[0:00]Rhode Island. >> Madame President, is the Senate presently in a quorum call? >> We are. >> May I ask unanimous consent that that quorum called be visiated? >> Without objection.
[0:11]>> Thank you, Madam President. It was the spring of 2019.
[0:25]public and media interest in special counsel Robert Mueller's report into Russia's election interference operation
[0:37]reached a fever pitch. There had been a steady drip drip drip of reporting on the Trump team's cozy
[0:48]and peculiar relationship with Russia. Since his surprise election victory in 2016,
[1:00]ahead of the Mueller reports release, Trump's Attorney General, Bill Barr, issued a letter to Congress purporting
[1:10]to summarize the report's findings. The letter declared that Russia and the Trump campaign did not collude to steal the election.
[1:21]The press, ravenous for any news of the longanticipated Mueller report's conclusion, largely accepted
[1:31]Attorney General Bar's narrow, carefully worded conclusion and not yet having access to the full report,
[1:42]blasted the attorney general's summary around the world. Trump himself declared all caps no collusion.
[1:52]He said he had been cleared of the Russia hoax, a term he reserves only to describe things that are true, like climate
[2:03]change. Frustrated, Mueller wrote to Bar that the attorney general's letter did not fully capture
[2:14]the context, nature, and substance of the investigation. But by the time the dense, voluminous Mueller report was issued the month
[2:25]after Bar's letter, its message had been obscured. The Mueller report actually concluded that the Trump campaign
[2:36]knew of and welcomed Russian interference and expected to benefit from it.
[2:47]That conclusion was later echoed and reinforced by an investigation led by then chairman Marco Rubio's
[2:58]Senate Intelligence Committee, a bipartisan report. But Bar's scheme had largely worked.
[3:09]Many in the media and in the Democratic Party seemed to internalize that the Russia speculation had perhaps gotten out of hand and that perhaps we had been
[3:19]wrong to believe there was a troubling connection between Trump and Russia after all. But were we?
[3:29]Let's take a look at a sampling of what Trump has done for Russia just lately.
[3:39]and usually at the expense of American interests. There are many, but here's a top 10.
[3:50]One, after Trump and Vice President Vance theatrically chastised the heroic Ukrainian President Zalinski in front of
[3:58]TV cameras in the Oval Office last year, Trump paused our weapons shipments to Ukraine.
[4:08]Two, in July, during the worst Russian bombing campaign of the war until that point, Trump paused an already funded weapons shipment for
[4:19]Ukraine, including the Patriot interceptors that protect civilians
[4:26]from Putin's savage attacks. Three. That same month, Trump's Treasury
[4:36]Department stopped imposing new sanctions and closing sanctions loopholes, effectively allowing dummy corporations
[4:47]to send funds, chips, and military equipment to Russia. Leaked phone calls. Four leaked phone
[4:59]calls show that White House envoy Steve Witkoff and Putin envoy Hil Ditrif have worked together closely behind the
[5:10]scenes on a peace deal favorable to Russia. Five. Last summer, Trump rolled out the
[5:20]presidential red carpet for the Russian dictator on American soil. with a summit in Alaska that yielded unsurprisingly
[5:32]no gains toward ending the war in Ukraine. Six. Trump's vice president traveled to the
[5:42]Munich Security Conference last year to parrot Russia's anti-western talking points pushed by right-wing groups that Putin
[5:52]has long funded and used to create political strife in Europe. Seven,
[6:03]Trump installed Russia apologist Tulsi Gabbard as his director of national intelligence,
[6:10]much to the glee of Russian state media. Eight. Upon the confirmation of Trump's
[6:19]Attorney General Pam Bondi, the Department of Justice shuttered its anti-letocracy work that had
[6:28]successfully targeted Putin's Russian oligarchs. Nine. Late last year, Trump unveiled a new
[6:39]so-called national security strategy which abandoned traditional alliances in Europe and favored a transactional foreign
[6:49]policy that the Kremlin praised as quote largely consistent with Moscow's
[6:59]vision and desires. and 10. The Trump administration is even paving the way for Russia's return to
[7:08]global sports competition, ending its isolation in those arenas in the wake of the hostile Ukraine invasion
[7:18]and statebacked systemic doping programs in Russia.
