MAGA Was Sold A False Promise About Epstein. Now Trump Faces A Reckoning.
For years, Trump’s allies claimed the Epstein Files would expose Democrats. Instead, Trump’s refusal to release them is exposing himself, and forcing MAGA to confront worldview-shattering truths.
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Donald Trump made a deal with the MAGA base. For a decade, he told them that there was an elite, corrupt cabal of powerful people deliberately making their lives worse, enriching themselves, and lying about what’s really going on while they cover up their own depraved conduct. Underneath all the “isms” and fear-mongering, a core of Trump’s message was a promise that he would “drain the swamp” of these corrupt figures, bring them to justice, and spread prosperity to his followers.
What we’ve seen over the past few weeks with the intensifying backlash over the Trump Administration’s mishandling of the Epstein Files is the seeds of a possible new MAGA realization: that Trump himself could be the corrupt elite he’s been warning about.
As a much better Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, once said, “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.”
President Trump’s allies spent years telling the MAGA base that there was an “Epstein Client List” within the Epstein Files that would incriminate Democrats. Vice President J.D. Vance called for these files to be released in 2024. President Trump himself said he would release them if he won. He won, and his administration didn’t deliver the goods. Now, he’s panicking and blaming Democrats for the scandal he himself fueled, insulting the intelligence of his voters.
Attorney General Pam Bondi also deserves some blame for how this played out. She hyped up an impending release of the Epstein Files with her binder stunt in February, which backfired after right-wing influencers called her out for failing to provide new details. She also continued to stoke false hope when she appeared to claim that the “Epstein Client List” was sitting on her desk in response to a question on Fox News.
After all that buildup, on July 6, the DOJ released a memo that proclaimed there is no Epstein client list and Epstein did, in fact, die by suicide. This was monumental, especially given that Trump’s own DOJ officials, like FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino, have themselves questioned Epstein’s cause of death.
This, understandably, sent MAGA into uproar. Trump sought to temper their anger, but he only made it worse, calling his own voters “weaklings” who are perpetuating a “hoax” created by the Democrats. He has since appeared to appease some of the MAGA influencers with a largely procedural request for a federal judge to release some grand jury testimony in the Epstein case. Also, there has been a rallying effect after the Wall Street Journal published an explosive article revealing an alleged birthday card Trump sent Epstein, where he allegedly claimed the two men “have certain things in common” and wished that “every day be another wonderful secret.”
Trump has since sued the Wall Street Journal over this story for $10 billion, and denied the authenticity of the card.
Trump may be able to rally some right-wing influencers against the media, a familiar political target, in the short term. But I remain unconvinced Trump will be able to fully spin this. Polling indicates deep divides among Republican voters, with sizable percentages opposing Trump’s handling of the Epstein Files.
Why are these divides occurring, and why does the scandal have so much staying power? Because this is the kind of scandal that shatters the MAGA worldview.
In order to break down how Trump fueled this, and why his base has such strong convictions about the Epstein Files, we have to break down how conspiratorial thinking about a secret cabal of pedophiles became a key component of MAGA ideology.
It’s important to note that the existence of Epstein Files and the depraved pedophilic sex trafficking crimes of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell are far from a conspiracy theory. And those who raise questions about the nature of Jeffrey Epstein’s death are hardly crazy for having those questions.
But the claims of a client list that will take down countless Democrats are unfounded, and ignore the existence of Republicans who have well-known friendships with Epstein - like Donald Trump.
But that’s what conspiracy theories do. They exploit a kernel of truth or a pre-existing suspicion and extrapolate it into a broader, baseless narrative.
So, back to the “deal” I mentioned at the top of this article. Trump has been spreading conspiracy theories about a cabal of corrupt elites for his entire political career.
To feed distrust of these elites among his base, Trump’s conspiracy theories have taken many different forms. First, it was lies about Barack Obama not really being born in America. Then, it was false claims of Hillary Clinton corruption that Trump rode into the White House in 2016. Then came the claims of a “deep state” that was working against him while he was in office, an excuse to explain away his failures. Then came QAnon, which became an all-encompassing far-right conspiracy theory during Trump’s first term about a cabal of pedophile elites that were trafficking children and harvesting substances from them to maintain youth and power.
QAnon in particular took on a life of its own, as Trump openly embraced and amplified the cultlike conspiracy theory. There was a lot of QAnon representation at the January 6 insurrection, which was a violent culmination of Trump’s democracy-eroding lie about the 2020 election.
Conspiracy theories can become impervious to facts and take on an almost religious framework where common belief in the lie ties the community together. This is what happened in QAnon, and among the other conspiratorial thinking that has linked the MAGA base together.
When it comes to Epstein, his pedophilia is very real, but the conspiracy theories about a list that would take down Trump’s Democratic enemies have yet to be substantiated by a single piece of evidence. And now, Trump is failing to deliver on that promise.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-AL), one of Trump’s most loyal supporters, sent a post on X that illustrates how MAGA is feeling betrayed on the deal they made with Trump:
“If you tell the base of people, who support you, of deep state treasonous crimes, election interference, blackmail, and rich powerful elite evil cabals, then you must take down every enemy of The People. If not. The base will turn and there’s no going back. Dangling bits of red meat no longer satisfies. They want the whole steak dinner and will accept nothing else.”
What we’re currently seeing is an implosion of right-wing conspiracism.
This is what happens when you elect “leaders” who sell conspiracy theories instead of solutions. MAGA needs to reckon with this.
Of course, Donald Trump could settle all of this by releasing the Epstein Files. But why isn’t he? More details about Trump’s long-lasting friendship with Jeffrey Epstein and the damaging allegations that could surface if those files were released might be responsible for Trump’s frantic effort to keep these files secret.
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