you were wrong? Not no.
Once you've gone alpha dog mode, you're
sitting there with your chest pumped
out, you know, hey, I got all take, you
know, so and then what is there going to
be an additional escalation on this
part?
President Putin is 100% correct. The
place for these discussions is behind
the scenes. Um, so you don't box
yourself into a corner, so there's room
to maneuver. You know, it's it's
diplomacy 101. And you know, even a
simple marine like me knows this that
sometimes it's best not to go public
with things and you you handle it behind
closed doors and uh and and then when
you finally reach agreement, as
difficult as that process might be, you
come out and put on a common smiley
face, shake hands, and everything's
good. The world doesn't need to know
what your disagreements are. They only
need to know that you actually, you
know, worked through them and came to,
you know, to an eventual agreement that
makes the world a safer place to be. I
I'll leave you not leave you, but I I'll
say this. You know, on July 29th, uh,
President Trump in responding to a
question from a task correspondent, uh,
talking about the New START treaty,
which is the last, uh, strategic nuclear
arms agreement in play between the
United States and Russia, said, "That's
an agreement that cannot be allowed to
expire. It expires on 4 February 2026."
That's the most sane thing this man has
said. So hopefully there's a modicum of
sanity in that brain of his so that he
understands the danger of nuclear
weapons. He appears to understand that
the necessity of avoiding an arms race.
He appears to understand that. And
hopefully we can get through these
turbulent times and and and get on to
doing what needs to be done like
extending the New START treaty.
The Russian people are referring to
Trump by a certain word. What is that
word?
Oh dear. Um, it's a word I'm not
supposed to use. It's not a foul word,
but it's it's not a nice word. Durac
means fool. It means idiot. It's not
meant in a kind way. And if you call
someone a durac, it is it is a debasing
term. It means you're literally an
idiot. You're stupid. You're you're
dumber than than belief. Um, I use the
word today uh in describing President
Trump. And I used the Russian variant
because I just happened to believe that
the 150 plus million Russians who looked
at this, that's probably the first word
that came to their mind. Durac, what an
idiot. What a fool. Because there's no
there's no justification for his
actions. There's no legitimate trigger
for this. It's as foolish and idiotic as
it gets.
What is American intel doing now in
response to what Trump uh announced?
Well, I mean what it should be doing
right now is monitoring uh Russian
strategic nuclear forces, looking for
any alteration in um in alert status. Um
you know, counting Russian submarines.
You know, the Russians just deployed a
brand new submarine, the biggest
submarine in the world. It carries 96
nuclear warheads on it.
Uh, I can't remember how many um, you
know, RS56 um, Bulo missiles, but the
most mo more modern than the Trident
missile. Uh, 96 of them. It's out there
right now on station. Um, American
intelligence trying to find out where
that submarine is. Uh, trying to look at
the, um, operational status of the uh,
mobile missiles, the SS27s that are out
there. Um, are they are they in
garrison? Had they been put out into the
uh, Siberian forests? uh you know uh
what's the alert status of the other
missiles in their silos uh because what
Trump did is begin
unfortunately he began the process of
the mobilization of nuclear forces that
if left unchecked will lead to an
inevitable nuclear I just again I want
to come to the point last fall we were
over 50% chance of a nuclear war we were
very lucky to avoid it um right now that
that that percentage is higher we are
it's It's an extraordinarily dangerous
situation that even though I sort of
chuckle when I talk about the word
durac, it's only because this this
situation's so damn dangerous that you
have to laugh. It's like, you know,
we're going to die. You know what? What
can you do? Cry or laugh? And and we're
going to die unless something changes.
This we're this is it that there won't
be historians able to write this history
because they'll all be dead. But if they
were, this will be one of those moments
that a person like Barbara Tukman would
be talking about in the future, you
know, Guns of August um book that that
would have been written if anybody
lived. But we're talking about
thermonuclear war here, global
thermonuclear war. There won't be
survivors.
Wow. How destructive can these
submarines be if they were to uh
attack under the radar or under the
defensive systems at Moscow?
We talking about Hiroshima and Nagasaki
type destruction or greater?
Oh, good lord. Greater. Um Hiroshima and
Nagasaki were 12 kilotons under 20
kilotons of destructive power. Very I
mean destructive. No doubt about it. uh
our our cities would be hit with, you
know, 150 kilotons, uh 300 kilotons, one
megat ton, that's a thousand. Um we're
we're literally talking I did a I did a
um a uh public briefing last uh December
at the National Press Center where I
invited Theodore Postal to come in and
give a presentation about uh what a
single Russian nuclear warhead over
Washington. This is the brilliant and
fearless MIT physicist.
Yeah. A good man. And you you look at
this briefing and it just it it
terrifies you. And that's just one.
Understand that um when you do nuclear
targeting, you're putting at least two
warheads on each target just to ensure
if you're hitting a national capital
center, I I I can say this, during the
Cold War, Moscow was targeted uh by
about 60 warheads. That just overkill to
make sure we got everything. Um and and
so what we're we're the Russians will be
doing the same thing. There will be
nothing left alive in Washington DC.
Read Annie Jacobson's book nuclear war.
She she run through a very realistic
scenario and um it's it's over. And you
don't want to survive this. If there's a
nuclear war, you want to die. You want
to be one of the ones who turns into
dust immediately because to to live
isn't to live. To live is to die. uh
Rear Admiral Buchanan who is the
director of plans for strategic command
gave a lecture last November in
Washington DC and after he acknowledged
that the Biden administration is ready
to have a nuclear exchange with Russia.
We're ready to have a nuclear war with
Russia and we're going to win. This is
what he said. He then said we probably
should be more honest with the American
public about what this means and what
victory means because he said even when
we win life will never be the same for
any American. There won't be civil
liberties. We'll be living under
permanent martial law. Uh you're not
going to have electricity, want running
water, medicine. None of the nicities of
civilization that you currently enjoy
will exist. And that's winning a nuclear
war. Ladies and gentlemen, you don't
want to win a nuclear war. You just want
to die because to win means you're going
to be suffering. And if you're a parent
with kids, who the hell wants that for
their children? This is why people have
to become angry about this and mobilized
about this. You know, people should be
calling up their their representatives
in Congress and saying, "What the hell
are you doing?" People should be
demanding that Lindsey Graham, the
perfume princess, get booted out of the
Senate. This is the man who is almost
singularly responsible for this very
crisis because of his asinine
performances, because of his
Russophobia. Um, this is why what why I
do what I do to combat Russophobia. So
that people when they hear the lunacy
out of people like Lindsey Graham, out
of Donald Trump and others, they go,
"No, that's not real. That's not the
Russia. That's We're not buying into
this crap. But it's an uphill battle
right now. But people need to
understand, we're talking about you're
going to die. Your kids are going to
die. And if they don't die, they're
going to suffer like you've never seen
people suffer before. And no parent
wants to see that or experiencing that.
So let's nip this thing in the bud.
Let's let Donald Trump, let's let
Peakhead Seth, let's let Lindsey Graham
and everybody else know that this is not
okay. This is not good. You don't deploy
two Ohio class nuclear submarines
because of a mean tweet. Get real.
Become an adult. Become the leader that
everybody expected you to be. A mean
tweet sent two of the most powerful re
assets of the United States into an
operational status. This is insanity.
Literal insanity.
Scotty, I know you have to go, so I will
let you go. Thank you very much for all
this. You warned about all this in your
book, Highway to Hell. I just want the
book.
I mean, it's why I write a book, Judge.
You did. You did. I read the book. I was
privileged to to write a blurb for it.
It's all in there. It predicted what's
happening right now. Scotty, I know you
got to go. Thank you very much. Have a
great weekend. We'll see you Monday or
early next week.
Okay, Judge. Thanks a lot.
Thank you. Wow. And uh, of course,
everybody should have a nice weekend.
God only knows what will happen Monday.
All of your regulars will be with us.
Alistister Crook at 8 in the morning,
Ray McGovern at 10:00, Larry Johnson at
11:30, and probably Scott Ritter to
bring us up to date on God only knows
what will happen uh over the weekend.
Thank you for watching this special
edition of Judging Freedom. Judge
Npalitano for judging freedom.

[admin]

INTEL Roundtable w/ Johnson & McGovern : Weekly Wrap 1-August
Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom
Streamed live 7 hours ago