[7:26]That's a top 10, but the list goes on. If Trump were purposefully doing Russia's bidding,
[7:37]it is hard to see what he would be doing differently. It's the most powerful nation in the world.
[7:51]Russia is a weak, corrupt regime. My old friend, Senator John McCain, used to say that Russia is a gas station run
[8:02]by gangsters with an army. It doesn't make sense that the president of the United States
[8:14]who insists insists on being dominant in essentially every relationship is so submissive to one person
[8:30]and that one person is Russia's dictator Vladimir Putin.
[8:37]So, what is it about Trump and Russia? And could it have any connection with Trump's close friendship
[8:49]with the deceased pedophile Jeffrey Epstein? Much about Epstein remains unknown, but the survivors who have come forward
[9:05]and the millions of emails released through the bipartisan Epstein Files Transparency Act have shed some light on the operation
[9:16]of the late financiers global pedophile ring.
[9:23]and over and over it touches Russia. When recently asked by a reporter about
[9:32]the Epstein files, Trump said in part, "It's just a Russia Russia Russia hoax."
[9:42]Again, hoax, the word he uses for when something is true. But the most telling part is that
[9:51]Trump's mind asked about Epstein immediately went to Russia. Russia, Russia, Russia.
[10:02]I should start by pointing out that Epstein's ties to foreign intelligence may never be fully known.
[10:12]It's a murky world. He had links to officials in the United States, Russian and Israeli governments,
[10:24]and many others. But it's worth looking at those ties to Russia, a nation so hostile. Epstein's career began in the mid 1970s
[10:48]at the prestigious Dalton School in New York City, where despite dropping out of college, 21-year-old Jeffrey Epstein was given a position teaching high school
[10:58]mathematics to the children of some of New York's wealthiest families. Perhaps of note, the outgoing headmaster
[11:06]at the time of Epstein's hire was Donald Bar, the father of future attorney general Bill Bar and a former
[11:18]intelligence officer during World War II. The elder Bar was known for making unconventional hires at Dalton. After a couple of years, Epstein was
[11:29]able to leverage the elite connections he made at Dalton to a job at Wall Street investment bank Bear Sterns, where he rose quickly
[11:41]through the company. However, after getting caught fabricating his resume, using the company credit card on
[11:51]expensive gifts for his girlfriend, and ultimately providing privileged stock information to a girlfriend, among other unscrupulous behaviors, Epstein called
[12:02]it quits and started his own financial firm. Those early scams were just the start. Shortly thereafter, Epstein fell in with
[12:14]a wealthy man named Douglas Lease, a British defense contractor with connections in the arms industry and the British government. During this period,
[12:25]Epstein would tell people he was a bounty hunter who tracked down hidden money. According to Stephen Hoffenberg, a
[12:34]former business mentor of Epstein's who went to prison for a massive Ponzi scheme that he later said Epstein had designed.
[12:46]Lease introduced Epstein to Robert Maxwell. Gileain Maxwell, who became Epstein's
[12:57]girlfriend and sex trafficking accomplice after her father's death, was Robert Maxwell's favorite daughter,
[13:07]and he involved her deeply in his work. An opportunist in pursuit of wealth, the Czechoslovak born Robert Maxwell had
[13:19]complex shifting ties to British, Soviet, and Israeli intelligence. Initially bankrolled by MI6,
[13:30]he accepted secret payments from the KGB through his Soviet friendly publishing company and was the rare individual who
[13:39]traversed both sides of the Iron Curtain. In 1992, the British newspaper, The Sunday
[13:48]Express, wrote that a secret document, signed by the head of the KGB months before Maxwell's death at sea,
[13:59]showed that Maxwell was a political and intelligence asset for the Soviet Union. The newspaper claimed
[14:10]that the document indicated Soviet leadership had instructed the KGB to protect Maxwell's reputation and
[14:22]business activities. Maxwell's UK foreign office file released more than a decade after his
[14:31]death described him as, I'm quoting here, a thoroughly bad character and
[14:39]almost certainly financed by Russia. Journalist Vicky Ward wrote the following in Rolling Stone magazine in
[14:49]2021. She said, "Hoffenberg told me that Epstein had said he'd worked on several
[14:59]projects with Robert Maxwell, including solving Maxwell's debt issues." The word debt is in quotes.
