New Epstein Emails Ignite a Political Firestorm as President Trump Pressures GOP to Shut Down Congressional Probe; Chaos: Trump, ‘Bubba,’ Russians, Dementia Claims

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Newly released emails from Jeffrey Epstein have reopened long-simmering questions about his ties to President Donald Trump, setting off a fierce political showdown on Capitol Hill and injecting new urgency into Democrats’ push to fully release the government’s sealed Epstein records.

The tranche of documents, disclosed Wednesday by House Democrats on the Oversight Committee, includes several previously unseen emails in which Epstein name-drops Trump in casual, matter-of-fact exchanges — at times suggesting familiarity, at others claiming insight into Trump’s behavior or mental state. The messages span from 2011 to 2018, weaving a complicated picture of a disgraced financier who remained plugged into elite political, diplomatic, and social circles even after his first sex-offense conviction.

Democrats: Emails raise questions about what Trump knew

Among the messages drawing the most attention is a brief but explosive 2017 email in which Epstein tells an associate that Trump had “spent hours at my house” with one of the girls connected to Epstein. Another message is even more direct, alleging Trump “knew about the girls.”

House Democrats say the emails reinforce the need for a full public accounting of the government’s Epstein files.

“The American people deserve clarity,” committee Democrats said as they released the documents, arguing that Trump’s name appears too frequently in Epstein’s correspondence to dismiss as coincidence.

The White House: A ‘smear campaign’

The Trump White House immediately denounced the release as political gamesmanship.

Calling the emails a “smear,” officials accused Democrats of selectively leaking documents while ignoring Epstein communications involving Democrats and other prominent figures.

Trump himself took a sharper tone online, claiming the disclosures were designed to “deflect” from the end of the government shutdown — and issuing a blunt warning to his own party:

“Only a very bad, or stupid, Republican would fall into that trap.”

Inside the emails: Thanksgiving guests, Russian diplomats, and private insults

While many Epstein emails are cryptic or typo-filled, several stand out for their direct references to Trump.

A 2017 Thanksgiving headcount

In one casual exchange with model-scouting executive Faith Kates, Epstein listed his apparent holiday guests:

“David fizel. hanson. trump.”

It is unclear whether Trump actually attended, or whether Epstein was exaggerating his proximity to powerful individuals — something he was known to do.

Epstein claimed he helped Russians ‘understand Trump’

In a 2018 exchange with European diplomat Thorbjorn Jagland, Epstein offered himself as an informal interpreter of Trump’s psychology for Russian officials, boasting that the late U.N. ambassador Vitaly Churkin “understood trump after our conversations.”

“I have met some very bad people,” Epstein wrote, “none as bad as trump.”

Epstein questioned Trump’s mental fitness

In several conversations, Epstein expressed scathing views of Trump’s personality and mental health — calling him “dangerous,” “f—- crazy,” and speculating about “early dementia.”

These messages contrast sharply with Trump’s public insistence that he barely knew Epstein and cut off contact long before Epstein’s 2019 imprisonment.

A viral email adds fuel: ‘Trump blowing Bubba’

One email from Epstein’s brother, Mark Epstein, went viral for an incendiary aside: a suggestion — framed as speculation — that Russian President Vladimir Putin might possess a compromising photo of “Trump blowing Bubba.”

“Bubba” is the long-standing nickname for Bill Clinton, who has also faced scrutiny for his association with Epstein.

Republicans on the Oversight Committee countered by releasing the entire 20,000-page document haul, accusing Democrats of “cherry-picking” emails to attack Trump while ignoring mentions of Democratic officials.

Both sides agree on one thing: the new emails are only the beginning.

If the discharge petition succeeds, Congress may soon be forced to decide whether the full web of Epstein’s associations — political, social, foreign, and otherwise — will finally see daylight.

Click HERE to view all of the released files.

FBI’s Dan Bongino Rages at GOP’s Thomas Massie Over Whistleblower Accusations

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FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino harangued Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) for speculating that President Donald Trump’s administration was trying to publicly out a whistleblower.

The Kentucky Republican posted a letter he had received from the FBI whistleblower’s attorney that said a Thursday morning meeting at the bureau’s Washington field office was intended to identify the individual who made a protected disclosure about the ongoing investigation into pipe bombs placed at the Democratic and Republican national headquarters on January 5, 2021.

“I received this troubling letter today from the attorney representing the most recent FBI whistleblower regarding the J6 pipe bomb investigation,” Massie posted. “Just a reminder to @FBIDirectorKash, in case this letter is warranted, federal law prevents retaliation against whistleblowers.”

Bongino fired back in a lengthy post on X, saying he had offered to brief the congressman over the phone but he did not answer.

“When I spoke with you [Wednesday] a little after 8am ET (screenshots attached), I offered you an in-person brief on our work,” Bongino posted on X. “We spoke for ten minutes. I called you back a bit after 7:30pm ET to again make that offer. You didn’t answer and have yet to call me back.”

