Bulwark Takes - LIVE REACTION: Epstein Files Released, Elise Stefanik Quits

Episode Date: December 19, 2025

Sarah, JVL, and Tim Miller are going live to discuss the HUGE news day. Exclusive $35 off Carver Mat at https://on.auraframes.com/BULWARKTAKES. Promo Code BULWARKTAKES

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please contact Connix Ontario at 1866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. miracle, Tim. It is. We're having a holly. It's a Christmas miracle. There's a lot of news happening right now. And so we wanted to have a holly jolly Christmas together with all of you. Elise Defonick's career is over, apparently, and Sarah Longwell's having a martini. And before we get to the joy of Elise Tophonic and the eggnog and the cookies, the dessert, there is some other breaking news right now. The Epstein Files have been released, and we're going to want to talk about that. And so, Chris, could you pull up on the screen what we've got?

the first trunch. That's from the first trunch from the government there. That is document 0-0-0-609. Dot pdf. There's 100 pages that look just like that. So I don't know. I don't know if we're going to resolve anything today on the Epstein files. There were some pictures of Bill Clinton looking a little creepy.

But we're still going through them. The team is going through them. But it seems to me that, you know, maybe they're not actually going to give us everything. You know, maybe they might not totally, there might not be full transparency related to Donald Trump. Not committed to transparency from the Trump administration is what you're telling me. What do you think about it? Have you seen anything from the Epstein Files worth chatting about before we get to Elise? I'm shocked.

You're shocked? Not in this new tranche. Yeah. But I will say, you know, we reacted to the Susie Wiles Vanity Fair. piece in real time. We did get a big news from Susie. But Susie, one of the things that Susie said, because so much of it was about her kind of soft pushing some things into the narrative, sorry.

But some of them was that Trump is all over the Epstein files and that he's not doing anything awful. Possibly illegal, but not awful. But not awful because we're working with standards of the Trump team. It does not shock me that they have reached. redacted everything. Like this was their goal, right? Once they knew that they were going to have to release the files, per congressional,

they passed a law saying that we had to be transparent about this. They went to work redacting everything that they could. And so I think it's going to take a while to work through their redactions. It almost seems as if there's a cover up happening with the files, JVL. I don't know. What do you think? I mean, you never know. But it's funny.

It took a long time. time you get the Epstein files redacted to release. They really get his name up on the Kennedy Center right quick. That's today. It's already on the building. You guys, I drove by it. I drove by it. They have scaffolding up. Like they are, they are like getting it done

right now. It's done. Where did they get the letters? So this is, you know, like you've got to get matching. Do they just have somewhere lying around from the original when they put the, it looked like it matched to me. They look like a match to you? Oh, you know, like when you put in tile somewhere, you always buy extra

tiles that if you break one of them, like you don't have to like, oh, you know, this tiles out of production, we can't match it. Maybe the Kennedy Center has had a bunch of extra letters lying around. Or maybe they had planned this whole thing for a long time. Impossible to say. Yeah. I have gone full JVL on the Kennedy Center, by the way. I did it with David from this morning on the podcast, and he was a little taken aback. I think he was. What is the full JBL? Yeah, what is the full JBL. I know. I want to bulldoze the Kennedy Center when we get back in power. I want to bulldoze the Trump Kennedy. center i'm sorry taking his name off it is not good enough for me anymore i want to raise it and then i don't know build something else maybe low-income housing there a gay bar big gay club or something i'm sorry the kennedy center is like a gay club i haven't been there like it's just musicals and like reproductions of sheer madness it's not that's a good point it's not we're still spitballing on it okay so that's the breaking news on on the Epstein situation.

Come on, bring it good stuff. I didn't get on this podcast in the middle of my holiday party for Trump's Kennedy Saturday. It's a Christmas party, Sarah. You can say Christmas again.

It is a Christmas party. I was just trying to make sure we had no other, is there no other important news context about that Epstein? I just think that like, look, they said today they're only going to reach, like release 100,000 of the

documents and they're going to continue to roll them out. and you know I just here this is boy I'm just looking at this other batch that's come up here I need degree to which this stuff is is redacted as preposterous it's almost like why I guess they had to do it by law is the answer my question was going to be like well why didn't they just stonewall it but I guess this is there because you can just take us to court over right now so now you'll take it to a coin over extreme redacting and then they'll fight that out yeah the classic Trump strategy This is what he did with his legal.

Like his legal strategy this summer was about just trying to delay and delay until people either lose interest or stop fighting. But this is where we will never stop fighting for the release of all the Epstein files. You will never. I love that Sarah is like the point person now for the Epstein files release. You know, it was Joe Rogan World. And now it's Sarah and Nicole Wallace. Yes. It's like, you know, it's like the zeal of the convert.

You know, JVL knows about that. in the Catholic Church. Okay, are we ready for the happy Christmas? Is it happy Christmas, everybody? Yes, into my veins. Give it to me. Give it to me. Here's a tweet that was just sent out within the last hour. It's from Elise Stefanik, my former colleague.