[15:10]Maxwell died in 1991 under very strange circumstances, apparently having fallen off his yacht, the Lady Gileain, in the middle of the night.
[15:21]and it was discovered in the aftermath that he'd stolen hundreds of millions of dollars from the pensions of his employees. The story continued. Epstein had also
[15:34]told Hoffenberg that via Maxwell and lease he was involved in something that Hoffenberg described as national
[15:44]security issues which he says involved blackmail, influence trading, trading information at a level that is very
[15:54]serious and dangerous. The story concluded, "Four separate sources told me on the record that
[16:03]Epstein's dealings in the arms world in the 1980s had led him to work for multiple governments, including the Israelis."
[16:13]End quote. Epstein's strategies for making money and working intelligence contacts seem to have some similarities to Robert
[16:24]Maxwell. For the record, Epstein, a proflegate liar, once told Ward that he never met Robert
[16:35]Maxwell or Lee. At some point in the 1980s, Epstein struck up a friendship with a fellow
[16:45]brash New York businessman by the name of Donald Trump. Author Michael Wolf has said of Trump and Epstein,
[16:56]"They shared everything. They shared their airplanes. They shared women between them. They shared constantly business and financial
[17:08]advice." End quote. There are many photos of the two men together on the New York and Palm Beach
[17:17]party circuits throughout the 1990s. Trump now famously said in 2002, "I've
[17:27]known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy. He's a lot of fun to be with. It is even
[17:37]said that he likes beautiful women. as much as I do and many of them are on the younger
[17:46]side. Alan Dersowitz told the New York Times in 2019 that in those days if you didn't know Trump and you didn't know Epstein, you
[17:58]were a nobody. Dersowitz is the well-known lawyer who served both on Epstein's defense team when he was charged with having sex with
[18:09]minors back in 2006 and on Trump's impeachment defense team in 2020. The president of Trump's Atlantic City
[18:21]Trump Plaza Hotel in the late 1980s said he saw Trump and Epstein together so frequently that he believed Epstein was Trump's best friend.
[18:32]That same man described an incident where Trump brought Epstein and a 19-year-old girl to the casino gaming
[18:41]floor. Epstein once took a model to Trump Tower where she says Trump groped her while laughing with Epstein. She
[18:52]remarked that it seemed like a twisted game between the two men. One survivor says Epstein summoned her
[19:02]to his offices late one night. Trump soon arrived and according to the New York Times, she recalled feeling scared as Mr. Trump stared at her bare legs.
[19:13]Then Mr. Epste entered the room and she recalled him saying to Mr. Trump, "No, no, she's not here for you." After the men left the room, she said she overheard Trump commenting that he
[19:25]thought she was 16 years old. In 1992, Trump hosted a calendar girls competition at Mara Lago for dozens of
[19:36]young women. The event organizer was appalled to learn that Trump and Epstein would be the only men present. A private
[19:47]showing during during Maxwell's trial, one of Epstein's victims said he took
[19:57]her to meet Trump at Mara Lago when she was 14. Maxwell recruited 16-year-old Virginia Giuffre
[20:08]from the spa at Mara Lago. Giuffre was abused by Epstein and trafficked to other men in Epstein's orbit.
[20:19]Trump said in 2025, "I think Giuffre worked at the spa. He stole her." He being Epstein.
[20:30]In 1997, the UK tabloid The Daily Mirror, formerly owned by Robert Maxwell, claimed that Trump was dating a 20-year-old British model and that
[20:41]Gileain Maxwell had introduced them at a party. The tabloid notes Trump met the model at a party in Manhattan.
[20:53]Several American millionaires already had their eyes on the model, but she was there with Robert Maxwell's daughter, Gileain, who has introduced several of
[21:03]her attractive friends to the property developer Trump. According to the Mirror, after their meeting, Trump flew Madame Maxwell and
[21:14]the model south to the Sunshine State, where they enjoyed a happy weekend together. When they returned to New York, the model was installed in one of Donald's many apartments there.