INTEL Roundtable w/ Johnson & McGovern : Weekly Wrap 1-August



Transcript

Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here
for Judging Freedom. Today is Friday,
August 1st, 2025. It's the end of the
day, the end of the week, our favorite
time. It's the intelligence community
roundt with my dear friends and
colleagues Larry Johnson and Ray
McGovern. Larry, Ray, welcome here.
Thank you for your time. Thank you for
the double duty. Uh, as always, Larry,
let me start with you first. In the past
hour and a half, President Trump
announced the deployment of two nuclear
submarines, quote, to an appropriate
location, close quote, in response for
some what I think was ridiculous and
childish social media spat that he had
with former Russian President Dmitri
Medvidev. What is your take on the
approp the propriety or impropriy of
such an announcement by the president?
uh he's pushing us closer to nuclear
war. It'd be one thing if it was just
this in isolation. You could say, yeah,
you know, Trump just uh he didn't get
his nap today and you know, he's a
little groggy from uh you know, because
of that. But with within the last week
and a half or two weeks, the United
States redeployed to the England nuclear
bombs that had been withdrawn previously
as a as a sign to the then Russians that
okay, yeah, we're serious about
deescalating. So now that we've deployed
those and on the back heels of that you
had this general Donahghue who is the
commander of US Yukon the European
command uh talk about invading capturing
Kenigrad and very very quickly. So the
the and in fact and you yourself you
were on Dmitri Sin's show I think
yesterday or the day before
and uh
the generals were expressing genuine
concern like what what the hell is this?
Yes.
What is Trump trying to what are you are
they serious? If you know, if Ry or I
were back at our old jobs and we were
and the Russians were doing stuff like
this, we'd have to say, you know, Mr.
President, you've got to be prepared
that uh the Russians may be preparing to
attack. I'm going to play uh the clip uh
of General Donahghue and then Ray, I'm
going to ask you to tell us what is
Kinenrad
and what is this guy talking about? This
is the commander of more troops than any
other fourstar uh in the military.
Colonel McGregor has some choice words
for this guy and his background. We
don't need to get into that now, but
he's addressing a group of European and
American military leaders and he
threatens to put American boots on the
ground. My question to you after you see
this is A, what is Kinenrad and where is
it? And B, Rey, could he possibly have
made a statement of this magnitude
without the knowledge and consent of
Secretary Heget than President Trump?
Chris, cut number 10.
If you look at Clenrad at its, you know,
you can argue back and forth, but it's
about 47 miles wide,
surrounded by NATO on all sides. There's
absolutely no reason why that A2 AD
bubble to deter Russia. We cannot take
that down from the ground in a time
frame that is unheard of and faster than
we've ever been able to do. We've
already planned that. We've already
developed it.
Ground ray already planned already
developed. So, first of all, what is
this place and where is it?
Uh, it's up there uh near near the
Baltic states in Poland. It's a what
they call an exclave. In other words,
there's no ground connection with Russia
proper. An exclave they call it. And so
it's it's really hard to defend if
anyone tried to take that seriously.
What Dan who is saying
is it is it Russia?
Yeah, it's part of Russia proper. It's a
leftover from World War II. Um, and you
know, there are there are agreements
that allow Russia to uh supply it, and
it's never been a problem. And so,
here's an artificial stoking up of a
place where Russia is particularly
vulnerable. And now we have the
president so saying he's going to send
two nuclear power nuclear equipped or
nuclear capable aircraft carriers into
the area. You know, as Larry said, if I
were advising President Putin, I would
say, look, you have to go to defcon,
whatever it is, you have to increase the
the uh the level of your of your alert
system because God knows what this guy's
going to do. And that's the the nub of
it. Uh Trump is the fly in the ointment.
He's totally unpredictable. He's under
great pressure from the Epstein stuff
and and he's being fought back against
by the deep state and the media and them
Democrats of course for this re
revelations of how they tried to
sabotage his election and then his
administration the first time around. So
is there's a lot of reason why he should
be upset. But derange. No, derange is
something that the Russians don't really
like. I imagine they're on tent hooks. I
imagine Putin is calling Trump and
saying, "Look, this is serious stuff.
Let's talk." Larry, the week began with
President Trump at his golf club or one
of them uh in Scotland seated next to
European or to UK Prime Minister uh Sir
Kir Stormer threatening President Putin
if the war isn't over used to be 50 days
now I'm only giving you 10 to 12 by
midweek he had reduced it to five so
he's basically saying if the war is not
over or a ceasefire isn't entered by
Tomorrow, Saturday, August 2nd, he,
Donald Trump, will force Putin's hand by
imposing secondary sanctions on anybody
that buys Russian oil. Can Donald Trump
successfully intimidate Vladimir Putin?
Will this threat change the Russian
military strategy in UK in Ukraine? One
iota, Larry?
No. I, you know, I think the the
Russians are starting to view uh Trump
like an annoying horsefly at a picnic,
something you just have to sort of swat
away and try to ignore. U the threat of
sanctions against Russia have, you know,
there's zero zero effect.
You and I have seen that personally.
Yeah. It's just Trump has no leverage
there. Um, China and India. Uh, while
there are some reports that the the
Indian refineries have stopped
processing Russian fuel, I guarantee you
what's going to go on this this stuff's
going to go into what what we would call
a black market. It's not going to be
easily recorded or easily identified. So
all that Donald Trump is doing is seeing
how much he can alienate
even countries in the world which we
previously thought we were our friends
and our allies. He is it's it's the most
erratic,
reckless behavior I've seen in any
president, including Joe Biden. And I I
really think that that that Trump is
suffering from some serious mental
decline that is, you know, he's able to
mask it
up to a point. But uh yeah, I liken it
to, you know, I'm sure we've all had an
elderly relative who is when they got
into like their last years, they would
start boarding out, you know, expletives
and say things in a very crude and rude
way that they never would have when they
were in sort of their normal state of
mind. And I think that's what we're
seeing with Donald Trump. Uh before I
jump to Rey uh on a similar topic,
Senator Graham of all people threatening
President Putin, you got to see this.
Larry, what is your take on General
Donahghue? Could in accordance with
military protocol, could he have made a
statement of that magnitude without the
knowledge and consent of the Secretary
of Defense or even the president?
No. No. He he spent too much time at
altitude without enough oxygen. That's
that's the only other explanation I
could give.
Uh here's
the other thing is that if and the
president wanted to to explain that
Danghue didn't really mean what he
wanted, they could have. So the Russians
have to accept that as the the plan, so
to speak, crazy as it is. I mean, um,
Trump is non-compassment
with with craziness attached, which is
doubly
doubly dangerous than Joe Biden for
God's sake. And I never thought I'd hear
myself say that.
Uh, Chris, gentlemen, watch this. Did
you know that Donald Trump is going to
whoop Vladimir Putin's ass? Not my
words, a quote from the senior senator
from South Carolina. Chris cut number
one.
Putin, your turn is coming. You know,
Donald Trump is the Scottish shuffler of
American politics and foreign diplomacy,
and he's about to put a whooping on your
ass. What's going to happen here is that
Trump is going to impose tariffs on
people that buy Russian oil. China,
India, and Brazil. Those three countries
uh buy about 80% of cheap Russian oil.
That's what keeps Putin's war machine
going. So, President Trump's going to
put a 100% tariff on all those
countries, punishing them uh for helping
Putin. Putin can live through sanctions.
He could give a damn about Russian
soldiers. But China, India, and Brazil,
um they're about to face a choice
between the American economy or helping
Putin. And I think they're going to come
pick pick the American economy.
This may be the crudest, but I don't
know which is the most reckless. Trump's
threat of Putin, General Larry, General
Donahghue's threat to land troops or
this craziness from Senator Graham.
Yeah. Well, this is reminiscent of uh
the character that George C. Scott
played in the movie Dr. Strange Love,
right?
I mean, it's abs it's absolutely I think
George C. Scott won an Oscar for that.
So, so maybe Lindsay should be should be
up for it. Look, I I read an article
earlier this week and it had two
fascinating charts. It showed that in
the year 2000, the the country that was
the majority trading partner with most
of the world was the United States.
Today in as of 2024 the country which is
the majority trading partner of the 75%
of the world is China completely role
reversal. Donald Trump is acting like
we're back in 2000 when the United
States did have some dramatic leverage
with other countries. But what's taking
place now, like with these tariffs he
put on China, we used to be a major
exporter of pork and soybeans to China
in just a spate of three months cut off
and China's buying from Russia and
Brazil because you know what? We don't
have a monopoly on pigs. We may have a
monopoly on pigheaded politicians, but
but not a monopoly on pigs.
You're on a roll, Larry. God bless you,
Ray. uh a group of Republican senators
have offered uh has offered legislation
uh to authorize the Pentagon, subject to
the president's discretion, to
distribute another 54 billion with a B
dollar in military equipment to Ukraine.
I guess the Joe Biden days are back.
Well, 54 billion. Wow. That's about a
quarter of what we've already given
them. That's a lot.
Correct.
You know, last time this happened, it
was two years ago, and I watched that
Senate uh that Senate session where they
were talking about giving, I think was
uh over 150 billion or 50 billion more
to Ukraine. And every one of those
senators said, "Now look, remember that
money is staying here. I mean in our
districts it's going to be spent on our
weaponry. So please please understand
this is not given money to Iran or to to
Ukraine. Now you know that was so
cynical. There was only one senator
Chris von Holland from Maryland that
didn't say specifically that. So the
game is up. You the game is very very
transparent. Uh the military-industrial
complex is profitering on all this
stuff. Even the Europeans are now
supposed to buy our weapons at our
prices and give them to Ukraine. Give me
a break. I don't know if Congress will
will approve another 54 billion. Uh do
you Larry?
No. No. I I I don't see them uh there
only a few that are getting paid off by
Ukraine.
Do how much longer can Ukraine last,
Larry? whether this 54 billion passes
and Trump signs it or not.
Well, actually, I think that's one of
the reasons you've seen the change in
Trump's tone on this that u previously
he was being assured, oh yeah, you know,
this isn't going to end anytime soon.
But now in light of uh the significant
military advances that uh you Russia is
making in Daetsk this particular they
just captured finally captured the city
of Chazafiar and then there's this other
city called Pakross the the relevance of
those is uh let let's they're not the
same size but let's think of them as
Washington and New York City in terms of
a defensive line that's a critical place
and when you capture those all of a
sudden The Ukrainians are in a
desperation mode. Top that off with the
fact that almost every single night over
the last two weeks, Russia is hitting uh
Ukraine with more than 500 drones and
dozens of Iscander or Kinsal uh
missiles, hypersonic missiles. Ukraine
doesn't have an answer for it. It it
used to be if you go back a year, two
years ago, Russia might do this like
once every two or three weeks. Now
they're doing it every night. They've
got they've now got the productive cap
the production capability. So Ukraine's
ability to survive militarily. I think I
think they genuinely could be it could
be over before the end of the year.
Ray,
Larry, I'm I'm having a flashback here.
I think it was less less than three
years ago that uh the director of
national intelligence
said to the world uh that Russia was
running out of ammunition and weaponry
and and didn't have any indigenous
capability to replace their great losses
on the battlefield. Do you mean do you
mean to tell me that that Joe Biden was
being misinformed? And do you mean to
tell me that Trump is true when he talks
about hundreds of thousands, millions of
Russian casualties? I mean, where is
where is Trump getting his information
from?
Well, actually, we we now know thanks to
Sai Hirs. So, Scott Sai Sai wrote an
article where he quoted this
intelligence official telling him that
the Russians had two million casualties,
right?
And so, I reached out to Sai. I said,
"Sai, you're being fed what what my
brother Ray McGovern calls mail by an
excrement." And and Sai was, "Oh, no,
no, no, no. He's these are reliable
sides." I said, "I'm not saying he's not
a reliable source. I'm just telling you
he's lying to you." So, I did produce an
article which spelled out exactly how
many soldiers the Russians recruited and
signed up under contract in in 2022, the
same for 2023, same for 2024, same for
the first six months of 2025, and can
show you without a doubt that the
Russians have deployed to the field a
grand total of 2,00 2,500,000
soldiers roughly in this last three and
a half years. If they had 2 million
casualties, they would have they
wouldn't have the 700,000 soldiers they
have in the field now,
right?
It just doesn't. So, they're lying flat
out lying.
Even the CIA stenographers,
aka journalists and editors at the
Washington Post said a million Russian
casualties. It can't be anywhere near
that. I I can't imagine that the
Russians have lost a 100,000
uh killed, Larry. No, they've they've
probably had about 120,000 killed. Okay,
that's that's that's from a group called
Media Zona. What they've done is they've
tracked the obituaries that show up in
the Russian press. And if we take, you
know, the conventional combat, it
usually says there's a a 1:4 ratio, one
killed, three to four wounded. So, if
you take that, that means Russia could
have suffered a total of 600,000
casualties. I think that's possible. But
the difference is they're signing
they're signing up uh enough people
every month that their military is
growing in size in contrast to Ukraine
which is shrinking. And then Russia's
got every advantage with armor, armored
vehicles, artillery shells, fixedwing
aircraft, rotary wing aircraft, fab
bombs, missiles, drones. There's not a
single area in which Ukraine has a
military advantage. I want you to watch
um you may have seen this elsewhere,
Lieutenant Colonel Tony Aguilar
uh on Tucker Carlson earlier this week.
Chris cut number 11.
You've spent your life in combat zones.
That's why I think your uh testimony is
so compelling. Um because you have a
frame of reference. You've seen a lot of
destruction and a lot of killing in your
life for 25 years. How would you compare
what you saw in Gaza to what you've seen
in say Afghanistan or Iraq?
Nothing compares.
Nothing I have seen in Iraq, in
Afghanistan, in Baghdad, in Mosul,
Solder City, all throughout Afghanistan,
Syria, the southern Philippines, some
places where there's dense populations.
I have never witnessed anything as
brutal, destructive, violent,
and I would say that that that steps far
over our international laws of of of
how we persecute wars and how we engage
in warfare. Um, we've we've long
departed from that standard and America
America is a part of it.
Govern is the world starting to coalesce
around the idea of what we have been
saying for the past three years. Yeah,
there is genocide there and yes, the
Israelis are using starvation as a
weapon and yes, that is absolutely
unacceptable.
Yes, but it bothers me knowing
that no one figures out what the hell to
do about it. That's that's that's
problem. The old Noah principle. No more
awards for predicting rain. Awards only
for building arcs. None of us have
figured out a way to build arcs so we
can stop this damn thing. I never
thought my country would be aiding,
abetting, arming, and supporting
genocide and forced salv starvation. My
god, can't we get our our can't we get
together and figure out some way to stop
it? Uh, I'm at a loss for words.
Larry, watch this. This is somebody that
the three of us probably would not quote
very much. Senator Dick Durban. This is
a rather emotional and profound
statement he made uh on the floor of the
Senate two days ago. Chris number 12.
Several weeks ago, several senators
joined me in meeting with the ambassador
from Israel, and we asked him why Israel
was not providing humanitarian aid in
Gaza. He said, "That's not true. We were
providing it, but Hamas was stealing it
from us and using it to buy weapons and
to make them stronger."
And then he went on to say when we asked
him about the children starving the
images we had all seen on television he
said that is not true that is a United
Nations narrative
and then we asked him basically if there
is such a difference of opinion between
what is happening in Gaza why don't you
allow international journalists to come
into this area and report to the world
what they actually see and he said it
was too dangerous for journalists to
even witness it.
Mr. President, I want to tell you that
was an incredible statement and I
believe totally wrong. At the outset,
Cindy McCain and others have told us
there is no diversion by Hamas of the
humanitarian aid. It just isn't coming
into Gaza and went on to say that these
children, of course, we see them on
television, you can't avoid it. That's
the reality of the situation. And
furthermore, when it came down to it,
that we had to stand up and acknowledge
the obvious that Israel is part of this.
Children of Gaza are starving and dying.
The question is, what will the United
States do about it? I thank the senator
from Vermont for offering these
resolutions this evening. It's painful
for many of us who've devoted our
congressional careers to supporting
Israel and standing by them through
difficult times. It is impossible to
really explain or defend what is going
on today. Gaza is starving and dying
because of the policies of BB Netanyahu.
at Larry that he had referred to this
ambassador who obviously was lying the
way Bernie Sanders referred to Netanyahu
as quote a disgusting liar. Of course,
the two of them are very late to this
game as Ry just pointed out. Larry, your
thoughts on all this?
Well, of course, I do I sure raise both
anguish, anger, and frustration over
this whole thing. I think the good news
though, we're starting to see this week
in particular and last starting last
week, the worm is starting to turn. Apac
is losing some of its clout and
influence and we we've seen it in a
variety of ways. One, more of the
European states are now standing up
saying, "Okay, we're going to recognize
Palestine come September when the UN
General Assembly has its annual
meeting." Uh so, you know, with England,
uh with France, with Canada now saying
it and and what does Trump do? Trump
starts threatening those countries with
tariffs in order to protect Israel. But
also important is the these shows, shows
like yours, but but Tucker Carlson has
really been hitting it out of the park
this week because he had John Mirshimer
on Wednesday for an hour and John just
raped Israel up one side and down the
other. They I mean he told the story of
the Zionist um conquest, if you will,
and how how wrong it is. Then he then
Tucker followed that up with Colonel
Aguilar. And Colonel Aguilard, tell you
what, I I used to not have too high an
opinion of West Point. But man, after
listening to him and his his recitation
of the Geneva Convention and his
description of what commanders need to
be doing with respect to the troops to
keep him from murdering children and
then his own encounter with this small
boy who was subsequently murdered by the
Israelis that those messages are having
power and then Tucker's doing it again
today with Candace Owens. They're
hitting this subject and Candace is
hitting it as well. The reason I point
those two out, they have a strong
resonance in Trump's MAGA base. So Trump
is lose starting to lose that base. I
know he's I know he's lost several that
I know.
Well, he's he's lost a lot of the base
over the Epstein saga, but he's losing
the base of those who are repulsed by
the slaughter of innocents.
Yes. Yes.
Yeah. I would just add, you know, that
uh Trump is in a very dangerous state of
mind here. He's got Epstein.
Uh I believe he's being blackmailed by
Netanyahu on Epstein.
I believe like Max Blumenthal that
Epstein was working with Mossad and they
have stuff on Trump. And to think to
think that Trump would be doing genocide
largely because he wants to escape blame
for this kind of thing is just atrocity
squared in my view. So let me just add
that I think that rather than Ukraine,
it's the Middle East that really is the
the boiling pot here. Uh uh Netanyahu is
going to probably resort to something
that he'll want US support for. It will
be an attack on Iran. And you know,
Iran's not going to take it easily.
Iran's going to destroy large parts of
Israel and then Netanyahu is going to be
faced with the choice of using his
nuclear weapons or forgetting about it.
And you know, a fellow who can who can
approve genocide and all this other
stuff, force starvation, you can't
convince me that he will not use nuclear
weapons in extremists. That's the real
live wire. And Trump, my god, I don't
know what he do. Last time he let
himself be mousetrapped. Would he do
that again? Well, we'll have to see. But
Iran, Middle East, that's the key in my
view. We'll we'll end with that. As
terrifying as uh as it is, Brother uh
Ritter is coming up in a couple of
minutes. Gentlemen, thank you very much.
We'll look forward to seeing you uh at
your usual times on Monday morning. Have
a great weekend. Thank you for joining
us.
Thanks so much. Thank you.
And coming up at 4:30 Eastern on the
president's recklessness with nuclear
submarines, Scott Ritter, Judge Npalit
Tenno for judging freedom.
[Music]
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[admin]

Ghislaine Maxwell transferred to less restrictive prison after DOJ meeting. Normally, sex offenders like Maxwell are not housed in minimum-security prisons, but she has been moved to one.
by Erica Orden
Politico
08/01/2025 12:59 PM EDT
Updated: 08/01/2025 04:52 PM EDT
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/0 ... g-00488424

Days after sitting down with one of the highest-ranking members of the Justice Department, Ghislaine Maxwell has been transferred to a less restrictive, minimum-security federal prison camp in Texas, her attorney said.

As a convicted sex offender, Maxwell would not normally be eligible for a minimum-security prison. According to a Bureau of Prisons policy, people with a sex offender determination known as a “public safety factor” are required to be housed in at least low-security prisons unless they receive a waiver from an arm of the bureau that designates inmates. Low-security prisons are more restrictive than minimum-security ones.

The bureau is a component of the Justice Department, meaning its leadership reports to Attorney General Pam Bondi.

A spokesperson for the Justice Department didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. The Bureau of Prisons also did not respond to a request for comment.

Maxwell’s attorney David Oscar Markus said Friday she had been moved to Federal Prison Camp Bryan, a facility for female inmates in Southeast Texas. He declined further comment.

It’s unclear why Maxwell might have been moved, but her transfer comes as she and her attorneys have been advocating both for a pardon by the Trump administration and for her conviction to be overturned by the Supreme Court.

Maxwell, the onetime girlfriend of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, is serving a 20-year sentence for her 2021 conviction for sex trafficking crimes. Until this week, she had been serving her sentence in Florida, at FCI Tallahassee, a low-security prison.

Late last week, Maxwell sat for two days of interviews with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, the No. 2 ranking official at the Justice Department, who met with Maxwell as part of an effort by the Trump administration to quell backlash over its handling of the so-called Epstein files.

According to the Bureau of Prisons, the type of facility to which Maxwell has been moved has “dormitory housing, a relatively low staff-to-inmate ratio, and limited or no perimeter fencing,” as opposed to the “double-fenced perimeters” of the type of low-security prison where she had been housed.

Maxwell had also been seeking to postpone a scheduled deposition with the House Oversight committee, a request committee chair James Comer granted. Comer said in a letter to Maxwell that the committee would delay her testimony until after the Supreme Court rules on her appeal.

“We will continue to engage with Congress in good faith to find a way for Ms. Maxwell to share her information without compromising her constitutional rights,” Markus said in a statement.

Following Maxwell’s meeting with Blanche, Markus told reporters of Trump’s pardon power that “we hope he exercises that power in the right and just way.”

