Epstein files: Is it about justice for victims, or just politics

Miami Herald

5 days ago

Editor's note: Welcome to Double Take, a regular conversation from opinion writers Melinda Henneberger and David Mastio tackling news with differing perspectives.
MELINDA: What infuriates me about Jeffrey Epstein has little to do with Donald Trump, MAGA or politics of any kind. The tragedy of Epstein and his fancy friends, whoever they were, is what they did to those girls, period. That is why it chaps me when people say oh, they're so bored with this whole thing. You know who is not bored, because their lives were stolen before they really even got started? His victims, some of whom were as young as 14.
We would know nothing about any of this without our brave McClatchy reporting colleague Julie K. Brown of The Miami Herald. And what she just said on a New York Times podcast with Ross Douthat that I highly recommend is that 'these girls' lives were essentially ruined, even if they had only gone to his house one time.'
So no, the ennui is not killing me the way it is some of you who keep telling us how over it you all are even as you also keep writing about it as if it were some joke. (Hey, let's do Gérard Depardieu next!) It is not, as you wrote in comparing it to a 'Seinfeld' episode, 'a scandal about nothing.' Now you can tell me how you didn't mean it that way.
DAVID: I'll give you two examples of what I mean by nothing.
First there is The Sunday New York Times magazine story with the headline 'An accuser's story.' First the accuser was in her 20s at the time of the wrongdoing she complained of, not 14. Until the time the last man dies, men are going to chase young women in their 20s. It is not a crime and we shouldn't make it one. This isn't even up to the standards of having oral sex with your intern in the Oval Office bathroom.
MELINDA: This is not about older men 'chasing' younger women. The story you reference begins this way: 'It was the summer of 1996 when Maria Farmer went to law enforcement to complain about Jeffrey Epstein. At the time, she said, she had been sexually assaulted by Mr. Epstein and his longtime partner, Ghislaine Maxwell. Ms. Farmer, then in her mid-20s, had also learned about a troubling encounter that her younger sister — then a teenager — had endured at Mr. Epstein's ranch in New Mexico. And she described facing threats from Mr. Epstein.'
These events, as described, absolutely are crimes. And why are you euphemizing what we know happened? This is a man who, according to Brown, molested hundreds of girls.
DAVID: That same accuser's story includes this 'to be sure' paragraph about what is in the Epstein files: 'The story of Ms. Farmer's efforts to call law enforcement attention to Mr. Epstein and his circle shows how the case files could contain material that is embarrassing or politically problematic to Mr. Trump, even if it is largely extraneous to Mr. Epstein's crimes and was never fully investigated or corroborated.' That seems to me to be a long-winded way of saying there is going to be a lot of nothing in the Epstein files.
MELINDA: You glean from this that there is nothing worth knowing in the files? Again, Brown is the expert, and here's what she wrote in The Miami Herald months ago:
'Sources also said that the files are voluminous. There are 22 files containing over 500 pages in the FBI vault, a portal on the FBI's website accessible to the public. The bulk of those 11,000-plus pages are heavily redacted, and Justice Department prosecutors have fought their release for years. … One critical source of evidence against Epstein was in the discovery for a Florida civil case brought by Epstein's victims against the FBI in 2008. That case spanned a decade and included tens of thousands of pages of material that sheds light on how federal prosecutors mishandled that early case. Not all the FBI documents connected to that case — or the federal criminal case — in Florida have been made public.'
DAVID: When Trump goes down in flames, it will not be because of allegations that may or may not be true and haven't been investigated.
If the Wall Street Journal story from last week at the center of Trump's new lawsuit against Rupert Murdoch is an example of the kind of revelations about Trump that we can expect, then, yeah, I stand by my description of it as nothing. A naughty picture? Seriously?
So what else did Julie Brown have to say to Ross Douthat?
MELINDA: You are looking at this primarily as a story about Trump, but I am not. And no one should ever go down in flames — especially hard on straw men, I think — based on uninvestigated allegations. What I say is, finish the investigation and find out who else was responsible.
Douthat asked Brown, 'Do you think it was just Epstein?'
'No, it wasn't,' she said. 'Because over the years a lot of women have come forward. … These women are scared to death.'
Another question from Douthat: 'So, from your perspective, then, it is likely that there are some set of men in the world who move through Epstein's mansion — Epstein's island and so on — who are guilty of essentially having girls trafficked to them and in part, having sex with minors.'
Here's her answer: 'That's correct.'
DAVID: That sure would be a scandal, but it would be Epstein's scandal and he's dead.
Anything going forward from here is going to have to be about Trump. And to get excited about what is supposedly in there, you have to believe that the Obama administration didn't leak it to save Hillary Clinton in 2016 and the Biden administration didn't release it in 2024 to save Kamala Harris. Not likely in my view.
MELINDA: Why does it have to be about Trump? Stop looking at this as a political story for a minute and you might see what I see. Which is a man who damaged who knows how many lives. He died in jail because the judge denied bond, and the judge denied bond because Epstein's victims feared for their safety.
Brown says they are still afraid now, and why would that be, if their only abuser is dead? I do not know the answer, but I want to. How about 'getting excited' — argh — about what more can be known just to see justice done? Run it all down and then we'll be done.
No, I do not think the Democratic Party is run by pedophiles. And no, I never understood why one wing of MAGA was ever counting on someone who had a long friendship with Epstein and many allegations of sexual misconduct going back decades to be the man who was going to break up the party. But that doesn't mean Trump is implicated, either. I just want justice for those girls, even if the one you read about was in her 20s.
Of course this story reminds me of one I covered for years, about former Kansas City, Kansas, detective Roger Golubski, who like Epstein was charged by the feds with sex trafficking. Golubski, too, acted with impunity for decades and then, on the morning he was supposed to show up for the first day of jury selection in his first federal trial, killed himself instead. No way did he act alone, either. I thought of him as a down-market Epstein a long time before the two of them chose the same way out. Two predators, two cowards, zero 'glee' from me.
DAVID: Justice is a rare and delicate thing among us tragically flawed humans. It is nice when we can get it, but expecting it in this life is the road to disappointment.
The main culprit died in jail. His main helper is in jail, too. That's pretty good for our flawed system. Often when we pursue perfect justice, what we get is worse. I don't think releasing a bunch of unvetted allegations gets us closer to justice especially if we protect the identities of those making the allegations as many of the efforts to release the Epstein files propose. Being able to face your accuser is among the things we've learned is necessary to get justice.
It is time to let God judge Epstein as he will all those who preyed on young women with him. We need to let it go.