[21:26]In an interview with BBC News Night, the model stated, "Gile Maxwell did introduce me to him, that is Trump, and she introduced me to him with a clear
[21:37]message of my being with him in the same way that she had trafficked me and brought me to Jeffrey Epstein." End quote. She also said, "I can only speak for
[21:49]myself and this in no this is in no way to negate any other experience that anyone else might have had with him. But at no time did President Trump behave
[21:58]with any impropriy with me." The same woman accused Epstein of sexually abusing her when she was a teenager
[22:08]in a 2019 interview with NBC. from NBC. I'm quoting, "The abuse spanned several
[22:17]years and loces. In addition to the estate on his private island, she said Epstein prayed on her at his homes in New York and Paris."
[22:28]According to Craig Unger's book, American Compromat, and I'm quoting here, Trump was often the center of Maxwell's attention. And women who
[22:38]entered Trump's orbit sometimes ended up being associated with both Trump and Epstein, spending part of their time living in a Trump Tower condo and part
[22:49]in Florida at Mara Lago or one of Epstein's homes. Among them was a Russian model and beauty pageant contestant
[23:00]whose journey from the world of beauty pageantss and modeling to Trump's Mara Lago and Epstein's Island Retreat is highly suggestive in terms of how
[23:12]Epstein and his associates began manipulating young women. The story continues. In the early 90s, before coming to the United States, the
[23:22]woman had placed well in a number of beauty pageantss, coming in second in Miss Russia 1993 and winning the 1994 Miss Baltic Sea
[23:33]title that year. In 1995, she left Moscow, spent six weeks learning English in St. Petersburg.
[23:44]That's St. Petersburg, Florida, not Russia, and was profiled in the Tampa Tribune as reigning Miss Russia.
[23:54]And before long, she met Donald Trump. Quoting here, notwithstanding the fact that Trump was still married to his second wife, Mara Maples, the woman moved into a 30th floor condo in Trump
[24:06]Tower on Fifth Avenue. there. According to an item in the New York Post, her lavish accommodations were taken care of courtesy of an unidentified sugar daddy.
[24:16]She spent time with both Trump and Epstein. Flight logs released by a federal judge in New York in 2019 showed that in February 1999, the woman, then
[24:27]27, flew on board Epstein's Gulfream, the so-called Lolita Express with Maxwell and Prince Andrew
[24:37]from Epstein's Little St. James, aka Pedophile Island, back to Florida." End quote. Trump has tried to distance himself from
[24:48]his former friend, the monstrous pedophile who was believed to have abused at least a thousand women and girls. It's worth taking a look at how the
[25:00]friendship between Trump and Epstein allegedly soured. There are varying accounts as to whether Trump ever banned Epstein from Mara Lago over his
[25:10]recruitment of spa workers from the resort. But we know the falling out was at least in part related to a bidding war between Trump and Epstein over a
[25:22]Palm Beach mansion in 2004. Trump won and purchased the property for $41.3 million.
[25:33]Just four years later and after modest renovations, Trump sold the mansion to billionaire Russian oligarch Dimmitri
[25:45]Rebolv for 95 million. At the time, it was reported to be to be the most expensive residential property
[25:56]sale in United States history. Pretty stellar investment for Mr. Trump. The oligarch, for his part, after paying
[26:06]the $95 million, never even moved in. Which brings us back to Russia.
[26:16]Epstein claimed to have given at least some insight on Trump to the Russians. Epstein met on many occasions with
[26:25]Vitali Churkin, Russia's representative to the United Nations from 2006 until Churkin's death in 2017.
[26:35]Epstein wrote in an email, "Cherin was great. He understood Trump after our conversations. It is not complex.
[26:45]He must be seen to get something. It's that simple." End quote. Epstein
[26:53]wrote in 2018 to Thorbjorn Jagland, a former prime minister of Norway who was then head of the Council of Europe.
[27:03]I'm quoting here. I think you might suggest to Putin that Lavro can get insight on talking to me.
[27:14]That appears to be a reference to Sergey Lavough, Russia's Minister of Foreign Affairs. The email was sent prior to the Helsinki
[27:25]summit between Trump and Putin. In another email to Jagland, Epstein wrote that he wanted to help
[27:34]Putin and Russia reinvent the financial system. A 2017 FBI report based on a
[27:44]confidential human source claims that Epstein was President Vladimir Putin's wealth manager. End quote.