Maxwell, who isn’t due for release from prison until 2037, was convicted of five felonies connected to her participation in Epstein’s child sex trafficking ring, including sex trafficking conspiracy and sex trafficking of a minor. Epstein died by suicide in jail while awaiting trial in 2019.

[admin]

Trump Gets SCREWED in Court by HIS OWN DOJ
by Michael Popok
Legal AF
Aug 1, 2025 The Intersection with Michael Popok

AG Pam Bondi just screwed Trump (again) in a new Court filing where she confesses that the Epstein Scandal is of great public importance (undercutting Trump who says "boring" an "nothing to see here") and that her own FBI/DOJ close out memo fueled public demand for the Files! Popok examines the new federal court filing about the Maxwell Grand Jury materials, and the revelation that there is virtually nothing new in those files the public hasn't seen, and only 2 law enforcement witnesses testified!



Transcript

[Michael Popok] Attorney General Pam Bondi just did it
again. She completely undercut and
undermined Donald Trump's talking point
that when it comes to the Epstein
scandal that he's desperately trying to
shove back into Pandora's box, saying
"This is boring. There's nothing to see
here. I don't know why you are all
interested in this." She completely
undercut his position in a new filing in
federal court, in the Southern District
of New York, where she tells a federal
judge, as she tries to get the grand jury
transcripts released, that this case is
of great public interest and importance
and it demands the release of files. I
couldn't agree with you more, Pam Bondi,
although that completely wraps you
around your own axle, about arguing to
the American people that the full
Epstein file should not come out while
you shoot your client in the head if
not the foot. I

I'm Michael Popock. You're
on Legal AF YouTube. This is Friday
morning. Let's get to the Epstein report
because it's that important. I got the
new filing right here. I will post it on
Legal AF Substack. What is this all
about? Well, if you recall, to try to
tamp down the public interest, as Pam
Bondi puts it in her own filing around
Epstein, self-created, I would suggest,
by Donald Trump himself, um they went
and said, "Well, we'll redefine what the
Epstein files are. We won't call them
the truckload, Pam Bondi's phrase, of
documents reviewed and scoured for hours
and hours and months by the FBI in order
for Pam Bondi to brief her client and
her boss, Donald Trump, about his name
being all over the Epstein files, as
reported by the Wall Street Journal. No,
no, no. To the Trump administration,
that's not the Epstein files. The
Epstein files are the grand jury
transcripts of the Epstein and Maxwell
grand juries from several years ago.
Really? Because even now they have to
admit that there's basically nothing of
novel interest in those files in those
in those grand jury proceedings because
get this have a seat only two witnesses
and they were both law enforcement
testified combined at the Epstein and
Maxwell grand juries. That's it. An FBI
agent and a New York police officer
detective working on a human trafficking
task force summarizing the evidence in
front of the grand jury. No victims, no
Patreon, no patrons, no people who
participated in the child trafficking
ring, no Epstein, no Maxwell, no
nothing. In fact, Pam Bondi had to admit
in her filing that there's very little
in those summary witness testimonies by
law enforcement that the public doesn't
already know about.
And yet she continues to beat the drum
that this case is of great public
interest undercutting Donald Trump's
talking point to MAGA. You're on Legal
AF. Take a minute, hit the free
subscribe button. Let's get into this
new filing. You know, because you it's
very difficult to keep a lie straight.
Isn't that what we're watching? The
truth will set them free, but the truth
is hard. You have to tell the truth. You
have to but but lies you have to
remember them. And then you have to get
your your factual BS uh mythology that
you're using for political purposes. And
when you're getting interviewed on
Scottish golf courses, you got to get
that straight with what you can really
argue pen to paper when you file
something in court. Now, let's point out
a couple of things about this filing.
Pam Bondi is on the cover. Todd Blanch
is on the cover. And Jake Clayton is on
the cover. There's always a direct link
to Donald Trump on the cover. So, let's
talk about who these people are who just
filed this just to show you that they
have, you know, some sort of bonafide to
speak for Donald Trump. Pam Bondi,
attorney general, former impeachment
lawyer for Donald Trump, did terribly.
He got impeached. Todd Blanch, former
criminal defense lawyer for Donald
Trump. He batted 500. He got he was the
defense lawyer when Donald Trump got
convicted of 34 felony counts related to
Stormmy Daniels and the election
interference case and he was able to
ultimately obtain the immunity decision
from the United States Supreme Court. So
we call that 50/50. Who's Jay Clayton?
Jay Clayton which is the and you're
going to love this term says he's the
United States attorney for the Southern
District of New York. He's not the
United States attorney for the Southern
District of New York. At best, he's the
acting US attorney for the Southern
District of New York because he hasn't
been confirmed by the Senate. He had
been the US attorney many, many years
ago, and then Donald Trump appointed him
to be the head of the Securities and
Exchange Commission back in the first
administration. He is, how do I put this
nicely? A golfing buddy of Donald Trump.
Trust me, he's a golfing buddy of Donald
Trump. Not the brightest tool in the
shed. No, sharpest tool in the shed. I
may not be the brightest tool in the
shed. Not not the sharpest star in the
sky, is that it? Um, and that's why he's
on here with a phony title, but from
this administration, you'd you'd expect
nothing less. So, they file it with this
judge. There's two different judges that
are looking Well, there were really
three originally, but two different
judges that are looking at the grand
jury materials issue. One is Judge
Angeler,
who is presiding over the Maxwell grand
jury transcripts. He took over from
Judge Nathan because Judge Nathan after
she handled the Maxwell case and
sentenced Derby got elevated to the
second circuit court of appeals.
The other one is Judge Burman who was
the original judge for Epstein. And they
both issued similar orders. We need to
get to the bottom of the grand jury. We
don't understand why you want the grand
jury. We want to uh walk us through the
factors. Write us a brief. Find out if
Maxwell in the Maxwell case has any
objection. You know, kind of get your
act together. another judge down in West
Palm Beach about another grand jury
involving Epstein. She already rejected
the release of the grand jury
transcripts, finding nothing under
federal rule of criminal procedure six,
which deals with the release of grand
jury material applied. That was Judge
Rosenberg up in West Palm Beach
Division. So, we put that to a side. Now
we got the new filing and here's what
Pam Bondi says
as a justification
on page four. Why disclosure is being
sought in this particular case. Remember
Donald Trump tells people there's
nothing to see here. This is boring
details. Why are you still asking me
questions about this? Um there's nothing
to see. Uh he he was a creep. Uh you
know he stole young girls from me. You
know all those statements that Donald
Trump's been making. So here's what
here's what her his attorney general
says in court. As described above and in
the underlying motions, there is
undoubtedly a clearly expressed interest
from the public in Jeffrey Epstein's and
Galain Maxwell's crimes. You know what's
stoking that interest? Donald Trump's
failure to be transparent, I would
suggest. Beyond that, there is abundant
public interest in the investigative
work conducted by the Department of
Justice and FBI into those crimes.
Yeah. So, let's stop right there. She
releases a two-page unsigned, undated,
nobody takes responsibility for it memo
which kicks this all off at the
beginning of July that says that Jeffrey
Epstein died by suicide because we
looked at the video and we didn't see
anything untored. MAGA conspiracy
theorist hated that. And we looked
through all the files and uh there's no
client list and so we're done. They
actually thought that would close this
out. So yes, we are interested in the
Department of Justice and FBI
investigation into those crimes. And I
find it I find it the height of I don't
want to say hypocrisy, but just just
gling that they cite as the reason why
these files should be released and that
people are interested in investigation
of a crime. They cite to the Rosenberg
trial where two Jewish Americans
were convicted of espionage
and and put to death back in the 1950s
for allegedly helping the Russians or
the Soviets at the time. I mean, you're
bringing up the Rosenbergs to justify
your position in the Epstein case. It's
just mindboggling. I mean, nobody thinks
twice about this, you know, between Jay
Clayton, the golf buddy, Todd Blanch,
and um Pam Bondi. Attention given, this
is what they say on page five. So, that
was page four. Page five. Attention
given to the Epstein and Maxwell cases
has recently intensified in the wake of
their own memo, July 6th memo,
announcing the conclusion of the
government's review and investigation.
Um, no crap. But what really is
re revoly is the fact that they have to
admit that there's very little in the
grand jury proceedings that the public
doesn't already know about. So then they
undercut their other argument of
transparency. Oh, the Epstein grand jury
transcripts will be the Rosetta Stone.
We said on legal af. That's not the
files. The files are the search
warrants. the f and results of the
search warrants on laptops, on
computers, on safes that were in Jeffrey
Epstein's house, from the plane, from
the home when they caught Maxwell on the
run. All of that, you know, there's also
financial transaction reports about
money exchange. Follow the money between
Epstein and the girls that he raped.
There's lots of data and information and
pictures and audio and video. That's the
Epstein files. So they already undercut
it because now it's revealed that the
grand jury material at best is a total a
total in both grand juries, Epstein and
Maxwell of two witnesses. One was the
same. One was an FBI agent who testified
in both. The other was a New York uh uh
detective who worked on the human
trafficking task force, kind of a joint
task force with the feds. And he
testified in the Epstein along with the
FBI. That's it. Summary witnesses at
best. Not that unusual. We said there
would be nothing in there. No exhibits.
Um although now the judge is
questioning, "Do you want me to release
the exhibits, too, because you better
address that as well because there were
exhibits that were used by these two
witnesses." Of course, they didn't think
that through. The judge thought it
through for them, and he issued an
order. I'll also post up on Substack,
Judge Angle Meyer, and he says, "The
government's application to unseal the
grand jury transcripts is pending, and
the government's submission, which I
just read to you from, suggests,
although does not squarely state that
the government is seeking to unseal the
exhibits, also the documents that were
used." And then he wants full briefing
on that by Monday, and I'll report back
here about which grand jury exhibits
you're proposing and why. Now in the
Maxwell, which is what Angelmy, Judge
Angelmire is dealing with. Maxwell is
alive. So she's also commenting and
being given a right to comment. The
victims are a lot or some of the lawyers
representing the victims. I know one of
them, Jack Scarola down in Florida, he's
okay with the release of the grand jury
material. the the DOJ Pam Bondi argument
is that most of this victim testimony
has already come out either through
suits because they sued Epstein or the
estate of Epstein civily or in the
criminal prosecution of Maxwell. So
again, she undercuts the argument of
complete transparency because there's
effectively nothing in the grand jury,
even if we were to get it. Grand jury
materials that we haven't already seen,
which reinforces, Pam, that's not the
Epstein files. You keep trying to
redefine them so small that you'll think
we won't notice, but we do notice. And
we talk about it here on a regular basis
on our updates. Uh this one here on
Friday morning on Legal AF. Take a
moment, hit the free subscribe button. I
talk a lot about the legal AF Substack
growing growing growing. We put lots of
critical material there for you to read
yourself. These this order and the and
the motion or the response by the
government both are there. Now you have
my commentary. So until my next hot
take, I'm Michael Popac. I'm Michael
Popac and I got some big news for our
audience. Most of you know me as the
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[admin]

[SPECIAL] - Scott Ritter : Trump deploys Nuclear Subs to Russia over Social Media Rift
Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom
Streamed live 100 minutes ago



Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Npalitano here
for Judging Freedom. Today is Friday,
August 1st, 2025.
Welcome to this special edition of
Judging Freedom with my dear friend and
colleague Scott Ritter. Scott, thank you
for the double duty uh this week.
There's no better person on the planet
for us to turn literally for us to turn
to to explain the dangers, the
significance and the idiocy
uh behind what President Trump ordered
today. What did he announce that he did
today and what did he order and did what
is the significance of it?
What did the president do today? Well,
what the president did today is deploy
two of the most lethal strategic nuclear
assets in the American arsenal. Or at
least he claims to deployed. I I think
we will touch upon this later. Um Ohio
class uh submarine um launch ballistic
missile capable uh submarines armed with
trident u nuclear or you know solid fuel
missiles. Each one tipped with multiple
thermonuclear warheads. Um he has said
that he has ordered them deployed into
the appropriate areas um you know in in
in response to a Russian tweet uh from
Dimmitri Midto. This means areas where
the submarines missiles can target
Russia. Um this is extraordinarily
dangerous. You know, the United States
maintains
um a permanent force of Ohio class
submarines on station. Two submarines at
least in each of the oceans, two in the
Atlantic, two in the Pacific. Uh they're
on station where their missiles could
reach any of the
potential nuclear threats to the United
States of America. On occasion, we
deploy additional Ohio class submarines.
For instance, just recently uh an Ohio
class submarine was deployed into the
Indian Ocean close to Iran
where it's um Trident missiles armed
with um W76-2 low yield nuclear weapons
um could be used against Iran if the
president so ordered. But we have four
nuclear armed submarines. So, when he
said he's ordered two deployed, uh, is
he talking about two additional
submarines to this, uh, or is he talking
about redeploying
two submarines out of their, uh,
existing stations into
um, new deployment areas that make them
even more of a threat to Russia.
The tweet he's responding to is one from
Dimmitri Midv in which Midv sort of
mocked the president as
MV is the former president of Russia
who's the number two person on their
national security council
who who in recent years has been more
publicly bellose than President Putin.
He's like the the bad cop to Putin's
good cop. Um
and and what did he do? pick a social
media fight with Trump and Trump took
the bait.
Mean tweets. This is literally mean
tweets. This is about Donald Trump
threatening to end the world as we know
it because of a mean tweet. But what's
even more outrageous is that Donald
Trump doesn't understand what Midv
tweeted. Midv was telling Trump to knock
it off with the dangerous threats saying
that you know if you do this you America
can end up looking like the walking dead
uh because of the dead hand. The dead
hand is a reference to the perimeter
system, which is a defensive system put
in place by the Soviet Union back in the
1980s.
um so that if they are ever struck
preemptively by the United States, a
first strike, by the way, the tactic to
be used in a first strike is to bring
Ohio class submarines close to Russia's
shores, fire off their Trident missiles
on a flattened trajectory to avoid
detection so you can strike the targets
quicker, which is what Trump just
actually appeared to order the US Navy
to do. So the dead hand now becomes a
factor because if Trump is dumb enough
to launch an attack against Russia, the
dead hand, the perimeter system will
ensure that all of Russia's strategic
nuclear forces will be fired against the
United States even if Trump takes out
Putin, the National Command Authority,
etc. I know this is a fact. When I was a
weapons inspector in Vladkinsk, there
was a missile crisis in March of 1990
because the Russians were trying to get
three missiles out of the factory
without us turning on the cargo scan
x-ray system. Why? These weren't three
SS25 missiles. They don't care if we see
those. These were three of what they
callina. These were modified SS25s, not
to carry nuclear warheads, but to carry
the radio equipment that's used to
broadcast the codes. They needed to get
these missiles out and deployed and
ready so that the perimeter system was
alive and well and living. The dead hand
is only defensive in nature. Trump
should feel no threat from this unless
he's planning on attacking Russia. This
is the insanity. This president doesn't
even know what he's doing. And he's
responding to a mean tweet from a guy
who's been me tweeting for years now. I
mean, I think most people, you know,
view Dmitri Midva's tweets with sort of,
you know, humor. Um, yeah, they hurt
sometimes. He's he's very good at what
he does. Uh, but he's not the president
of Russia. He doesn't command Russia's
military, nuclear forces. He doesn't
direct the Russian economy. He advises
Vladimir Putin, but he is not Vladimir
Putin. So to treat Midv as if his tweets
actually will translate into a into
action is, you know, childish behavior,
but in this case, dangerously childish
because he's literally putting two US
nuclear submarines on a combat patrol
against Russia.
Let's read uh exactly uh what Trump
said. Chris has prepared a full screen.
This is from his social uh his truth
social based on the highly provocative
statements of the former president of
Russia Dmitri Medvev who is now the
deputy chairman of the security council
of the Russian Federation. I have
ordered two nuclear submarines to be
positioned in the appropriate regions
just in case these foolish and
inflammatory statements are more than
just that. Words are very important and
can often lead to unintended
consequences. I hope this will not be
one of those instances. Thank you for
your attention to this matter.
Exclamation point. Would would Hegth
understand what you just explained about
the power of these and how the Russians
would perceive the threat? Would Pete
Hegsth know that we already have four
underwater and and and are we adding two
more? Do we have two more to add or has
he just repositioned two of the four
that are already uh somewhere in the
seas?
I think we have 14 Ohio class
submarines. I mean, somebody can correct
me if I'm wrong, but I think it's 14.
And they go through a rotation. You
know, first of all, those four
submarines that are out there, it's a
minimum of four, two in each ocean. You
know, they go through rotations. And so,
they'll rotate back to their home port
for refitting. the crews have to go out.
Um, there are some that are cycling
through long-term refueling and
refurbishment. So, you don't have 14
able to be deployed at any one time. I
think you probably have somewhere in the
area of, you know, n six to nine Ohio
class submarines available for
deployment. Um, you'll have the four out
in the fleet out in the field. You'll
have two that are getting ready to come
out and replace two of the four. And
then you have surge capacity. Like I
said, sometimes they send an additional
submarine out to the Indian Ocean. Other
times they may choose to put three
submarines in each of the deployment
areas depending on what the world's
situation is. Um, but this is a standard
operating procedure, something that uh
Pete Hgsth should be cognizant of now
that he's the Secretary of Defense. He
should have been briefed on this by the
commanding general strategic command
whose job it is to run these uh
submarines. Um, the other thing that
we never announced the movement Ohio
class,
I was just going to ask you what is to
be gained by making an announcement like
this. Is he just trying to cause Putin
sleepless nights?
Well, I don't think Putin's going to
cause sleep. But to make this
announcement, first of all, it's
foolish. Uh, because all you're doing is
um giving credence to the legitimacy of
the dead hand. I mean, the dead hand
again only exists, it only becomes
viable if the United States launches a
preemptive nuclear strike against
Russia. And redeploying Ohio class
submarines close to Russia's shores
indicates that that's what you're doing.
So, you know, the Russians are going to
be doing something in return. This is
where it gets stupid because now they
have to do something in return.
Hopefully, they don't announce it and
make a big deal of it, but they do it in
a way that we detect it and we know what
they've done. Um, but the other thing
is, let's say I'm a Ohio class submarine
commander, a captain, and I'm out there
just minding my own business, and all of
a sudden I'm told that the president is
redirecting my submarine to a new
deployment area. Um, maybe even telling
me to target my warheads. I mean, we
don't know. Uh, all the all the warheads
should have been deargeted a long time
ago. Um, because we don't want
inadvertent launch. But what did the
president now say? Not only are we
redeploying them, but you're now going
to have a Russian city targeted to each
one of these uh uh warheads. Who knows
what's going through this man's head,
but the president did this publicly. So
now I'm the Russians. And I go, "Okay,
guys, start looking for an Ohio class
submarine moving." Because when Ohio
class submarine's on station, it's
sitting at the bottom of the damn ocean
and it ain't moving. It's avoiding
detection altogether. You don't want to
be moving this submarine because it can
become detected. Now, if I'm the
Russians, I'm looking for this thing.
The Russians has some very good
submarines. And if they locate it and
trail it now, they'll follow it to its
new deployment area. And if it makes a
threatening move, the Russians will sink
it immediately.
I mean, this is how dangerous this is.
He has put the lives of uh 19-year-old
sailors
uh at risk as well as senior everybody
on these subs.
Oh, yeah. There's not too many 19 year
olds on that submarine because submarine
nuclear submarines require people with
that have to go through some good
training. But you got some 20, 21 year
olds. You got a lot of 30 year olds. You
got a lot of 40-year-old men with
families and kids. Um, you know, th this
this is insanity. These are America's,
you know, most capable warriors um who
we never want to they we don't ever want
these guys to go into combat. They're
there for nuclear deterrence. They're
there to deter an enemy from carrying
out an attack against the United States.
Now the president has put them in a
place where they're not doing
deterrence, but they have now become the
perceived aggressors. This is insanity
in the extreme. Pete Hegath should be
advis the chairman of the joint chief
should be screaming his head off. I mean
every JD Van should be saying, "Mr.
President, no." But what we get, Lindsey
Graham, the perfume princess, out there
having an orgasmic response to the
president's toughness, you know, telling
his friends, the Russian people, Lindsey
Graham isn't friends with anybody in
Russia. Um, I can tell you nobody in
Russia is friends with Lindsey Graham.
But, you know, I mean, this is ridic I
apologize for the sexual reference
there. That was inappropriate. But, you
know, you just take a look at the way
this man's responding to these this this
dangerous absurdity on the part of the
president. It's idiotic.
This is going to raise your blood
pressure even more. Rather than
cautioning the president, my former Fox
News colleague, who now runs the
Pentagon, has reposted
on his own uh ex account President
Trump's nuclear post that I just uh read
to you. There it is on Pete Hegs's
official account. He reposted what
Donald Trump uh said. So, these guys are
enablers, Scott. But I I gotta ask you
something that I think is going to make
this worse. Is it true that within the
past several weeks, the United States
delivered uh nuclear armaments to Great
Britain? And if so, what did we send
there?
Well, it appears to be true. I mean I I
can't confirm it, meaning I haven't seen
the deployment order and I haven't seen
the miss, but I've read the media
reports and uh all indications are that
we have delivered uh B6112
um uh gravity bombs. These are the
basically it's the same weapon system
that we have deployed throughout NATO,
part of the NATO nuclear deterrence. Uh
we've now uh deployed these to uh to
Great Britain uh to to air bases there,
which means that uh we we now have a um
a nuclear deterrence outside of the NATO
hierarchy. That's what's interesting
here because in order for Great Britain
to receive American nuclear weapons
under the NATO umbrella, you have to
invoke the, you know, the the the NATO
nuclear uh advisory council and all
this. There has to be discussion and
things of this nature. This is a
unilateral deployment of the United
States to Great Britain, which implies
that this is about the United States and
Great Britain posturing as opposed to
United States strengthening NATO's
nuclear deterrence. Uh this is at a time
when Great Britain just did the
Northwoods uh declaration with France
where they've combined uh the nuclear
doctrines of France and Great Britain as
an independent outside of NATO uh
nuclear capability. This is when Great
Britain has extended its nuclear
umbrella into Poland. Um and now the
United States is attaching um its
nuclear force to to the British. I mean
we are literally people look at all this
stuff and they they're like, you know,
oh that's not a big deal. Let's not blow
this out of proportion. If you go back
and read Barbara Truckman's fantastic
book, um, The Guns of August, it's about
the leadup to August 1914, the beginning
of World War I. Especially in the month
of July, all the things that were
happening, the people went, "Yeah, but
it's just mobilization." Yeah, we're
just doing this. No, there will never be
a war. Nobody wants a war. And then
boom, World War I. Right now, we are
moves are being made right now that if
they're not stopped and reversed are
going to lead to a general nuclear
exchange between the United States and
Russia. This is the direction we're
heading. And I want to remind your
audience that the CIA said last year
there's a greater than 50% chance that
there will be a nuclear war between the
United States and Russia during the last
months of the Biden administration. What
the Biden administration was doing, as
provocative as it was, pales in
comparison to what this administration's
doing. We're above 50% right now, Judge.
We're heading into extraordinarily
dangerous territory.
What do you think uh is going on in the
Kremlin as we speak as a result uh of
all of this?
Dismay. Dismay. I mean, first of all,
the Kremlin right now, I believe, is,
you know, trying to
bring an end to the Ukraine conflict uh
without creating an even greater
conflict. And so, this is always a
delicate diplomatic balancing game. Um,
and then you have this president making
threats. I mean, we we still have the
August 8th deadline coming up. The 10
days expires. What's going to happen on
August 8th? Steve Whit flying to uh to
to to Moscow to meet with his Russian
counterparts. Are threats going to be
issued? And now in that environment
where we're supposed to be actually
trying to calm each other down, the
president deploys two nuclear submarines
uh you know, in response to a mean treat
from uh Demetri.
the the the good news here, and I know
I'm going to get in trouble here from
people, but um thank God there's one
mature, responsible adult in the room,
and that's Vladimir Putin. You know, is
he perfect? No. Does he walk on water?
No. But I'll tell you what, he doesn't
do any of the garbage that Trump's
doing. And I believe Putin will do that
which is necessary to ensure Russia's
security interests without being
provocative. if you saw his uh his his
his discussion today about Ukraine um
very levelheaded um you know saying the
doors open for peace don't look don't
blame us it's Ukraine saying they don't
want peace you know it's United States
that's doing the we're ready for it but
there are realistic conditions that have
to be met um you know trying to just
calm things down lower lower the
temperature and um I think he's going to
continue this way this this man is not
suicidal he didn't spend a quarter of
century getting Russia out of the ashes
to where Russia is today. This nation
where Russians are actually proud of who
they are and what they are and what
they've become. He didn't do all this
just to throw it away in a in a blinding
flash of nuclear insanity. Um and I and
think that was what was behind Dmitri
Mviet's, you know, mean tweet. What he
was telling the president of United
States is calm down, take a chill pill
because the things you're talking about,
the way you're talking can only end with
a nuclear apocalypse. And if you think
for a moment that you can preemptively
strike our leadership because we're not
playing the game in Ukraine the way you
want to play, we have the dead hand. And
the dead hand will take you out. That's
not provocative. That's just a statement
of fact. And it, you know, hey Tulsi, if
you're watching, talk to the guy. Brief
him on the perimeter system. Brief him
on the dead hand. And if you need help,
call me. I'll come in and back you up.
But this guy needs to have some hard
facts put on the table in front of him.
I don't think I don't think I don't
think he listens to anybody.
Telsey Gabbard is the only one that will
tell him what he doesn't want to hear,
but the others are all yesmen around
him. However,
yeah. Yeah. Pete Hex retweeted. That's
that's the biggest indication of the
syphy that you can come up with.
Correct. Correct. President Putin did
release a statement very brief
to the point and manifesting
what you said the adult in the room. All
disappointments arise from excessive
expectations.
In order to have a peaceful resolution,
it is necessary to have substantive
conversations
and not in public. He gets it. He gets
it that Donald Trump is just bravado on
steroids.
Yeah. And well, the other thing is
public public
posturing like this boxes you into a
corner. I mean, what what is the
masculine statement that he's trying to
make by deploying these nuclear
submarines? Because this is this is
alpha dog territory here. So, now that
you've done it, do you back away? Do you
back off? Do you pretend you didn't do
it? Do you admit you were wrong? Not no.
Once you've gone alpha dog mode, you're
sitting there with your chest pumped
out, you know, hey, I got all take, you
know, so and then what is there going to
be an additional escalation on this
part?
President Putin is 100% correct. The
place for these discussions is behind
the scenes. Um, so you don't box
yourself into a corner, so there's room
to maneuver. You know, it's it's
diplomacy 101. And you know, even a
simple marine like me knows this that
sometimes it's best not to go public
with things and you you handle it behind
closed doors and uh and and then when
you finally reach agreement, as
difficult as that process might be, you
come out and put on a common smiley
face, shake hands, and everything's
good. The world doesn't need to know
what your disagreements are. They only
need to know that you actually, you
know, worked through them and came to,
you know, to an eventual agreement that
makes the world a safer place to be. I
I'll leave you not leave you, but I I'll
say this. You know, on July 29th, uh,
President Trump in responding to a
question from a task correspondent, uh,
talking about the New START treaty,
which is the last, uh, strategic nuclear
arms agreement in play between the
United States and Russia, said, "That's
an agreement that cannot be allowed to
expire. It expires on 4 February 2026."
That's the most sane thing this man has
said. So hopefully there's a modicum of
sanity in that brain of his so that he
understands the danger of nuclear
weapons. He appears to understand that
the necessity of avoiding an arms race.
He appears to understand that. And
hopefully we can get through these
turbulent times and and and get on to
doing what needs to be done like
extending the New START treaty.
The Russian people are referring to
Trump by a certain word. What is that
word?
Oh dear. Um, it's a word I'm not
supposed to use. It's not a foul word,
but it's it's not a nice word. Durac
means fool. It means idiot. It's not
meant in a kind way. And if you call
someone a durac, it is it is a debasing
term. It means you're literally an
idiot. You're stupid. You're you're
dumber than than belief. Um, I use the
word today uh in describing President
Trump. And I used the Russian variant
because I just happened to believe that
the 150 plus million Russians who looked
at this, that's probably the first word
that came to their mind. Durac, what an
idiot. What a fool. Because there's no
there's no justification for his
actions. There's no legitimate trigger
for this. It's as foolish and idiotic as
it gets.
What is American intel doing now in
response to what Trump uh announced?
Well, I mean what it should be doing
right now is monitoring uh Russian
strategic nuclear forces, looking for
any alteration in um in alert status. Um
you know, counting Russian submarines.
You know, the Russians just deployed a
brand new submarine, the biggest
submarine in the world. It carries 96
nuclear warheads on it.
Uh, I can't remember how many um, you
know, RS56 um, Bulo missiles, but the
most mo more modern than the Trident
missile. Uh, 96 of them. It's out there
right now on station. Um, American
intelligence trying to find out where
that submarine is. Uh, trying to look at
the, um, operational status of the uh,
mobile missiles, the SS27s that are out
there. Um, are they are they in
garrison? Had they been put out into the
uh, Siberian forests? uh you know uh
what's the alert status of the other
missiles in their silos uh because what
Trump did is begin
unfortunately he began the process of
the mobilization of nuclear forces that
if left unchecked will lead to an
inevitable nuclear I just again I want
to come to the point last fall we were
over 50% chance of a nuclear war we were
very lucky to avoid it um right now that
that that percentage is higher we are
it's It's an extraordinarily dangerous
situation that even though I sort of
chuckle when I talk about the word
durac, it's only because this this
situation's so damn dangerous that you
have to laugh. It's like, you know,
we're going to die. You know what? What
can you do? Cry or laugh? And and we're
going to die unless something changes.
This we're this is it that there won't
be historians able to write this history
because they'll all be dead. But if they
were, this will be one of those moments
that a person like Barbara Tukman would
be talking about in the future, you
know, Guns of August um book that that
would have been written if anybody
lived. But we're talking about
thermonuclear war here, global
thermonuclear war. There won't be
survivors.
Wow. How destructive can these
submarines be if they were to uh
attack under the radar or under the
defensive systems at Moscow?
We talking about Hiroshima and Nagasaki
type destruction or greater?
Oh, good lord. Greater. Um Hiroshima and
Nagasaki were 12 kilotons under 20
kilotons of destructive power. Very I
mean destructive. No doubt about it. uh
our our cities would be hit with, you
know, 150 kilotons, uh 300 kilotons, one
megat ton, that's a thousand. Um we're
we're literally talking I did a I did a
um a uh public briefing last uh December
at the National Press Center where I
invited Theodore Postal to come in and
give a presentation about uh what a
single Russian nuclear warhead over
Washington. This is the brilliant and
fearless MIT physicist.
Yeah. A good man. And you you look at
this briefing and it just it it
terrifies you. And that's just one.
Understand that um when you do nuclear
targeting, you're putting at least two
warheads on each target just to ensure
if you're hitting a national capital
center, I I I can say this, during the
Cold War, Moscow was targeted uh by
about 60 warheads. That just overkill to
make sure we got everything. Um and and
so what we're we're the Russians will be
doing the same thing. There will be
nothing left alive in Washington DC.
Read Annie Jacobson's book nuclear war.
She she run through a very realistic
scenario and um it's it's over. And you
don't want to survive this. If there's a
nuclear war, you want to die. You want
to be one of the ones who turns into
dust immediately because to to live
isn't to live. To live is to die. uh
Rear Admiral Buchanan who is the
director of plans for strategic command
gave a lecture last November in
Washington DC and after he acknowledged
that the Biden administration is ready
to have a nuclear exchange with Russia.
We're ready to have a nuclear war with
Russia and we're going to win. This is
what he said. He then said we probably
should be more honest with the American
public about what this means and what
victory means because he said even when
we win life will never be the same for
any American. There won't be civil
liberties. We'll be living under
permanent martial law. Uh you're not
going to have electricity, want running
water, medicine. None of the nicities of
civilization that you currently enjoy
will exist. And that's winning a nuclear
war. Ladies and gentlemen, you don't
want to win a nuclear war. You just want
to die because to win means you're going
to be suffering. And if you're a parent
with kids, who the hell wants that for
their children? This is why people have
to become angry about this and mobilized
about this. You know, people should be
calling up their their representatives
in Congress and saying, "What the hell
are you doing?" People should be
demanding that Lindsey Graham, the
perfume princess, get booted out of the
Senate. This is the man who is almost
singularly responsible for this very
crisis because of his asinine
performances, because of his
Russophobia. Um, this is why what why I
do what I do to combat Russophobia. So
that people when they hear the lunacy
out of people like Lindsey Graham, out
of Donald Trump and others, they go,
"No, that's not real. That's not the
Russia. That's We're not buying into
this crap. But it's an uphill battle
right now. But people need to
understand, we're talking about you're
going to die. Your kids are going to
die. And if they don't die, they're
going to suffer like you've never seen
people suffer before. And no parent
wants to see that or experiencing that.
So let's nip this thing in the bud.
Let's let Donald Trump, let's let
Peakhead Seth, let's let Lindsey Graham
and everybody else know that this is not
okay. This is not good. You don't deploy
two Ohio class nuclear submarines
because of a mean tweet. Get real.
Become an adult. Become the leader that
everybody expected you to be. A mean
tweet sent two of the most powerful re
assets of the United States into an
operational status. This is insanity.
Literal insanity.
Scotty, I know you have to go, so I will
let you go. Thank you very much for all
this. You warned about all this in your
book, Highway to Hell. I just want the
book.
I mean, it's why I write a book, Judge.
You did. You did. I read the book. I was
privileged to to write a blurb for it.