(Read more from “FBI’s Dan Bongino Rages at GOP’s Thomas Massie Over Whistleblower Accusations” HERE)

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America: The Last Bulwark of Christianity as Western Faith Collapses

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America’s relationship with Christianity is entering a defining crossroads. A new Gallup poll released Thursday reveals that U.S. religiosity has fallen below 50% for the first time ever recorded, marking a dramatic shift in the nation’s spiritual identity even as the United States remains far more religious than nearly every other developed nation.

According to Gallup, only 49% of American adults now say religion is an important part of their daily lives. Less than a decade ago, the number stood at 66%. The 17-point plunge marks one of the steepest drops Gallup has ever recorded in a ten-year span—surpassed only by sharp declines in Turkey, Chile, Poland, Italy, and Greece, which saw drops in the 20-point range between 2013 and 2023.

Despite the rapid decline, Americans remain significantly more religious than most developed nations.

Gallup put the U.S. median religiosity at 51%, compared to just 36% across other OECD countries. Globally, religiosity stands at a striking 83%, emphasizing how far the West—especially Europe—has drifted from faith.

The U.S. does not neatly fit into any global category. It ranks “medium-high” in Christian identity but sits in the middle on religiosity, an unusual position among Western nations.

In 2024, 64% of Americans identified as Christian—similar to countries like the U.K., Germany, Finland, and Denmark. But unlike those nations, where Christianity is culturally symbolic at best, religion still plays a significantly larger role in the daily lives of Americans.

Several countries—including Italy, Argentina, Ireland, Poland, Chile, Slovakia, and Greece—report higher Christian identification than the U.S., yet maintain religiosity levels similar to America’s.

Meanwhile, nations such as Belgium, Sweden, Australia, the Netherlands, and Uruguay sit at least 10 points lower on both Christian identity and religiosity, cementing their secular shift.

In a surprising twist, even as the U.S. and Europe trend secular, Gallup reports that global religiosity has actually increased over the past five years, climbing to 83% in 2024—one point higher than when worldwide tracking began in 2008.

This rise is fueled by non-developed, majority-Christian nations including Zambia, Rwanda, Eswatini, Zimbabwe, and the Philippines, as well as deeply religious non-Christian countries like Pakistan, Palestine, Jordan, Gambia, Tunisia, and Nepal.

The world is getting more religious — while the West is losing its faith.

This contrast, Gallup notes, makes the United States “an outlier: less religious than much of the world, but still more devout than most of its economic peers.”

Research Team Seemingly Records Multiple UFOs, Claims FBI ‘Very Concerned’ After Conversation With Them

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Nightcrawler Research, a data-focused UFO investigation team, reports capturing footage of three unidentified flying objects (UFOs) in New York. In each case, the citizen journalists say the objects disrupted camera performance during recording. They further disclosed that their efforts have drawn attention from the FBI and other federal agencies.

During an interview with host Ross Coulthart on NewsNation’s “Reality Check,” Nightcrawler Research’s John Tedesco revealed that one of the UFO sightings they captured on video in New York took place July 5.

“This was an object that presented over the water. Initially, what we saw was something that, roughly about 600 feet from the surface off the Atlantic Ocean, we saw an object that was not very luminous, very, very low, low light, not really in the IR, some visible light was present, and we noticed that the light presented in the same basic area, the same area of the sky,” said Coulthart.

“Within a short period of time, that object disappeared, and we saw this, what looked like a sphere on the water, an extremely bright, luminous sphere.”

(Read more from “Research Team Seemingly Records Multiple UFOs, Claims FBI ‘Very Concerned’ After Conversation With Them” HERE)

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Zohran Mamdani Wants Social Workers Responding to 911 Calls — But Test Program Is Already Failing

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Mayor-elect Zohram Mamdani wants to deploy social workers instead of police officers to respond to 911 calls — but the controversial plan has already been operating in the Big Apple and is failing.

The early results of a program dubbed B-HEARD spells trouble for Mamdani’s proposed $1.1 billion Department of Community Safety (DCS), a signature imitative that his newly announced chief of staff and left-hand woman Elle Bisgaard-Church helped craft.

B-HEARD launched in 2021 as a pilot program and only operates in some city neighborhoods, but a bleak audit conducted in May by the city comptroller found it was limping — with a whopping 60% of calls deemed ineligible while more than 35% of eligible calls from mental health professionals never got a response.

“Calls were considered potentially dangerous, were ineligible because a mental health professional was already at the scene, or were unable to be triaged because FDNY EMS did not take the call or all necessary information could not be collected about the person in distress,” the comptroller’s office wrote in a news release at the time.