[27:55]Epstein tried several times to meet with Putin, often via Jagland, although it is unclear if any such meeting took place.
[28:06]But Putin is named almost a thousand times in the latest trunch of Epstein file documents and there are almost
[28:16]10,000 references in the documents to Moscow. Epstein roped many Russian and East
[28:26]European girls and women into his trafficking operation. The New York Magazine profile of Epstein, published all the way back in
[28:35]2002 reads, "Indeed, at a party at Maxwell's house, her friends say, one is just as apt to
[28:44]see Russian ladies of the night as one is to see Prince Andrew." End quote.
[28:53]In Ward's 2003 profile of Epstein, a guest described a quote cocktail party thrown by Maxwell
[29:03]that Prince Andrew attended which was filled, she says, with young Russian models.
[29:12]In a 2010 email, Epstein suggested a young woman as a dinner companion to Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, the former
[29:23]prince, assuring him that she was, and I'm quoting here, Russian, beautiful, and trustworthy,"
[29:34]end quote. The Daily Beast recently reported on an alleged classified US intelligence document claiming that, and I'm quoting
[29:45]here, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor was drawn into Moscow's orbit thanks to his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein,
[29:55]which the Kremlin allegedly used as a route into the British establishment. In another 2010 email to a person whose
[30:06]name has been redacted, Epstein wrote, and I'm quoting here, "Tomorrow I'm organizing a dinner for
[30:16]some new Russian girls. See you at 10:00." He received an email from a redacted
[30:24]sender in 2012 that read, "I have two Russian girls for you to meet.
[30:31]121, another 24. A message left for Epstein by one of his employees in 2005 claims that French
[30:43]model scout Jeanluke Brunell had found a quote teacher who could give Epstein quote free lessons. Quote, he has a teacher for you to teach
[30:58]how to speak Russian. She is 2 * 8 years old, not blonde.
[31:10]End quote. Two times 8 years old. According to American compromat, in addition to whatever legitimate
[31:22]careers Brunell may have fostered as a model scout, he also allegedly hired scouters to identify, procure, and transport underage girls, many 15 years
[31:34]of age and under, hire them to give quote massages, and traffic them. Brunell was found hanged in his French
[31:45]jail cell in 2022 after being arrested on rape and sex trafficking charges. Bill Gates
[31:56]appears said he had affairs with two Russian women which Epstein later discovered. Somewhere along the way, Epstein struck
[32:07]up a relationship with Sergey Belakov, Russia's former deputy minister of economic development and a graduate of the FSB,
[32:19]Russia's intelligence academy. Epstein introduced him to contacts like Peter Theel, the tech billionaire, who would go on to give $10 million to the
[32:30]super PAC that helped elect now Vice President J. D. advance to the Senate in 2022. In 2015,
[32:39]Epstein warned Belellakov that, I'm quoting here, a Russian girl from Moscow is attempting to blackmail a group of powerful businessmen in New
[32:50]York. End quote. It was, Epstein said, quoting again, bad
[32:59]for business for everyone involved. Belellakov responded back with information about the woman who he said
[33:08]worked in the sex and escort business. The FSB Academy graduate said he would meet with someone who knows her. The following year, Belikov told Epstein
[33:23]that he a new position at the Russian Direct Investment Fund, the Russian sovereign wealth fund headed by current
[33:31]Putin envoy Kuriel Demitriov, the same guy who was caught in those friendly leaked phone calls with Steve
[33:42]Witkoff that I mentioned earlier. Masha Draova, a former spokesperson for Nashi, the
[33:51]pro- Kremlin Youth Movement, was in regular touch with Epstein in the last couple of years before his death in prison. She was ostensibly helping
[34:01]Epstein with his public relations. According to the Washington Post, she was quote the subject of the 2011
[34:11]documentary Putin's Kiss, whose title refers to a widely publicized awards ceremony in which she received a medal from Putin and spontaneously kissed him
[34:21]on the cheek." End quote. In a 2017 email, Draova asked Epstein to connect her with adequate
[34:32]Russian oligarchs. The Post reported in 2022 that her fundraising pitches highlighted her ties to wealthy Russians. Although Draova
[34:43]denied writing those emails and said she did not receive Russian funding, Epstein advised Draova as she launched her Silicon Valley venture capital firm and
[34:54]she introduced Epstein to the contacts she had made in the tech world. In one emailed interaction in 2017,
[35:04]Draova, after claiming to meet billionaire Jeff Bezos, tells Epstein she is quote trying to understand what she is not understanding about him end
[35:15]quote. Epstein writes back that Bezos is quote smart, funny, and visionary. He's a very nice person, probably mistyped, but obviously means probably the best in