[admin]

Journalist who EXPOSED Epstein TELLS ALL on Trump-Epstein CONNECTION
Sidney Blumenthal and Sean Wilentz and Julie K. Brown
Legal AF
Aug 1, 2025

The Court of History’s Sidney Blumenthal and Sean Wilentz are joined by investigative journalist Julie K. Brown, who broke the Epstein story and helped bring him to justice. She reveals what Harvey Weinstein may know about the Trump-Epstein connection and the broader pedophile coverup. Brown also exposes how Trump and Epstein exploited the modeling industry to prey on young women, and names Alan Dershowitz—not Ghislaine Maxwell—as the true puppet master behind the scandal. She details how Dershowitz used intimidation tactics to silence victims and even tried to sabotage her Pulitzer Prize.



Transcript

Welcome to the Court of History. I'm Sydney Blumenthal. The court is in session. I am here with Sean Wentz, my colleague, Princeton University. Sean, I have been watching a lot of TV shows about cold cases on Britbox and other sites, and I watched one called Department Q, and some other ones.

Oh, that was a great one. I love that one.

But it turns out that the greatest cold case of them all is Jeffrey Epstein.

Yeah. Well, it goes on and on and on, doesn't it?

I mean, you're getting to the point where the cover up is almost as interesting as anything else in the story. And the coverup's gotten to the point where I think Donald Trump said something for the first time in his entire life, which was to tell a bunch of reporters, "Don't talk about Donald Trump." This tells me that he's under grave distress if nothing else.

Well, the person who broke that cold case is with us today, and she probably knows as much about Jeffrey Epstein, what he did, and the people he did it to as anybody. And, we're eager to speak to her. She is, of course, Julie K. Brown. She's a member of the Miami Herald's investigative team. She's reopened the Jeffrey Epstein sexual abuse case with her reporting, and her probe into Epstein has won many journalism awards, including a George Pulk award, which was her second. She was also a member of the Herald's 2022 Pulitzer Prizewinning team for its coverage of the Surfside condo collapse, and she is the author of Perversion of Justice, the Jeffrey Epstein story. Welcome, Julie, to the Court of History.  

Thank you.

So, I'd like to start in the present, and then jump all the way back to the beginning. And in the present, what I'm really interested in, among other things, is you uncovered so many victims, and interviewed them, dozens and dozens and dozens. You must be in touch with them today. And what do they tell you about what's going on? Particularly with Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, running down to Tallahassee to the prison to interview Glenn Maxwell. Do you talk to the victims about this?

Yeah. I mean, there's a range of emotions. Sexual trauma victims, especially those that were victimized when they were children, often feel retraumatized. There's triggers, and this certainly is a trigger with all the chaos surrounding this case, particularly as it concerns one of their predators, Ghislaine Maxwell. In their minds, this is just another attempt at cover up, or attempt at somehow letting the people who were involved in their sexual assaults off the hook. In their eyes, this is a huge mistake. They they don't even care what information she's going to provide. They don't believe that she should ever leave jail. In fact, I've heard some of them say that she's a danger to society because of what she did, and how she did it.

Were any of them interviewed or approached by Mr. Blanche, or any other member of the Department of Justice, involving the interview with Glenn Maxwell?

I can't answer that question. I don't really know, because I've been interviewing them before recent events. I interviewed them a couple of days before Blanche went down to interview her. So as far as I know there were 200 victims, so it's hard to say whether any of them were contacted.  

Have they ever voiced to you how they would feel if she were pardoned?

As I said, they just feel betrayed again by the criminal justice system, that the DOJ would even consider doing something like this. And the oddity of sending the second in command of the DOJ in to broker some kind of a deal. In their minds, it seems as though they're trying to broker another deal like they did with Jeffrey Epstein in 2008, which led to his release, and also led to him being able to prey on additional victims. So, in their minds, this is a retraumatization of some of the same things that they felt back in 2008 when Jeffrey Epstein essentially was able to get a slap on the wrist.

Let's go back if we can of the beginning of the case that was opened against Epstein. That happened after a real estate deal between Trump and Epstein went bad over a Palm Beach property, and they broke up over it. And we spoke with Michael Wolff, who says that Epstein believed that Donald Trump was an informant to the authorities against Epstein to try and get even with him and cover up. I don't know if you've heard any of that.

I don't know. I haven't heard that. I haven't even heard that from the lawyers who have worked pretty closely with the victims on the cases. So, I don't really know if that's true or not.  

A spat over a $41 million mansion

But public sightings of the two together ended in 2004, when nursing home magnate Abe Gosman's Palm Beach mansion, named the Maison de l'Amitie (The House of Friendship), came on the market in a bankruptcy auction. Both Trump and Epstein wanted the six-acre oceanfront estate for themselves, the Post reported.

Joseph Luzinski, who was the property's trustee, told the paper that both men started lobbying him and would talk behind each other's back.

"It was something like, Donald saying, 'You don't want to do a deal with him, he doesn't have the money,' while Epstein was saying: 'Donald is all talk. He doesn't have the money,' " Luzinski told the Post. "They both really wanted it."


The Maison de l'Amitie estate in Palm Beach, Florida, on May 21, 2013. Sensation White Amsterdam/ Wikimedia Commons

When the home hit the auction block in November 2004, Trump came out victorious, paying $41.35 million for the property (he later sold it, more than doubling his investment).

Fewer than two weeks after the auction, Palm Beach police received a tip about young women seen coming and going from Epstein's home, according to a deposition the Post found from then-Police Chief Michael Reiter.

An investigation into Epstein was launched after police received a second complaint, from a woman who alleged her 15-year-old stepdaughter had been paid $300 by Epstein for a massage.

-- Trump and Epstein's friendship reportedly soured after they fought over a $41 million Palm Beach mansion. 2 weeks after the home's auction, cops received a tip about underage women at Epstein's house, by Ashley Collman, Business Insider, Aug 1, 2019, 10:53 AM MT

So tell us about how you got onto this cold case to begin with, because it was cold.

Well, it was cold, but it had been written about over the years. And I always felt that it was a mystery, because how does somebody get away with molesting all those girls, and be able to essentially get a deal where he isn't federally prosecuted, and he's able to just go about his jet setting life again, while these girls were devastated? So I knew about that, but I always thought, how did this happen? Who in Florida, in Washington, who were the people who were supposed to hold him accountable? And then Mr. Trump was running for president in 2016, and there was a civil lawsuit filed by a woman who claimed that when she was younger, she had been raped by both Epstein and Trump. And this was a ongoing civil lawsuit in 2016. And I happened to see a column that was written by a lawyer questioning why the media wasn't examining this. Look at this lawsuit. The media isn't looking at this.  

FACTUAL ALLEGATIONS

5. The Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, alleges that the Defendants, Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey E. Epstein, did willfully and with extreme malice violate her Civil Rights under 18 U.S.C ; 2241 by sexually and physically abusing Plaintiff Johnson by forcing her to engage in various perverted and depraved sex acts by threatening physical harm to Plaintiff Johnson and also her family.

6. The Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, alleges that the Defendants, Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey E. Epstein, also did willfully and with extreme malice violate her Civil Rights under 42 U.S.C.; 1985 by conspiring to deny Plaintiff Johnson her Civil Rights by making her their sex slave.

7. The Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, alleges she was subject to extreme sexual and physical abuse by the Defendants, Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey E. Epstein, including forcible rape during a four month time span covering the months of June-September 1994 when Plaintiff Johnson was still only a minor of age 13.

8. The Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, alleges she was enticed by promises of money and a modeling career to attend a series of underage sex parties held at the New York City residence of Defendant Jeffrey E. Epstein and attended by Defendant Donald J. Trump.

9. On the first occasion involving the Defendant, Donald J. Trump, the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, was forced to manually stimulate Defendant Trump with the use of her hand upon Defendant Trump's erect penis until he reached sexual orgasm.

10. On the second occasion involving the Defendant, Donald J. Trump, the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, was forced to orally copulate Defendant Trump by placing her mouth upon Defendant Trump's erect penis until he reached sexual orgasm.

11. On the third occasion involving the Defendant, Donald J. Trump, the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson was forced to engage in an unnatural lesbian sex act with her fellow minor and sex slave, Maria Doe age 12, for the sexual enjoyment of Defendant Trump. After this sex act, both minors were forced to orally copulate Defendant Trump by placing their mouths simultaneously on his erect penis until he achieved sexual orgasm. After zipping up his pants, Defendant Trump physically pushed both minors away while angrily berating them for the "poor" quality of their sexual performance.

12. On the fourth and final sexual encounter with the Defendant, Donald J. Trump, the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, was tied to a bed by Defendant Trump who then proceeded to forcibly rape Plaintiff Johnson. During the course of this savage sexual attack, Plaintiff Johnson loudly pleaded with Defendant Trump to "please wear a condom". Defendant Trump responded by violently striking Plaintiff Johnson in the face with his open hand and screaming that "he would do whatever he wanted" as he refused to wear protection. After achieving sexual orgasm, the Defendant, Donald J. Trump put his suit back on and when the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, in tears asked Defendant Trump what would happen if he had impregnated her, Defendant Trump grabbed his wallet and threw some money at her and screamed that she should use the money "to get a fucking abortion".

13. On the first occasion involving the Defendant, Jeffrey E. Epstein, the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, was forced to disrobe into her bra and panties and to give a full body massage to Defendant Epstein while he was completely naked. During the massage, Defendant Epstein physically forced Plaintiff Johnson to touch his erect penis with her bare hands and to clean up his ejaculated semen after he achieved sexual orgasm.

14. On the second occasion involving the Defendant, Jeffrey Epstein, the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson was again forced to disrobe into her bra and panties while giving Defendant Epstein a full body massage while he was completely naked. The Defendant, Donald J. Trump, was also present as he was getting his own massage from another minor, Jane Doe, age 13. Defendant Epstein forced Plaintiff Johnson to touch his erect penis by physically placing her bare hands upon his sex organ and again forced Plaintiff Johnson to clean up his ejaculated semen after he achieved sexual orgasm.

15. Shortly after this sexual assault by the Defendant, Jeffrey E. Epstein, on the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, Plaintiff Johnson was still present while the two Defendants were arguing over who would be the one to take Plaintiff Johnson's virginity. The Defendant, Donald J. Trump, was clearly heard referring to Defendant, Jeffrey E. Epstein, as a "Jew Bastard" as he yelled at Defendant Epstein, that clearly, he, Defendant Trump, should be the lucky one to "pop the cherry" of Plaintiff Johnson.

16. The third and final sexual assault by the Defendant, Jeffrey E. Epstein, on the Plaintiff, Kati Johnson, took place after Plaintiff Johnson had been brutally and savagely raped by Defendant Trump. While receiving another full body massage from Plaintiff Johnson, while in the nude, Defendant Epstein became so enraged after finding out that Defendant Trump had been the one to take Plaintiff Johnson's virginity, that Defendant Epstein also violently raped Plaintiff Johnson. After forcing Plaintiff Johnson to disrobe into her bra and panties, while receiving a massage from the Plaintiff, Defendant Epstein attempted to enter Plaintiff Johnson's anal cavity with his erect penis while trying to restrain her. Plaintiff Johnson attempted to push Defendant Epstein away, at which time Defendant Epstein attempted to enter Plaintiff Johnson's vagina with his erect penis. This attempt to brutally sodomize and rape Plaintiff Johnson by Defendant Epstein was finally repelled by Plaintiff Johnson but not before Defendant Epstein was able to achieve sexual orgasm. After perversely sodomizing and raping the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, the Defendant, Jeffrey E. Epstein, attempted to strike her about the head with his closed fists while he angrily screamed at Plaintiff Johnson that he, Defendant Epstein, should have been the one who "took her cherry, not Mr. Trump", before she finally managed to break away from Defendant Epstein.

