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Japan Times
5 hours ago
- Japan Times
Trump's distraction methods fall flat against Epstein uproar
U.S. President Donald Trump's super powers as a public figure have long included the ability to redirect, evade and deny. But the Republican's well-worn methods of changing the subject when a tough topic stings politically are not working as his White House fends off persistent unrest from his usually loyal base about convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his associates. Trump has scolded reporters, claimed ignorance and offered distractions in an effort to quash questions about Epstein and the suspicions still swirling around the disgraced financier's case years after his 2019 death in prison. The demand for answers has only grown. "For a president and an administration that's very good at controlling a narrative, this is one that's been harder," said Republican strategist Erin Maguire, a former Trump campaign spokeswoman. Unlike political crises that dogged Trump's first term, including two impeachments and a probe into alleged campaign collusion with Russia, the people propelling the push for more transparency on Epstein have largely been his supporters, not his political foes. Trump has fed his base with conspiracy theories for years, including the false claim that former President Barack Obama was not born in the United States. Trump's advisers fanned conspiracies about Epstein, too, only to declare them moot upon entering office. That has not gone over well with the president's right-leaning base, which has long believed the government was covering up Epstein's ties to the rich and powerful. "Donald Trump's been running a Ponzi scheme based on propaganda for the better part of a decade and it's finally catching up to him," said Geoff Duncan, a Republican former lieutenant governor of Georgia and Trump critic. "The far right element is just dug in. They're hell bent on getting this information out." The White House has dismissed reporting about Trump's ties to Epstein as "fake news," though it has acknowledged his name appears in documents related to the Epstein case. Trump and Epstein were friends for years before falling out. "The only people who can't seem to shake this story from their one-track minds are the media and Democrats," said White House spokesman Harrison Fields. Before leaving for a trip to Scotland on Friday, the president again urged people to turn their attention elsewhere. "People should really focus on how well the country is doing," Trump told reporters, lamenting that scrutiny was not being given to others in Epstein's orbit. "They don't talk about them, they talk about me. I have nothing to do with the guy." Trump in recent weeks has employed a typical diversion playbook. He chastised a reporter for asking about Epstein in the White House Cabinet Room. He claimed in the Oval Office that he was not paying close attention to the issue. And, with help from Tulsi Gabbard, his director of national intelligence, he explosively accused Obama of treason for how he treated intelligence in 2016 about Russian interference in the U.S. election. On Thursday, Trump took his distraction tour to the Federal Reserve, where he tussled with Chair Jerome Powell about construction costs and pressed for lower interest rates. That, said Republican strategist Brad Todd, was more effective than focusing on Obama in 2016, which voters had already litigated by putting Trump back in office. "The Tulsi Gabbard look backward, I think, is not the way for them to pivot," Todd said, noting that Trump's trip to the Fed highlighted the issue of economic affordability and taking on a Washington institution. "If I was him I'd go to the Fed every day until rates are cut." Democrats have seized on Trump's efforts to move on, sensing a political weakness for the president and divisions in the Republican Party that they can exploit while their own political stock is low in the wake of last year's drubbing at the polls. A Reuters/Ipsos poll this month showed most Americans think Trump's administration is hiding information about Epstein, creating an opportunity for Democrats to press. Trump's supporters and many Democrats are eager to see a release of government files related to Epstein and his case, which the Justice Department initially promised to deliver. "Yesterday was another example of the Trump folks trying to throw as much stuff against the wall to avoid the Epstein files," Mark Warner, a Democratic U.S. senator from Virginia, said in a post on X on Thursday about Gabbard's accusations against Obama. Trump allies see the administration's efforts to change topic as a normal part of an all-out-there strategy. "They are always going at 100 miles an hour. Every department, every Cabinet secretary, everybody is out there at full speed blanketing the area with news," Republican strategist Maguire said. Trump has weathered tougher periods before, and his conservative base, despite its frustration over the files, is largely pleased with Trump's work on immigration and the economy. In a July Reuters/Ipsos poll, 56% of Republican respondents favored the administration's immigration workplace raids, while 24% were opposed and 20% unsure. Pollster Frank Luntz noted that Trump had faced felony convictions and other criminal charges but still won re-election last year. "We've been in this very same situation several times before and he has escaped every time," Luntz said.