[35:27]the valley among the bees. The files also indicate that Epstein had dealings with Oleg Derapasca, a Russian billionaire who the Treasury Department
[35:37]has identified as a money launderer for Vladimir Putin. Derapasca also cultivated a friendship with Peter Mandolen, a senior figure in Britain's
[35:48]Labor Party. It appears that Mandolson tried to use Derapasca's contacts to acquire a lastminute Russian visa for Epstein
[35:58]in 2010. Correspondence also shows Epstein's assistant trying to set up a meeting for Epstein and Derry Pasca in Moscow or
[36:09]Paris. There's also audio of Epstein advising then Israeli Prime Minister Ehoud Barak to have dinner with Putin to line up
[36:19]work after he leaves government. There is at least one itinerary for a lengthy trip across Russia and photos of
[36:29]Epstein and Guileain in what is believed to be Russia, including with people who appear to be Russian soldiers.
[36:38]Umar Jabbrilof, a former Russian senator who committed suicide in recent days, described Maxwell as a soulmate.
[36:50]Epstein had a series of Russian visas between 2011 and his death in 2019. Epstein's crimes left a long money
[37:01]trail, and that trail winds back to Russia. Ranking member of the finance committee Ron Weiden has doggedly sought the truth about Epstein's transactions
[37:12]with Russian banks and Eastern European entities. One suspicious activity report filed by JP Morgan Chase after Epstein's death
[37:24]shows that between 2003 and 2019, Epstein conducted $4,725 wire transactions
[37:35]totaling over $1 billion. And that's just one bank.
[37:44]Epstein used multiple banks. According to JP Morgan Chase, the wire activity was flagged for the suspicious
[37:55]activity report for being, and I quote, consistent with alleged sex trafficking of minors and for involving
[38:07]quote the high-risk jurisdiction of the Russian Federation end quote. CNN notes that two accounts, including
[38:18]in the suspicious activity report, were linked to now sanctioned Russian banks, Alphab Bank and Spie Bank.
[38:29]also named in the suspicious activity reports, Maxwell, associated entities like Brunell's MC2
[38:38]model management, and various women and girls. Let's go back to the journalist Vicky Ward.
[38:49]Sources who range from former arms dealers to former spies and also Hoffenberg suggest that Epstein who lacked any sort
[39:00]of moral compass decided to compromise influential people by recording them doing things they wouldn't want made public.
[39:12]And once he got out of jail in the last 10 years of his life, Epstein bragged to various people including journalists that he was advising a whole assortment
[39:22]of foreign leaders who included Vladimir Putin, Muhammad bin Ray, Muhammad bin Salman, various African dictators, Israel, the British, and of course the
[39:33]Americans. He also told several of the same people that he was making a fortune out of arms, drugs, and diamonds. the I'm still reading the same quote. He
[39:45]was known in the intelligence world as a hyperfixer, somebody who can go between different cultures and networks. Epstein was, of course, known for his
[39:56]parties, which he insisted on hosting in his various mansions where he could completely control the environment. Many of Epstein's victims have said they
[40:06]believe they were recorded. Virginia Giuffre wrote in her postumous memoir that Epstein had a huge library of videotapes
[40:17]and a room in his New York home where monitors displayed real time surveillance footage from his properties. quote, "He explicitly talked about using
[40:28]me and what I'd been forced to do with certain men as a form of blackmail so these men
[40:37]would owe him favors," she wrote. Another survivor said Epstein once walked her through his mansion, pointing out
[40:47]pinhole-sized cameras. He boasted that they were in every room. According to Epstein's emails, in 2014,
[40:58]he directed a staffer to procure hidden cameras which were installed in tissue boxes. The New York Times obtained photos of the interior of Epstein's New York
[41:10]mansion, which show a camera installed near the ceiling of the master bedroom and another along the molding of an adjoining room. The Times also spotted
[41:22]cameras near a suite of bathrooms on the same floor as Epstein's bedroom. When police searched his Palm Beach home
[41:30]in 2005, they quote located two covert paren hidden closed Paren cameras end quote. Both cameras were located inside
[41:42]clocks, one by a desk and the other in the garage. It's worth noting that Epstein often seemed to get tipped off in advance as to when the Palm Beach police would be
[41:53]dropping by. Epstein is said to have once told an ex-girlfriend, "I collect people. I own people. I can
[42:05]damage people." The disgraced financier Huffenberg allegedly claimed to the National Enquirer in a final account before his
[42:14]death that quote wherever Epstein was entertaining, he and Guilain were taping. That report was only released last
[42:25]summer as Hoffenberg had asked the Inquirer not to publish his comments until three years after his death.