17. The Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, was fully warned on more than one occasion by both Defendants, Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey E. Epstein, that were she ever to reveal any of the details of the sexual and physical abuse that she had suffered as a sex slave for Defendant Trump and Defendant Epstein, that Plaintiff Johnson and her family would be in mortal danger. Plaintiff Johnson was warned that this would mean certain death for herself and Plaintiff Johnson's family unless she remained silent forever on the exact details of the depraved and perverted sexual and physical abuse she had been forced to endure from the Defendants.

MATERIAL WITNESSES

18. Tiffany Doe, a former trusted employee of the Defendant, Jeffrey E. Epstein, has agreed to provide sworn testimony in this civil case and any other future civil or criminal proceedings, fully verifying the authenticity of the claims of the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson. Witness Tiffany Doe was employed by the Defendant, Jeffrey E. Epstein, for more than 10 years as a party planner for his underage sex parties. Despite being subject to constant terroristic threats by Defendants Epstein and Trump to never reveal the details of these underage sex parties at which scores of teenagers, and pre-teen girls were used as sex slaves by Defendant Epstein and Defendant Trump, witness Tiffany Doe refuses to be silent any longer. She has agreed to fully reveal the extent of the sexual perversion and physical cruelty that she personally witnessed at these parties by Defendants Epstein and Trump.

19. Material witness Tiffany Doe fully confirms all of Plaintiff Katie Johnson's allegations of physical and sexual abuse by Defendants Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey E. Epstein. Tiffany Doe was physically present at each of the four occasions of sexual abuse by Defendant Trump upon the person of Plaintiff Johnson, as it was her job to witness all of the sexual escapades of Defendant Epstein's guests at these underage sex parties and later reveal all of the sordid details directly to Defendant Epstein. Defendant Epstein also demanded that Tiffany Doe tell him personally everything she had overheard at these parties explaining to her that "knowledge was king" in the financial world. As a result of these underage sex parties, Defendant Epstein was able to accumulate inside business knowledge that he otherwise would never have been privy to in order to amass his huge personal fortune.

20. Material witness Tiffany Doe will testify that she was also present or had direct knowledge of each of the three instances on which Defendant Jeffrey E. Epstein physically and sexually abused the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson. Tiffany Doe will testify to the fact that the Plaintiff, Katie Johnson, was extremely fortunate to have survived all of the physical and sexual horrors inflicted upon her by Defendants Epstein and Trump.

-- KATIE JOHNSON, Plaintiff v. DONALD J. TRUMP and JEFFREY E. EPSTEIN, Defendant(s). COMPLAINT FOR CLAIM RELIEF DUE TO: 1. SEXUAL ABUSE UNDER THREAT OF HARM; 2. CONSPIRACY TO DEPRIVE CIVIL RIGHTS, Case Number: ED CV16-00797 DMG *(KSX), FILED: 2016 APR 26 AM 11:12

It was right around the time that Trump was being barraged with allegations from some other women who were claiming that he had committed some kind of sexual harassment or impropriety against them. So I thought, let me take a look at this. I was always curious anyway. So I started requesting the files while working on a million other stories, because as we do in local newspaper journalism, you don't have the luxury of just having one story and that's it. So anyway, I was picking away at it, and in the middle of when I was looking at it, Trump was elected president. And then he nominated Alexander Acosta to be his labor secretary. And that was "boom" for me, because I knew by that time that Alexander Acosta was the prosecutor in Miami who gave Epstein his sweetheart deal.

Yeah, tell us about the sweetheart deal, and the lawyers who made that deal, and how that worked involving Alex Acosta, who was then the US attorney, right?

After the allegations first came to light in 2005-2006, it was investigated by Palm Beach police. They took it to the state attorney in Palm Beach, Barry Krischer. Barry Krischer initially was gung-ho about going after Epstein, because he didn't know initially who Epstein was. So Epstein was trying to keep a lid on the whole thing. Epstein hired Alan Dershowitz, another local attorney, to pressure Krischer not to file charges. And he was on the verge of just letting the case drop, largely because Alan Dershowitz had convinced him that the young girls that Epstein had molested weren't credible, because they drank beer, and were having sex with their boyfriends. He kind of mined all their social media pages.

Yeah, I read in your book that you said that Dershowitz hired private investigators to look into the private lives of the victims, right?

And their families and their parents.

Their families, too. And what would the point of that be?

Intimidation. So, Dershowitz hired PIs to intimidate the victims. Intimidate the victim.

On behalf of his client?  

Yeah. And also it did intimidate them. They were scared. You know, when you're being followed like that, and you're young, and there was at least one instance that I know of where a big car was putting its headlights on one girl's house, and her lawyers had to grab her and take her to a hotel, put her in hiding, because she was being pursued so aggressively.

So, please continue.

So, Krischer got cold feet. But the Palm Beach police didn't want to let it go. So they kept trying to get him to do something. Eventually, he relented and opened a grand jury on the case. What we now know is that it was one of those kinds of grand jury sessions where you can indict someone on a ham sandwich. They didn't even call all the victims. They called one victim. And we subsequently have that grand jury testimony, and it's very painful to listen to, because they allowed the grand jurors to sort of ask her questions that were like, "Did you know what you were doing was wrong? Is that how your parents raised you" kind of thing. So they were prepared to give him an indictment on a lesser charge. And the Palm Beach police then took it to the FBI and said, "This is absurd. This is a serious crime. They're going to let this guy walk." And that's when the FBI took over around 2007, and started investigating.

Now, by this time, there were more victims coming forward. So initially there was only maybe five or six, and now there was almost two dozen, because one girl recruited another girl who recruited another girl. So if you interviewed the girl, she would say, "Well I recruited this one, this one, and this one." And then you go to those girls, and they say, "I recruited this one, this one, and this one." It was like a pyramid scheme he had going to get each girl to get more girls for him.

So, Ghislaine Maxwell's in the middle of this? And Ghislaine Maxwell is deeply involved in the recruiting process?

Well, initially she was the one that started this effort to recruit girls around Palm Beach. She would take Epstein's valet, and she would drive to spas in the area and find pretty girls at the spa, give them her business card, tell them, "I have a very wealthy man. He's looking for a personal masseuse. He's going to pay you very well. You'll be able to travel around the world," etc. So she started that, and as I said, once she got her foot in the door at some of these high schools, she was able to use the girls to bring her additional girls. So they were coming like three of them a day, at least, to his home in Palm Beach.

So the FBI took took over the case. But the prosecutor, Maria Villifana, was hitting a wall every step of the way. Epstein was very shrewd in how he handled his case in that each of his lawyers had a tie to one of the prosecutors on the case. Jay Lefkowitz for example, worked at Kirkland and Ellis um, and so did Alex Acosta. And Alex Acosta was very ambitious. He was a rising star in the Republican party at the time. So he was pressured by this lawyer who had enough influence to help appoint the new attorney general in 2007 or eight, Michael Mukasey. So he was ambitious. He didn't want to bend anybody out of shape. Epstein hired Kenneth Starr.

Ken Starr is also from Kirkland and Ellis, isn't he?

Absolutely.

And they're all federalist society people, aren't they?

Right. And Acosta wanted to be a Supreme Court justice. So imagine what would happen if he had prosecuted a client that they would have frowned upon, right? So they hired a woman, a defense attorney who had had a relationship with one of the attorneys, who had dated one of the attorneys. Epstein was shrewd. He hired people that had ties to big law firms and ties in Washington.

Yeah. My understanding is Acosta was a protege of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito.

Right. Right. He was very well connected.

So what I did that no one had really done before, was I was able to figure out a road map on how Epstein and his lawyers managed to pressure the prosecutors to give him a deal. I mean, he tried very hard to get off scot-free, but he wasn't able to do that. But ultimately, the one thing he was able to do was keep the deal secret. Because had the victims or their lawyers found out exactly what they were doing, they would have objected very publicly. So he was able to get the prosecutors to agree to seal the deal so that nobody knew what it was. And so when he appeared in court to plead guilty, nobody was doing this. It was Ken Starr, and he had a whole team of people. Lefkowitz was certainly involved. Dershowitz --

A very well-connected conservative attorney.

Right. So the deal came together and boom, it was done before anybody knew about it. He was serving time in the Palm Beach County Jail, which was not much of a a jail term because he was leaving every day to go to his office, and sometimes even his home in Palm Beach. Epstein completely manipulated the Palm Beach Sheriff's office to allow him to essentially leave all day long, and come back just to sleep there at night. In the meantime, he was at his office, and he hired all these Palm Beach sheriff's deputies, and paid them thousands and thousands of dollars to so-call "monitor him." They were calling him a client because he was paying them so well.

They were basically bribing them?

Yeah. And he was allowed visitors all day long, and some of them were women. And we now know that he was having sex with them in his office while he was supposed to be incarcerated. So he manipulated every aspect of his so-called punishment. By the time the victims filed a a motion with the judge to unseal the deal, by the time it was unsealed, Jeffrey Epstein was walking out of jail, and had already served his short jail term.  

Yeah. And then Alex Acosta, what happened to him? Didn't he go on to greater things later on?

He did become labor secretary, and then he had to resign. I think he's on Fox News sometimes now talking about the economy since he was labor secretary, but he had to resign because of the reopening due to my story.

What happened was my story came out in November of 2018, and it just really went viral. And some prosecutors in the Southern District of New York, the DOJ's office in New York, took the story that I wrote, showed it to the prosecutor and said, "We've got to do something about this. What can we do?" So he said, investigate. Find out if there's any victims here in New York, and look into it. So that's how it all started.

Yeah. The attorney general of Florida was Pam Bondi at the time. What was her --

She was not attorney general when the deal was struck, but there was a lot of information that came out subsequent to the deal. In other words, the victims filed a lawsuit claiming that the federal government violated their rights because you're supposed to, under the Crime Victim's Rights Act, inform victims when someone's reached a plea deal, or is appearing in court. And they didn't do any of that. They purposefully, deliberately concealed this from them. Now Bondi was a state official. The federal government concealed it from her. But Bondi certainly over the years knew that Epstein was a sexual predator. There was no arguing that. Even Epstein himself wouldn't call himself that. He didn't deny that he was doing this to young girls. So it wasn't like he was still saying he was innocent. He he always said he was involved with these girls. He just didn't know how young they were.

So as more victims over the years started suing him, there's all this discovery, and there were some stories written over the course of Bondi's tenure as attorney general. And this was a big case. It involved celebrities, former presidents. Bondi had to know about this information.

So as far as we know, she didn't do anything about it? She did nothing during this period?

No, I don't think so. Because the lawyers who represented the victims were begging authorities to look at what they had uncovered as part of the discovery in the civil lawsuits they had filed against Epstein.

One of the most interesting articles that I read of yours from this period was about your investigation of the model industry and Epstein, and overlap with Trump who had a major in interest in the model industry. And they had a mutual interest, right?

That came out as part of the discovery in one of the lawsuits. Brad Edwards, who represented a a number of victims, Epstein had a modeling company, and Brad Edwards deposed the accountant who worked for Epstein's modeling company. And in that deposition, she provided a lot of detail about what he was doing. And it's clear that he was using that modeling company as a cover, in part, for the sex trafficking that he was doing, because she was describing exactly what they would do. They would send the younger girls down to Epstein's place in Palm Beach. And she gave more detail than we had had before, including the fact that when Epstein formed his company, he said to her, I want it to be set up just like Donald Trump's modeling agency.

And that's in the record. She testified under oath that Epstein said that he wanted to model his modeling company that he would invest in on Trump's?

That's right. And so we don't know what that means. We can't say that means that Trump's modeling agency was trafficking, but we do know that in some respects Epstein's modeling company was used in part to recruit young girls from all over the world, and send them to events and parties where ostensibly they would be expected to have sex with some of the partygoers.

There are other parties that are described by other people who organized models with both Trump and Epstein present. There's one that was described where they're the only two guests for 25-some young models, Epstein and Trump. Jean luc brunel from Paris headed Epstein's company, and he was arrested for rape and for sexual assault, and hanged himself after Epstein's death. The two were business partners.

Yeah, they were business partners and close associates. Not only that, but Brunel was one of his top recruiters. And I'm not just talking models. I'm talking about girls and young women for sex. That's what he did. Because they would make these promises to these women when they met them, "we're going to get you into the modeling business. You're going to make lots and lots of money. I have a very wealthy person who has all these contacts, etc." And Epstein also had a lawyer working for him. The bookkeeper told us about this, or told Brad Edwards about this, he had lawyers that were helping the women from overseas get visas.

So it was very common at the time of HB1 visas, Trump's modeling agency depended upon those visas to bring over models mostly from Eastern Europe for --

It what was his specialty.  

So it's interesting, given Trump's current views on immigration, to say the least. But you're on the case here. You're exposing this as this is going on, bringing it up all again, reporting, right?

Yeah. Even after Epstein's death, I continue to report the trail of people that helped him, including members of the government of the US Virgin Islands. He employed the governor's wife there. He tossed around a lot of money to a lot of people. Remember, he was a convicted sex predator. So he was supposed to be monitored by the US Marshall Service. And he just wasn't monitored at all.

This is all around the island, Little St. James that he was doing this? Is that where they connected?

Right. And you know It's a remote island. You could only get there by boat or plane. So it was the perfect locale for him to have some of these sex parties, so to speak, or to entertain his clients, and offer them food, wine, and and a young girl if they wanted it.

So what's your view of Epstein's death? Was it a suicide or what? What's your view?  

I'm not convinced it was a suicide. I'm not saying it wasn't, but I am troubled by all the holes in the whole story. And quite frankly, the fact that the videotape that the Trump administration released to try to show that it was a suicide was not the video of his wing. It was of a another area of the jail. And unless they weren't told that, why would they use that? Unless it was a desperate move to try to quiet some of these loud voices who are questioning why Trump now is not releasing more information about the case.

You would think that they'd be careful given the atmosphere and the intense scrutiny, to make sure that whatever they put out would be accurate. And yet they put out this faulty, to say the least, false information. They did that before too when Bondi was saying, "Oh, I have this on my desk." She's telling the whole world on Fox News, "Oh, yeah, we have it. It's going to come out. We're going to release everything." And then she gives a binder of dated material to internet influencers. And in the victim's eyes, this was a stunt. They've been thinking that maybe Trump's going to get to the bottom of it. And here, with each step that they have taken, the victims feel that this is becoming another cover-up really.

Although it's one of those cover-ups in plain sight, as we see. They do this stuff that's so clumsy, handing out things that we've known already. The whole thing with Todd Blanche going down to see Maxwell. I mean, come on, we're not stupid here. and yet they do it. And I'm not sure in my own mind, is it about arrogance? Is it about incompetence? Is it just that they think they can get away with murder, and they're going to show that they can get away with murder? I don't know.

I don't know. I've asked that question both on the interviews that I've done on television, and on social media. I don't understand the endgame here. What's the end game? Is the endgame going to be that they're going to give her a pardon, and she's going to say Trump had nothing to do with this? I know that his supporters sometimes believe everything he says, but I just don't think they're going to believe this.