Japan Times
12 hours ago
- Japan Times
Top U.S. Justice Department official questions Epstein accomplice for second day
The U.S. Justice Department's deputy chief conducted a second day of questioning Friday with Ghislaine Maxwell, the imprisoned accomplice of late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, whose infamous case has created a political firestorm for President Donald Trump. Todd Blanche, who is also Trump's former personal attorney, has so far declined to say what he discussed with Maxwell in the highly unusual meetings between a convicted felon and a top DOJ official. Maxwell's lawyer, David Markus, said Friday afternoon that she was asked about "everything" and "answered every single question" during the second day of questioning at a courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida. "They asked about every single, every possible thing you could imagine," Markus told reporters outside the courtroom, without elaborating. But he did say there was "no offers" of clemency made to Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence on sex trafficking charges. Trump is looking to move past the Epstein scandal, which has seen him on rare unsure footing over claims his administration mishandled a review of the notorious case. On Friday, Trump again sought to put distance between himself and Epstein, the disgraced financier who died in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. "I have nothing to do with the guy," Trump, whose past friendship with Epstein has received much media attention this week, told reporters ahead of a visit to Scotland. Trump urged journalists to "focus" instead on Democratic Party figures like former President Bill Clinton and his treasury secretary, former Harvard President Larry Summers, whom the Republican claimed were "really close friends" of Epstein. Asked whether he was considering a pardon or commutation of Maxwell's 20-year prison sentence for sex trafficking, Trump said it was something "I haven't thought about" — but stressed he had the power to do so. He also denied multiple U.S. media reports that he was briefed in the spring by Attorney General Pam Bondi that his name appeared multiple times in the files related to the Epstein case. "No, I was never — never briefed, no," Trump said. Multimillionaire Epstein was accused of procuring underage girls for sex with his circle of wealthy, high-profile associates when he died by suicide in a New York jail cell. His death fueled conspiracy theories that he was murdered to stop him from testifying against prominent accomplices. Trump, who had promised his supporters revelations about the case, infuriated some after his administration announced in early July that it had not discovered any new elements warranting the release of additional documents. The Department of Justice and the FBI said there was no proof that there was a "list" of Epstein's clients, while affirming he died by suicide. Ahead of the second round of questioning, Markus told reporters "Ghislaine has been treated unfairly for over five years now" and described her as a "scapegoat." "Everything she says can be corroborated and she's telling the truth. She's got no reason to lie at this point and she's going to keep telling the truth," he added. Maxwell, the only former Epstein associate who has been convicted, was jailed in 2022 for grooming underage girls between 1994 and 2004 so that Epstein could sexually exploit them. Her lawyer said she still intended to appeal her conviction in the Supreme Court. The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that Trump's name was among hundreds found during a DOJ review of Epstein's case files, though there has not been evidence of wrongdoing. Trump filed a $10 billion defamation suit against the Journal last week after it reported that he had penned a sexually suggestive letter to Epstein for his 50th birthday in 2003. House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson cut short the legislative session this week, sending lawmakers home on summer recess a day early to avoid potentially combustible debate — particularly among Trump's Republicans — on the release of files.