Between fiscal years 2022 and 2024, the program received a total of 96,291 calls — 24,071 of those received a response from a “B-HEARD Team” which consists of two FDNY officers and EMTS, and one social worker. (Read more from “Zohran Mamdani Wants Social Workers Responding to 911 Calls — But Test Program Is Already Failing” HERE)

Bombshell Federal Audit: Gavin Newsom’s California Illegally Issued 17K Driver’s Licenses to Dangerous Foreign Truck Drivers

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A bombshell audit from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy reveals that California, under the direction of Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), illegally issued thousands of Commercial Driver’s Licenses (CDLs) to dangerous foreign truck drivers. Duffy said the CDLs are now being revoked.

This week, Duffy’s Department of Transportation (DOT) announced that the California Department of Motor Vehicles admitted to illegally issuing 17,000 CDLs to foreign truck drivers, who DOT officials said are dangerous and unqualified to drive semi-trucks.

“After weeks of claiming they did nothing wrong, Gavin Newsom and California have been caught red-handed,” Duffy said in a statement:

Now that we’ve exposed their lies, 17,000 illegally issued trucking licenses are being revoked. This is just the tip of the iceberg. My team will continue to force California to prove they have removed every illegal immigrant from behind the wheel of semitrucks and school buses.

Duffy said that the 17,000 foreign truck drivers who were issued CDLs by California have now been notified that their licenses do not meet federal requirements and will expire in 60 days. (Read more from “Bombshell Federal Audit: Gavin Newsom’s California Illegally Issued 17K Driver’s Licenses to Dangerous Foreign Truck Drivers” HERE)

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Elon Musk Plans to End Prisons by Having His Robots Follow Crooks and Stop Them from ‘Doing Crime’

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Tesla CEO and notorious hypemaster Elon Musk has suggested a new use for the company’s Optimus humanoid robots — having them track and surveil former criminals to prevent them from reoffending. Musk plans to end prisons in favor of a “more humane form of containment of future crime.”

Futurism reports that at a recent Tesla shareholder meeting, Elon Musk unveiled his latest unconventional idea: using the company’s Optimus robots to monitor criminals and intervene if they attempt to commit new crimes. Musk framed this as a “more humane form of containment of future crime” compared to the current prison system.

“You don’t have to put people in prisons and stuff,” Musk said. “If somebody’s committed crime, you now get a free Optimus and it’s just gonna follow you around and stop you from doing crime. But other than that you get to do anything. It’s just gonna stop you from committing crime, that’s really it.”

The proposal immediately generated controversy and raised numerous ethical and practical questions. Musk provided few details on how exactly the robots, which are still in early development, would be able to identify and prevent criminal acts. There are also significant concerns around privacy, surveillance, and the societal implications of having for-profit robots integrated into the criminal justice system.

“This shows a complete lack of understanding of criminology, the justice system, and frankly, basic human rights,” said Michael Johnson, a legal expert at the Brookings Institution. “The idea that a robot can somehow rehabilitate offenders better than comprehensive support programs is absurd. It comes across as a dystopian surveillance scheme more than anything else.” (Read more from “Elon Musk Plans to End Prisons by Having His Robots Follow Crooks and Stop Them from ‘Doing Crime’” HERE)

Epstein Emails Released by House Democrats Allege Trump ‘Knew About the Girls’

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Newly released emails from convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein appear to claim that President Donald Trump was aware of Epstein’s relationships with underage girls, according to documents made public Wednesday by House Democrats.

The three emails — part of a 20,000-page tranche of Epstein estate records — were shared by Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, revealing previously unseen correspondence between Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, and author Michael Wolff.

In one 2011 message to Maxwell, Epstein wrote, “That dog that hasn’t barked is Trump… [victim] spent hours at my house with him… he has never once been mentioned.”

Another email from 2019 to Wolff reads, “[Victim] Mar-a-Lago. [REDACTED]. Trump said he asked me to resign, never a member ever. Of course he knew about the girls as he asked Ghislaine to stop.”

Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the Oversight panel, said the emails raise urgent questions about what Trump and his administration knew — and when.

“The more Donald Trump tries to cover up the Epstein files, the more we uncover,” Garcia said in a statement. “These latest emails raise glaring questions about what else the White House is hiding. The Department of Justice must release the Epstein files to the public immediately.”

Democrats have been pushing for the DOJ to fully declassify Epstein-related materials, a move that could gain traction as the House prepares to vote to reopen the government. Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva (D-Ariz.) is expected to be sworn in Wednesday, providing the final signature needed to force floor action on the bill compelling the DOJ to release all Epstein documents.

The White House condemned Democrats’ release of the emails as “selective and misleading,” defending Trump’s past actions toward Epstein.

“The Democrats selectively leaked emails to the liberal media to create a fake narrative to smear President Trump,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said. “President Trump kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club decades ago for being a creep to his female employees, including Virginia Giuffre.”