So Pam Bondi said there was no client list of people who were blackmailed, but you never came across such an object ever. It seems to me that it was made up, wasn't it?

Yeah, it's a red herring that got sort of morphed by conspiracy theories. There was a phone directory that Maxwell compiled for him on a regular basis. Every time he met somebody new, she would get all his or her contact information, and so we had this thing that was referred to as the Epstein black book, which was really like a rolodex.

I've seen it online. It's got everyone in it, from Barbara Walters, to all sorts of prominent names from New York social life, that have nothing to do with anything except that Ghislaine Maxwell knew them, right?

Right. And somehow this morphed into people on social media saying, "Where's his list of clients?" Then that kind of took on a life of its own.

Now I do think that Epstein kept files on people. I absolutely think he did business with a lot of the men that have already been named as suspects. So it it makes sense that as a superb businessman, he probably kept files on these people. Now, whether that file included material about their sex life, we just don't know. But Virginia Giuffre, who was one of the most outspoken victims on this, and who was with him for quite a number of years, said that he would quiz her about a certain client's sexual predilections, and to her mind it was a way to have something on someone.

Epstein was friends with all sorts of prominent people. And he seemed to collect them. And among them was somebody who also had an interest in the modeling industry, and overlapped in the entertainment industry, who was a friend of Epstein's. That was Harvey Weinstein.  

Right. And he was also on the message pads. The Palm Beach Police Department did a search warrant on his home at the time he was first arrested, and these were the old-fashioned pink message pads where when someone called you, you'd write their name and why they're calling on the top copy and there was a copy right underneath. So they got these books of message pads, and Harvey Weinstein was one of those people that called him. Trump called him. There were a lot of names of people who would call him. Now, of course, they didn't say what they wanted. They just said, you know, Trump called, or Harvey called.

Yeah. There was a report that Epstein broke up with Weinstein because Epstein raped a young woman that Epstein regarded as his own, and somehow it involves Jean Luc Brunel, the guy who ran Epstein's model agency.

This raises another question. Why don't they talk to Harvey? Harvey might know something too?  

That's a very interesting question. Do you think Harvey Weinstein should be called as a witness by, or be approached by, Todd Blanche and the Justice Department?

I mean, he's a sex predator himself. So again, it's the same quandary involving someone who you have to ask the question of, "are they talking because they're really being honest, or because they want some kind of a deal?" So I think you have the same credibility issue with him. Although I feel like he might be able to provide information from a different vantage point, because he might not have been part of this Epstein sex trafficking operation, but maybe saw things? Do you know what I'm saying? I mean, I don't really know.

He was, despite what Donald Trump says to the contrary, friendly with Trump, who attended a number of -- it's been publicly reported, with photographs, that he and Melania attended Miramax film openings with Weinstein, and took photos with Weinstein. So they were friendly despite what Trump says. And we don't know what Weinstein might have to offer. I've seen a photograph of Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, and Guislaine Maxwell all dressed up at Prince Andrews, at Windsor Castle, at Prince Andrew's daughter's birthday party.

Yeah, I remember that. I just don't think that anyone wants those names to get out of the men who were very powerful and wealthy, who participated in sex with these girls and young women. They're very powerful people, and I don't think that even Trump wants those names to get out.

No, absolutely. I want to ask you about an incident that happened. I think your story is one of the great stories of modern American journalism.

Thank you. Thank you.

You deserve all the laurels, and you know, this story, which you've doggedly pursued on your own, has American politics in its grip right now, years later. And it goes to the heart of not only the crimes that were committed of sexual predation, but also of social power and political power. And yet, when you were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, someone wrote a letter urging the Pulitzer Prize committee not to give this award to you.

Right. Right. Alan Dershowitz, very publicly. He's put it on Twitter, so I'm not telling stories here.

Jeffrey Epstein's lawyer?

Yeah. Alan Dershowitz.

Not to mention Ken Starr, but that's another story.

I know now that there were a couple of journalists on the jury who didn't feel like what I did was much. Remember, by the time that they reviewed it, Epstein hadn't been arrested at that point. It was just after my series ran, so there was some feeling like, what's the big deal? Yeah.

Well, for a defense attorney to intervene in a journalism prize seems pretty extraordinary to me, and beyond the call of duty.  

Yeah. I mean, it is what it is.

And he has attempted to insert himself again, and claims that Ghislaine Maxwell is the Rosetta Stone, and before she was questioned by Todd Blanche, he raised her name.

Yeah. Well, she does know a lot. Ghislaine was on the ground level of this sex trafficking operation. In fact, some of the girl victims, or I should say survivors, that's what they want to be called, "the survivors," believe that she was a bigger monster than Epstein, because she was the one that made them feel safe. She was the one that brought them in. She used fraud by saying, "He's going to hire you. You're going to travel. You're going to be a masseuse." She acted like a motherly, nurturing type, you know, English lady with her English accent. And they took it as, "Wow, she's a really smart and kind lady." And she's who snared them. So in their mind and under the testimony that convicted her, some of these women were sexually molested by her. It wasn't that she just brought them to Epstein. She was involved with some of the sex. She would groom them, and tell them, "This is what you do to pleasure him."

I think with men who engage [DELETE] and hebephilia, it's more of a sickness that arises from their own abuse. Like my grandfather, my alleged grandfather, Walt's son, who worked for the CIA, allegedly faked his death to remove himself from my mother, because he was so sickened by what he could not control doing to her. Contrast that with my stepmother, who delighted in abusing me, and laughed at me when I was incapacitated by the drug they had me on, and made fun of me drooling on myself, being unable to speak. I think with her, and with Ghislaine, I'm certain they were abused as children themselves, but there's a different kind of psychopathy that grows within them where they get off on the power of it, and abetting in these acts to please their partners.

Now, Kari Epstein [her stepmother] was more sexually attracted to me than she was to her husband, Steven. But she did also do these things in order to stay in good graces with him. And that was more out of survival. Kari was a very broke cellist in her early adulthood with no familial support, whereas Ghislaine also comes from the aristocracy. She had access to her own funds independent of Jeffrey. So I can't speculate too much on what she gained from it besides psychopathic pleasure and sadism. A schaudenfraude of sorts. But I'm not a doctor. She was not a large presence in my life. That speculation on her personality is primarily based on what I know about my stepmother.  

-- Epstein's Niece [Ana Beth Epstein / Anna Petrova / Anya Wick] Exposes ALL From Bill Clinton to Cult of Baal Exclusive with Anya Wick, by Shaun Attwood

It would start out as a massage, then take off all your clothes, and it would be a little further each time. So she was grooming them for sex, and she participated in that.

Yeah, so I wonder if you're in touch at all with Maria Farmer?

With who?

Maria Farmer.

I've never interviewed her, even though I tried a couple of times, but initially she was suffering from cancer, and going through chemotherapy, and she just wasn't healthy enough. Then I had an interview scheduled with her. I was going to fly to Arkansas, and the night before I was scheduled to fly to interview her, Epstein was arrested. So I had to go to New York, and we never really were able to connect after that. I've never interviewed her.

And the connection to the relationship?

Well, Maria Farmer worked for Epstein. She was one of those women that got recruited, and worked for him, but in New York. And she is an artist, and Epstein was connected to a lot of important museum people, and people in the art world, and was telling her that he would help her with her paintings, and get people to look at them so she could sell them.

-- Inside power lobbyist, philanthropist and contemporary art collector Tony Podesta’s Kalorama home, by Laura Wainman, Washington Magazine, June 5, 2015

In any event, she has accused Epstein and Maxwell of trying to have sex with her. She rejected them, but she was there during this period of time when they were recruiting other people. So she had information. She saw some of this, and she went to do an interview with Vicky Ward, from Vanity Fair. And she told Vicky her story. She also went to the New York Police Department to report what was going on. They referred her to the FBI. The FBI did talk to her way back in the early 2000s, but they never did anything about it.

The time that is most memorable to me is the time when he hit on me because I was in the office. It was one of the first times I started working for Jeffrey. Donald Trump's a sleazebag. Okay. Yes. Um, it was when I started working for Epstein, and it was 9:00 at night. And Jeffrey Epstein's office was totally empty. I told the New York Times this, but of course they don't tell the whole thing, right? Even though Mike Baker is amazing, but they they would not allow him to tell the truth. So basically, I go into this office, it's 9:00 at night, and I sit down, and a few minutes later, and I'm wearing running clothes, okay, so it was really weird. It's 9:00 at night, and I'm wearing running clothes because I didn't have money. So I had to jog up there, right? And so I've just struggled, you know, for so long. So I'm like up there in the office seated, and I've got my running clothes on, so my legs are showing. And in walks this man that when I reported him to the FBI, I said that game show host Donald Trump, because I thought he was a game show host. He's so cheesy, you know. You know he walks in and I just kind of acknowledged him, like a head nod or something, and immediately he's seated across from me, I mean standing across the room from me, and I'm seated, and he's like oh Maria. Sorry, I was just looking at something. He's standing across the room, and he's looking at me, and I'm like oh gross. You know this guy's so gross. Anyway, he's just looking, glaring at my legs, like yum. I told my sister I felt like I was his dinner. or his lunch, you know? The way he was looking at me. So Epstein comes in and by the way, I did not look good. I was like not a pretty I'm not exceptionally beautiful or anything like that. These are just gross people, you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. So I'm just like a normal person who went on a run and I'm seated there. So he assumed I was there for him. And Epstein, this is how I know. Epstein walks up to him and goes, "No, no, she's not here for you." And they were smirking and Epstein whispered something. He goes, "Go in there." And so Trump, at 9:00 at night, goes in the other room. There's someone in there for him. Right. Right. I don't know who. But Epstein said, "No, no, no. She's not here for you."

-- Trump has SHOCK ADMISSION on Victims on AIR FORCE ONE, by Ben Meiselas, MeidasTouch, Jul 29, 2025

So she encountered Trump, didn't she?

That's what she just said recently, yes. You know, Trump and Epstein were friends. I don't know how you can deny that. They were friends. Maybe they had a falling out later, but at one point they were very close. They were friends. So it wouldn't surprise me that she encountered him. She encountered other people, too. So you have to understand that she feels that if the FBI had listened to her back then, and had truly investigated what was going on, it's possible that all these hundreds of women wouldn't have been raped, or molested, or abused, you know, in her mind. Now as we know now, the portion about her talking about Epstein, it was a profile, by the way. Vicky Ward was doing a profile of Epstein, and the editor decided to take out the part about Maria.

I remember this years ago. It was Graydon Carter who took that out, I think.

Right. So she was around Maxwell, she was in that orbit where she could see what Epstein was doing. And by the way, both Maxwell and Epstein molested her sister who was younger than her, who was a teenager. And then tried to ingratiate themselves with her. What they would do is they would buy things for these victims. These victims were being dazzled by Epstein, because they had so much money. You would go into his home in New York, and there are pictures of him with Bill Clinton, and other world leaders. He had tons of money. He had a big staff that was doing everything for him. So they were sort of in awe of him. And Maria and Annie in particular, wanted to go to college, and they came from a family that didn't have means. And he was promising them that he would put them through college, at least put Annie through college.

She tells the story that when Trump came in, Epstein said, "This one's not for you."

This is the first time I heard her talk about that. But, you know, with victim trauma like that, you don't always remember everything right away. Sometimes it comes back to you years later. It's funny how your brain, especially if you're a child that has been abused, or a young person, it does affect you. I talked to experts about this, and it does affect the way your brain works.

Yeah, you're still on the case. You're still reporting on this.

I am. Yes. Yeah.

So as the Trump administration and its Department of Justice is meeting with Ghislaine Maxwell and so forth, you're still out there.

Yeah, I'm still here, and I'm following tips, and getting lots of them every day, by the way. I'm getting a lot of people, which by the way, when I was doing my story, my original investigation, I couldn't even get a lawyer to comment for me on that case. I had so many problems trying to get a lawyer to talk to me about this deal, and how it worked, and just to comment on how unusual this deal was. And it really was a struggle. In some ways, finding a lawyer that was willing to comment on that case was harder than getting the victims to talk to me.

You know, people do listen to this podcast, we hope. And if any sources are listening, what would you say to them about coming to you?

Well, I've done this for a very long time. So I keep my sources confidential. And I don't think I would have been able to do a story like this if I didn't know how to handle sources, because a lot of what I found out was through sources. They would point me in the right directions. That's what I'm looking for. someone who's going to point me at something that maybe nobody noticed before, or saw before, or just something that will lead me to uncover more about how this man and this woman really were able to sexually abuse so many young women and girls over two decades. So I'll listen and investigate I guess.  

Well thank you Julie K. Brown, the indispensable journalist of the Miami Herald, who has uncovered the Jeffrey Epstein case, and is still on it, as well as indispensable. The unsinkable Julie Brown . Thank you so much, and this session of the court of history, on behalf of Sean Wilentz and myself, is now adjourned.

[admin]

Anonymous Releases Epstein's Latest Dark Bombshell About Trump
ANONYMOUS News
Aug 1, 2025 #anonymous #epstein #trump

Anonymous Releases Epstein's Latest Dark Bombshell About Trump



Transcript

Blessed be our new founding fathers.
Anonymous, a faceless collective known
for exposing the darkest secrets of the
world's most powerful, has just ambushed
the internet with an information bomb.

A new grim revelation about the
relationship between Jeffrey Epstein and
Donald Trump. And this time it is darker
than anything we could have imagined.
They declare, "You can delete files, but
you cannot delete the truth." And now we
have every detail we need. Nothing is
left out.

The story begins in the 1990s
when Trump and Epstein were still close
friends in America's elite circles. In
1993, Trump hosted a private party at
Mara Lago where there were only two men,
himself and Jeffrey Epstein. The rest
were more than 20 young girls. Parties
like this were not rare. They often
attended Victoria's Secret fashion shows
together. Everything carried a clear
sexual implication, a predatory
undertone. Trump was no stranger to
these behaviors. Then in the early
2000s, Trump suddenly cut off Epstein.
The official reason Trump gave while
speaking aboard Air Force One as
president of the United States was that
he had kicked Epstein out of Mara Lago
because Epstein was stealing my help.
Trump's exact words, he was stealing my
help. But take this literally. He was
talking about Epstein luring young
female staffers there into his sex
trafficking network. In other words,
Trump admitted he knew exactly what
Epstein was doing, and he knew it very
early on.

But everything truly shattered
in 2004. Jeffrey Epstein joined the
bidding for a luxurious Palm Beach
mansion priced at $36 million. He brought
Trump along to ask for advice about
where to put the swimming pool. But then
Trump turned on him quietly, outbidding
him at 40 million, and winning the house.
Epstein knew Trump didn't even have $40
million. He was very familiar with
Trump's patchy, fragile finances. So
where did that money come from? Epstein
was convinced it came from a Russian
oligarch, Dmitry Yevgenyevich Rybolovlev. And less
than 2 years later, Trump sold that same
mansion to Rybolovlev for 95 million. Yes,
95 million. A textbook case of money
laundering. And Epstein was furious.
Epstein began threatening to sue, to go
public, to tell the media that Trump was
merely a frontman for massive
international laundering deals. Trump
panicked. According to Epstein's own
words to journalist Michael Wolff,
Epstein was convinced that Trump was the
one who tipped off the police, and that
was the spark that triggered the chain
of investigations that led to Epstein's
downfall over the next 15 years. Michael
Wolff, the journalist and author who
conducted dozens of private interviews
with Epstein over many years, has
corroborated the entire story. He was
the one Epstein trusted to share these
secrets before his arrest. In an
interview with Meidas Touch, Wolff said
that Epstein was deeply unsettled after
he published his book Siege, in which he
revealed Trump's betrayal, and alleged
tip off to law enforcement. 3 weeks
after reading it, Epstein returned from
Paris to the United States, and was
arrested immediately at Teterboro Airport.
Coincidence? Or had the warrant
already been in place?