[42:35]According to the Daily Beast, the former US attorney for the Southern District of Florida, Alex Acasta, is once said to have claimed Epstein quote belonged to
[42:46]intelligence and that the decision to let him off easy in 2008 was made above his pay grade.
[42:56]The prime minister of Poland, a country that has extensive experience with Russian intelligence operations, has opened an investigation
[43:08]into potential links between Epstein and Russian intelligence. Prime Minister Tusk said
[43:18]more and more leads, more and more information, and more and more commentary in the global press all relate to the suspicion
[43:29]that this unprecedented pedophilia scandal was co-organized by Russian intelligence services.
[43:40]According to alleged anonymous intelligence sources published in the British tabloid the Daily Mail last month, some believe, and I'm quoting
[43:49]here, Jeffrey Epstein was running the world's largest honey trap operation on behalf of the KGB
[43:59]when he procured women for his network of associates." End quote. I want to stress that we don't have
[44:09]answers here. Epstein was an ineterate liar and a criminal who often sought to exaggerate his own
[44:19]power and influence. And the Epstein files need to be viewed through that lens.
[44:28]He could have been working with an intelligence agency or several intelligence agencies. He could have just been what the
[44:39]Russians call a useful idiot. We may never know. What we do know is that a significant number of powerful
[44:50]men, our current president, some of his cabinet secretaries, tech billionaires like Elon Musk, Bill Gates and others
[45:01]were very mixed up with Epstein at different times and Epstein seems to have been very mixed up with Russia.
[45:12]We also know that there is a cover up a foot at the Department of Justice. The MAGA Department of Justice is trying to shield Trump from something in the
[45:23]Epstein files. We know that documents in the files about President Trump that should be released have not been released.
[45:35]The missing files, first discovered by independent journalist Roger Solenberger, are alleged to detail claims by an Epstein accuser who said she was also
[45:46]sexually assaulted by President Trump when she was a young teenager. One of the great forces that Washington
[45:55]runs on is normaly bias. It's often in the interest of the bureaucratic establishment to look skeptically towards outlandish or extreme stories
[46:06]because in most cases the truth is more ordinary than what may first appear. What I've done here today is lay out the
[46:15]facts as documented by the many brave survivors who have come forward at great personal risk
[46:24]as well as by the many journalists who have tried and continue to try to get to the truth.
[46:35]As a lawyer, I know that you can prove cases with circumstantial evidence. You don't always need the smoking gun.
[46:46]Here we have links with Russia, girls from Russia, money from Russia, people from Russia, deals and
[46:57]transactions with Russia, contacts with people with Russian intelligence, news reports, exploring contacts with Russia, and an
[47:09]official investigation from the government of Poland into an Epstein Russia connection. Sometimes
[47:23]with a little imagination, you have the chance to see what's right in front of your face. And Mr. President, I'd like to ask
[47:31]unanimous consent that um this document, which is a bibliography of all of the sources that I quoted from
[47:41]in this speech, to be made a part of the record and appended at the conclusion of my remarks. Without objection, then I yield the
[47:53]floor and note the absence of a quorum. Cler will call the role. This also works.