Leavitt noted that the victim referenced in the emails — whose name Democrats redacted — was Virginia Giuffre, the former Mar-a-Lago employee and one of Epstein’s most vocal accusers, who died by suicide earlier this year.

“Giuffre repeatedly said President Trump was not involved in any wrongdoing whatsoever,” Leavitt added. “These stories are nothing more than bad-faith efforts to distract from President Trump’s accomplishments and the government reopening.”

Giuffre’s family criticized Trump earlier this year after he claimed Epstein had “stolen” her from Mar-a-Lago.

“It was shocking to hear President Trump invoke our sister and say that he was aware that Virginia had been ‘stolen,’” her family said. “It makes us ask if he was aware of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal actions.”

Epstein’s correspondence with Wolff shows a calculated attempt to use Trump’s public image to his advantage. In one message, Wolff suggested that if Trump denied their relationship, Epstein could gain “political currency.”

“If he says he hasn’t been on the plane or to the house, that gives you valuable PR and political currency,” Wolff wrote. “If it looks like he could win, you could save him, generating a debt.”

In a separate controversy earlier this year, Trump sued The Wall Street Journal for defamation after it published a story revealing a 2003 birthday note he allegedly wrote to Epstein. The note — later verified by the Oversight Committee — referred to a “wonderful secret” and said the two men “have certain things in common.”

The email release comes just days after House Judiciary Democrats revealed whistleblower claims that Ghislaine Maxwell is receiving “concierge-style treatment” in a Texas federal prison while preparing to seek a commutation of her sentence from Trump.

According to those reports, Maxwell has access to staff-only areas, private workouts, and custom meal deliveries — privileges that critics say highlight her ongoing influence and connections.

Treasury Secretary Hints at Income Limit on Trump’s $2,000 Tariff Checks

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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Wednesday that the Trump administration is considering setting an income cap for President Trump’s proposed $2,000 “tariff dividend,” potentially restricting the benefit to families earning less than $100,000 a year.

“Well, there are a lot of options here — the president’s talking about a $2,000 rebate, and that would be for families making less than, say, $100,000,” Bessent said during an appearance on Fox & Friends. When pressed on whether a final decision had been made, he clarified, “We haven’t. It’s in discussion.”
The proposal follows a turbulent week for the administration, coming days after Trump defended his use of “reciprocal” tariffs before the Supreme Court. The president first floated the idea of a $2,000 dividend last week but offered few details on how it would be funded or distributed.

Bessent later elaborated on ABC’s This Week, suggesting that the payments could take various forms — including tax relief. “It could be just the tax decreases that we are seeing,” he said, referencing provisions in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the sweeping economic package Trump signed into law earlier this year.

According to Bessent, the administration’s broader tax strategy — which eliminates taxes on tips, overtime pay, and Social Security income — has already begun delivering “big refunds” for working families. He also highlighted a lesser-known feature of the same law: the creation of “Trump accounts” for children under 18. Between 2025 and 2028, the federal government will open accounts for minors and deposit a one-time $1,000 contribution for each.

Trump teased the idea of a $2,000 dividend again on social media Sunday, writing that “a dividend of at least $2000 a person (not including high income people!) will be paid to everyone.” But analysts and lawmakers remain skeptical about the feasibility of such a payout.

Any large-scale direct payment program would require congressional approval, and even some Republicans have expressed concerns about the cost. “It’ll never pass,” Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) said in July. “We have a $37 trillion debt.”

Revenue from Trump’s tariffs, enacted under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), has totaled roughly $90 billion since their implementation, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. That figure pales in comparison to the hundreds of billions needed to fund a nationwide $2,000 dividend.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget previously estimated that a similar COVID-era proposal for $2,000 stimulus checks would cost about $464 billion. Even with an income cap of $100,000, the payments would still likely carry a price tag of around $300 billion, according to Erica York, vice president of federal tax policy at the Tax Foundation.

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House Votes to End Unprecedented Government Shutdown After 43 Days, Sending Funding Bill to Trump’s Desk

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The House on Wednesday passed a funding bill to end the longest government shutdown in US history, sending the legislation to President Trump’s desk for the final step to end the 43-day standoff.

In a 222-209 vote, the House voted to pass the funding bill it received from the Senate which will restart paychecks for federal workers and air traffic controllers, and fund food assistance programs.

The legislation finally “reopens the government, restores critical services, and puts an end to the needless hardship Democrats have inflicted on the country,” said GOP House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole of Oklahoma.

Trump will sign the measure into law Wednesday night in the Oval Office, officially ending the shutdown.

“We feel very relieved tonight,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters after the vote. “The Democrat shutdown is finally over thanks to House and Senate Republicans, who stood together to get the job done.” (Read more from “House Votes to End Unprecedented Government Shutdown After 43 Days, Sending Funding Bill to Trump’s Desk” HERE)

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