Japan Times
12 hours ago
- Japan Times
U.S. diplomats asked if nonwhites qualify for Trump's South African refugee program
In early July, the top official at the U.S. Embassy in South Africa reached out to Washington asking for clarification on a contentious U.S. policy: could nonwhites apply for a refugee program geared toward white South Africans if they met other requirements? U.S. President Donald Trump's February executive order establishing the program specified that it was for "Afrikaners in South Africa who are victims of unjust racial discrimination," referring to an ethnic group descended mostly from Dutch settlers. In a diplomatic cable sent July 8, embassy Charge d'Affairs David Greene asked whether the embassy could process claims from other minority groups claiming race-based discrimination such as "colored" South Africans who speak Afrikaans. In South Africa the term colored refers to biracial people, a classification created by the apartheid regime still in use today. The answer came back days later in an email from Spencer Chretien, the highest-ranking official in the State Department's refugee and migration bureau, saying the program is intended for white people. Reuters was unable to independently verify the precise language in the email which was described to the news agency by three sources familiar with its contents. The State Department, responding to a request for comment on July 18, did not specifically comment on the email or the cable but described the scope of the policy as wider than the guidance in Chretien's email. The department said U.S. policy is to consider both Afrikaners and other racial minorities for resettlement, echoing guidance posted on its website in May saying that applicants "must be of Afrikaner ethnicity or be a member of a racial minority in South Africa." Chretien declined to comment through a State Department spokesperson. Greene did not respond to requests for comment. The internal back-and-forth between the embassy and the State Department — which hasn't been previously reported — illustrates the confusion in how to implement a policy designed to help white Afrikaners in a racially diverse country that includes biracial people who speak Afrikaans, as well as whites who speak English. So far the State Department has resettled 88 South Africans under the program, including the initial group of 59 who arrived in May. Another 15 are expected to arrive by the end of August, one of the sources said. Trump, a Republican who recaptured the White House pledging a wide-ranging immigration crackdown, placed an indefinite freeze on refugee admissions from around the world after taking office, saying the U.S. would only admit refugees who "can fully and appropriately assimilate." U.S. President Donald Trump meets South African leasder Cyril Ramaphosa in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington in May. | REUTERS Weeks later, he issued an executive order that called for the U.S. to resettle Afrikaners, describing them as victims of "violence against racially disfavored landowners," allegations that echoed far-right claims but which have been contested by South Africa's government. Since the executive order, U.S. diplomats working to implement the program have been deliberating internally about which racial groups could be considered eligible, one of the sources said. In the July 8 cable, Greene laid out a summary of the different ethnic and racial groups in the country before seeking guidance on eligibility. In addition to Afrikaners and biracial South Africans, Greene mentioned indigenous South Africans known as the Khoisan people. He said that members of the Jewish community had also expressed interest, but that in South Africa they are considered a religious minority and not a racial group. "In the absence of other guidance, [the U.S. embassy] intends to give consideration to well-founded claims of persecution based on race for other racial minorities," Greene wrote. At least one family identified as colored has already traveled to the U.S. as refugees, two people familiar with the matter said. The cable forced the administration to clarify its position on whether the policy is for whites only, and if it does include other aggrieved minorities, who would qualify, two of the people familiar with the matter said. Chretien, a conservative who wrote op-eds promoting the Heritage Foundation's "Project 2025" plan to overhaul the federal government, is the senior official at the State Department's Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. During the apartheid era, which ended with the first democratic elections in 1994, South Africa maintained a racially segregated society with separate schools, neighborhoods and public facilities for people classified as Black, colored, white or Asian. Blacks make up 81% of South Africa's population, according to 2022 census data. Colored South Africans make up 8%, and Indians 3%. Afrikaners and other white South Africans constitute 7% of the population but own three-quarters of the privately held land in the country. When asked about the program in May, Trump said he was not giving Afrikaners preferential treatment because they are white. "They happen to be white, but whether they are white or Black makes no difference to me," he said. In response to a request for comment, a White House official said the administration's policy reflected Trump's executive order. "We will prioritize refugee admissions for South African citizens, including Afrikaners and other racial minorities in South Africa, who have been targeted by the discriminatory laws of the South African government," the official said. The assertion that minority white South Africans face discrimination from the Black majority has spread in far-right circles for years and been echoed by white South African-born Elon Musk, a U.S. citizen who served as a top White House aide during the first four months of Trump's administration. The South African government has rejected the allegations of persecution and a "white genocide." There is no evidence to back up claims of widespread, race-based attacks in the country. During a combative Oval Office meeting with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa in May, Trump showed a printed image of a Reuters video taken in the Democratic Republic of Congo as part of what he falsely presented as evidence of mass killings of white South Africans. The South African Chamber of Commerce said earlier this year that 67,000 people were interested in the program.