With Trump
pulling the trigger, the story doesn't
stop there. Michael Wolff recalls that in
one private meeting, Epstein pulled a
photo from his safe, which showed Donald
Trump with several young girls, and a
suspicious stain on his shirt. The girls
were laughing and pointing at the stain.
Epstein said it was one of his most
valuable pictures. Wolff believes that
photos like these were exactly what the
FBI found in Epstein's safe when they
raided his mansion after his arrest. To
this day, Trump's White House did
everything possible to block the release
of those materials, even threatening CBS
ABC, the Wall Street Journal, and Rupert
Murdoch, Fox News media mogul if they
mentioned the Trump Epstein connection.
But Murdoch is not easily intimidated,
and he has no love for Trump. This may
be a war of media titans, but for us,
the ones watching it, is a glimpse of
the truth being strangled daily. Then
Elon Musk appeared pouring gasoline on
the fire on his platform X. Musk wrote
that Trump's name really does appear in
Department of Justice files related to
Epstein. He even hinted that former
Attorney General Pam Bondi had once
confirmed it. Musk's tweets pressured
the DOJ to explain why more than 100,000
pages of documents were never made
public even though the case was
officially closed. Trump's allies from
Bondi to Kash Patel are now being
pressed about their role in delaying or
blocking Epstein records. And here is
the strange part. Why is Trump the only
political figure involved who has never
testified publicly? Bill Clinton, Prince
Andrew, even Bill Gates, all had to speak
up about their ties to Epstein.

It goes
deeper. Surveillance tapes from the jail
where Epstein supposedly killed himself
are under heavy suspicion. Experts say
the video data was tampered with, cut,
edited, and in some places replaced
months later, which raises the chilling
question, did Epstein really die the way
we were told? Even late night comedians
like Seth Meyers and Steven Colbert have
mocked Trump for endlessly deflecting
blame to everyone but himself. And Pam
Bondi, who once promised to reveal
everything, has now vanished.

Another
chilling piece in Epstein's 50th
birthday sketchbook. There is a drawing
of a naked woman signed with Trump's
messy scroll, and the note, "Happy
birthday. May every day be another
beautiful secret." A shiver down the
spine. Even in prior depositions,
Epstein refused to answer questions
about Trump by invoking the Fifth
Amendment. One lawyer asked, "Have you
ever hosted parties with Donald Trump
and underage girls?" Epstein stayed
silent. No denial, no confirmation, just
I plead the fifth. And Trump in 2003, he
wrote Epstein a letter calling him a
great friend, and praising the lovely
secrets we share together. Those letters
were found in a hidden drawer in
Manhattan. And while Trump's White House
tried to deny it, the FBI verified the
handwriting as Trump's. All of these
pieces have now been gathered, compiled,
and unleashed by anonymous in this
video. An information bomb. A complete
accusation. This is not just about
friendship, not just about financial
betrayal, but an entire network of
power, sex, blackmail, money laundering,
and suffocating silence. Trump knew.
Trump participated. Trump betrayed.
Trump covered it up. And now Trump is
using every ounce of his power to
suppress the truth. But here's the
thing. The truth cannot stay buried
forever. And if you are hearing this, I
urge you to share this video, hit like,
subscribe, speak out, and join us in
demanding release all Epstein files
right now for justice, for the truth,
and for the victims who deserve to be
heard.

*********************************

Trump and Epstein Feuded Over Mansion Russian Oligarch Bought, Says President’s Biographer. As Trump tries to deflect attention from Jeffery Epstein, author Michael Wolff, who has written about Trump and interviewed Epstein, reveals financial connections with a Russian oligarch.
by Stash Luczkiw
Kyiv Post
July 31, 2025, 3:44 pm
https://www.kyivpost.com/post/57315

In 2004, sex-trafficker Jeffery Epstein was looking to buy a mansion in Palm Beach, Florida, and asked his then-friend Donald Trump for advice about how to move the swimming pool, according to author Michael Wolff, who has written four books about the Trump presidency.

After Epstein showed Trump the house he was bidding on for $36 million, Trump went behind his back and bid $40 million for the property, says Wolff, who told Washington Monthly’s Jonathan Alter that he is sitting on 100 hours of recorded interviews with the late Jeffery Epstein.

According to Wolff, Epstein was “deeply involved” at the time with Trump’s “scattered finances” and understood that Trump “didn’t have $40 million to pay for this house.” If that were the case, then it must have been “someone else’s $40 million dollars.”

Wolff says that Epstein believed Trump was using the money of Russian billionaire oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, who eventually wound up buying that very mansion from Trump four years later, in 2008, for $95 million – more than double what Trump had paid.

Rybolovlev made his money through his former ownership of a large stake in Uralkali, a Russian fertilizer company.

Wolff has appeared on the MeidasTouch podcast as well as a host of other media outlets since MAGA cohorts have begun calling for the release of the FBI’s Epstein files. Wolff reveals conversations with Jeffery Epstein that contradict much of what Donald Trump has said about his relationship with sex offender who, according to police, hanged himself in a New York jail cell in 2019.

On the podcast, Wolff explains how Trump’s version of his fallout with Epstein is demonstrably false.

Trump claimed on Air Force One, while travelling back to the United States from the UK on Wednesday, that his disagreement with Epstein occurred because he was “stealing” workers from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club, specifically spa workers.

In response to a reporter’s question about whether one of the spa workers was Virginia Giuffre – who had accused Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell, of recruiting her to join their predatory ring – Trump said: “I think so… he stole her, and she had no complaints about us.”

Giuffre, who committed suicide in April 2025 while struggling with renal failure after a car accident, had also sued Prince Andrew for sexual assault.

[x]
A widely published photograph showed Prince Andrew with his hand around Ms. Giuffre’s waist. Ghislaine Maxwell, Mr. Epstein’s co-conspirator, stood at the right. Photo: AFP, via Us District Court — Southern District.

According to Wolff, after Epstein threatened to sue Trump for “fronting for someone else” in the purchase of the mansion, “Epstein believed Trump then informed the police in Palm Beach that he had a never-ending stream of underage girls in and out of his house there, and thus began his long years of legal peril.”

In his interview with Alter, Wolff also claims: “Epstein talked about how Trump liked to pick up girls, sleep with other men’s wives, liked black women, and at one point, they shared a girlfriend for almost a year.”

Conspiracy theorists – most prominent among them being Joe Rogan – have long cast doubt on the suicide explanation of Epstein’s death.

Longstanding connections with Russian mobsters

As a Manhattan real estate developer in the 1980s, Trump had no choice but to deal with the Italian mafia, which controlled the cement industry and labor unions, and would systematically extort real estate developers.

Thanks to Trump’s lawyer, Roy Cohen, who represented prominent mafiosi in the city, the future president was able to avoid many of the obstacles other real estate developers faced.

During that same period, Trump managed to solidify links with Russian organized crime, which had begun to make headway in New York City. In 1984, Russian mobster David Bogatin allegedly teamed up with Michael Franzese, a member of New York’s Colombo crime family to buy six condominiums in Trump Tower by laying $6 million in cash on the table.

In “American Kompromat,” a 2021 book by Craig Unger, former KGB officer Yuri Shvets claims that Trump had been recruited by Moscow in the 1980s.

“Donald Trump was cultivated as a Russian asset… and proved so willing to parrot anti-Western propaganda that there were celebrations in Moscow,” Shvets told the Guardian in 2021.

Shvets was a KGB major during the 1980s with cover job as a correspondent in Washington for the Soviet news agency TASS. He moved to the US permanently in 1993 and gained American citizenship.

In the book, which relies heavily on Shvets’ recollections, Unger describes how Trump first came to the Russians’ attention in 1977 when he married his first wife, Ivana Zelnickova, a Czech model. In 1979, once she married Donald Trump, already a notable American real estate mogul, Czech Secret Service spied on Ivana at home and abroad, and reportedly questioned her father about the couple after his trips to the United States. Trump became the target of a spying operation overseen by Czechoslovakia’s intelligence service in cooperation with the KGB.

Three years later, Trump opened his first big property development, the Grand Hyatt New York hotel near Grand Central Station. Trump bought 200 television sets for the hotel from Semyon Kislin, a Soviet émigré who co-owned Joy-Lud electronics on Fifth Avenue, near the hotel.

Shvets told the Guardian that Joy-Lud was controlled by the KGB and Kislin worked as a so-called “spotter agent” who identified Trump, a young businessman on the rise, as a potential asset. Kislin denied that he had a relationship with the KGB.

Then, in 1987, Trump and Ivana visited Moscow and St. Petersburg for the first time. Shvets said he was fed KGB talking points and flattered by KGB operatives who floated the idea that he should go into politics.

A 2017 Politico article by Luke Harding sustains that “according to files in Prague, declassified in 2016, Czech spies kept a close eye on the couple in Manhattan.”

Unger, however, has been quick to point out that the Trump recruitment process was almost fortuitous. “He was an asset,” Shvets said of Trump. “It was not this grand, ingenious plan that we’re going to develop this guy and 40 years later he’ll be president. At the time it started… the Russians were trying to recruit like crazy and going after dozens and dozens of people.”

Shvets noted that Trump was the perfect target: “His vanity, narcissism made him a natural target to recruit. He was cultivated over a 40-year period, right up through his election,” he said, referring to the 2016 election.

[admin]

Trump Biographer REVEALS Trump DEADLY FEAR from Past
MeidasTouch
Aug 1, 2025

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas introduces this exclusive report from Trump and Epstein biographer Michael Wolff about the torment Trump is going through right as he tells his friends he had nothing to do with the suspicious death.



Transcript

This is a Meidas Touch exclusive. You've
never heard these details before. They
come from Michael Wolf. Michael Wolf is
Donald Trump's former biographer.
Michael Wolf was also going to be
Epstein's biographer. Michael Wolf met
with Jeffrey Epstein multiple times,
spent hours and hours with Epstein,
heard things from Epstein that nobody
has heard before. So, Michael Wolf is
going to share these things with you.
Michael Wolf also has connections deep
inside the White House right now and
connections very close to Donald Trump.
Why? Because Wolf is Donald Trump's
former biographer. He's developed this
information. Now, Wolf has exclusive
details. Over the past 24 to 48 hours,
Donald Trump has apparently been calling
up close confidants to tell them, you
know, I didn't kill Epstein, right? You
know, it wasn't me who did that, right?
Do Do you know that? I want you to hear
it in Michael Wolf's words. what Trump
is allegedly saying to people that he
knows. But I also want you to hear from
Michael Wolf about other things that
Epstein told him that led to August of
2019 when eventually Epstein died.
Allegedly died by suicide. So this is
never before exclusive con never before
seen or heard exclusive content. What is
Donald Trump saying about how Epstein
died? Okay. Um, what did Epstein say to
Michael Wolf before his death?
Stunning words. I want you to watch now.
Hey, Michael, tell us uh give us this
exclusive info.
I had a conversation yesterday with
someone who speaks to Trump often, and
this person had spoken to Trump in the
last 48 hours. Now, a really
a really good way to understand what's
on Trump's mind is to track the
conversations that he has with this set
of people who he he calls often. Um, I
mean, I think my feeling has always been
that he uh that that that Trump needs to
think out loud and and uh calling this
list of people who he who he appears
appears to trust even though they might
call me afterwards.
uh is is a way really to say to think to
follow exactly what is on Trump's mind.
In this conversation that he had um
within the last last several days, he
said to this person, "People say I had
Epstein killed.
I didn't have Epstein killed," Trump
said. And then this person said,"Well,
do you think that he was killed?"
And Trump replied,
"A lot of people wanted him dead."
I find this,
to be honestly, a chilling conversation,
which I've
which I've been thinking about. Um, the
idea that the president of the United
States would have to say, even go out of
his way to say that he hadn't had
someone killed
seems chillingly
to imply that he could have had someone
killed,
you know, and there's a way that Trump
has often often spoken
about his belief that that
assassinations, both domestic and
foreign, have been carried out freely
carried out by the United States
government.
And then the idea that there are a whole
population of people who wanted Epstein
dead.
Um and and Trump Trump seems to include
rather include himself in in this and
and again it's that it's that sense and
sense on the part of Trump that he
believed Epstein knew too much.
And certainly in the case of in the case
of Trump,
Epstein could fill in a whole part of
the of the Trump background.
the um those early days, Trump's early
days in the real estate business in the
real estate business in in New York and
the real estate business in in New York
is filled with I a matter of fact I I
don't know how you're you can be in the
real estate business without having
direct connections to organized crime.
Um certainly that was that was one of
the things that Epstein talked about. Um
there are years in which the two of
these guys were just were pursuing
models, models, models, models. Uh doing
what what whatever they they could to
get these women this period in Trump's
life when there have where when there
have been accusations after accusations
by a whole lineup of of women. And then
this was the period in Trump's life of
his bankruptcies.
And Epstein had an had an interesting
view on on on this because
Trump was forgiven
personal loans that he had guaranteed
personally of about a billion dollars.
Now, when you're forgiven personal
loans, that immediately becomes income.
and Epstein would talk about his
involvement with Trump in hiding this
money from from the IRS.
What did Epstein know about Trump?
That's a a foundational question here.
And I spent a a lot of time thinking
about the ways in which Epstein
Epstein was a clear threat to Trump and
especially after he became the president
of the United States.
But I think it's also important to think
about
what kind of threat Trump was to
Epstein.
I know at one point when Epstein had
these would show me these pictures of
Trump
again it was a and I I described these
before but a set of about a dozen
Polaroid pictures three of which I
specifically remember
two with girls different girls sitting
on Trump's lap topless
and then if a third with a telltale
stain on the Trump on the front of
Trump's pants with um with
four or five girls pointing at this
topless girls pointing at him and
laughing and I I urged Trump I urged
Epstein I said I said these you should
release these these pictures um um I I
mean if for no other reason I mean and
Epstein was already in trouble and
already a a figure of of um um which
which uh which people were he was
already demonized. I said, you know,
maybe this will even even even help you.
You can be on the side of on the side of
right here. And um and I remember
Epstein said
again chilling at the time. He said, he
said,
"I may be a pervert, but I'm not crazy."
And then he said,
"Trump
is a man without any scruples."
A chill went up my back then.
And
I think this
I think this brings us to August 10th,
2019 in that jail cell. And obviously
obviously
all of the questions about what happened
that morning
are involved with why this story keeps
going.
And
the question, I think that the largest
largest question hovers over that is is
what did what did Donald Trump know
about what happened that that night?
And I think in all of the Epstein files,
that is the singular and pivotal
question we need answered.