She writes this, while spending precious time with my family this Christmas season, I've made the decision to suspend my campaign for governor. I was kind of expected. I ain't just going to lose anyway. I was going to kind of enjoy her losing that campaign. campaign. So I was a little sad. By 20 points. She was going to lose by 20 points.

That reading that first sentence kind of made me a little glum. I was like, ugh, her pain. I was going to have some shot in Freuda there. Her pain was going to bring me joy. And then I read the second sentence. And I will also not seek re-election to Congress. I did not come to the decision lightly for our family. Elise Stefanik thought, found herself thinking maybe she would be the vice president right now, threw her name in the ring, did some ozempic. got a glow up

put you did everything but suck on Donald Trump's toes maybe she did I don't know exactly what happened on Air Force one but she did everything at least toes Sarah he said toes oh toes okay toes suck on his toes everything except that we go live in the middle of a holiday party

we did wheels off he's over I said she didn't do that I said she did everything up until the possibility of sucking on his toes which we don't know actually I'm not on Air Force One but um just asking questions she did everything that she could to become VP and if not VP to become ambassador to the United Nations and if not that is a speaker of the house and instead she will be unemployed her and Matt Gates I guess Matt Gates is a competitor of ours in the

podcasting space not doing as good in the ratings it is joyful it is pretty joyful that at least if I sold her soul and got nothing Jonathan least Sarah Lisa is excited Sarah you first. Look, it's a Christmas miracle, right? This is, this is what we want. What we want is for people unable to navigate what it looks like to be in the post-Trump world to find themselves having to tap out because they sold their souls and they got nothing in return.

She was put up for UN ambassador and then had the rug pulled out from under her. And she thought, okay, okay, I'll run for governor. then what did Trump do? He had walked Mom Donnie into her office who she was going to run against. Her entire campaign. Her entire campaign was going to be Donald Trump undercutting. And then he couldn't even

endorse her. He was like they're both fine. Another guy, Blake says that? I don't think I've heard of him. But you know, it's a great person too. You know what? Donald Trump has only one good quality. Only one. And it is that when people sell their souls for him,

when they give up everything on his behalf, he does not care and he will happily humiliate them in the process. And he's done that to Elise Stefanik. Nobody deserves it more. And I'm thrilled for her. JVL. Hit me. There are a couple people who deserve it at least as much. And I'm waiting for the slow knife, Marco. This one's a nice one. Just let me have a nice thing, JVL. You can have a nice thing. I want to read you guys my favorite part from her statement. While we would have overwhelmingly won this primary. Sure. It is not an effective use

of our time or your generous resources to spend the first half of next year in an unnecessary and protracted Republican primary, especially in a challenging state like New York. Well, if you were going to win it overwhelmingly, why would it have been protracted? What a great point.

Great point. This is the most loser talk ever. I would like to read you a list of people. At least, Tophonic, Harvard educated. She's a Harvard girl, right? Harvard, yeah. Made a big stink when she wasn't invited to some Harvard thing. Yeah.

You know about how their woke lives, yeah. Bullwark takes is sponsored by ORAF frames. We're now getting down to the wire in holiday shopping season. Hanukkah's already started and you're getting close to that window for Christmas. That window's closing, basically. It's time to get serious with ORA frames. And I just got my own in the mail. It adds a touch of home to my desk here at the Bullwark.

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just trying to climb that pole. And here are some people. Latteras, usually the ladders. A greasy pole. The greasy pole. Cash Patel. Got to be director of the Epi. Hash Patel.

Got to be director of the FBI. His name will be etched in American history. Christy Gnome, the weird woman who went to the dentist and did a video about it. Got to be a cabinet secretary. Shotter dog.

Tulsi Gabbard, who was a Democrat until five minutes ago? Got to be DNI. Yeah. He's like in the middle of the five eyes, you know, doing James Bond shit. She wasn't even Republican. Janine Piro, a drunk from TV who's already 25 years past her prime, got a fancy attorney position.

Pete Hankseth, another drunk who wasn't even very good at TV. Let's take it easy on drugs right now. I'm not feeling mad at them for that. Secretary of War A quack Got to be Surgeon General The United States Just an influencer

Just a woman who's an influencer From the TikToks And the Instagrams Dan Bongino A man with a podcast Got to be deputy director of the FBI And Harvard educated

Check all the boxes Brown all the noses Do all the things That you have to do To get ahead in Republican politics. What she got was her ass run out of town. Buckkiss.

On the other side of that, John... It's the greatest thing ever. And how about this? Well, how about John Thune? No profile and courage. No love for John Thune. But like, you know, I didn't utterly debase himself

in every imaginable way to the degree that Elise Daphonic did. He got to be a majority leader of the Senate. Yep. You know, like, I mean, she completely sold every iota of dignity that she had for literally nothing. For nothing. Cole. Absolutely nothing.

Yes. That's the thing here. Let me ask you guys this, because this was my first thought after being like, this makes me happy. This is nice. Happy Christmas. I thought, what is it that this? Elise Stefanik, somebody like her who was a rising star in the Trump era, tapping out, what does it tell us? And the only thing I could think is, because one of the people JBL didn't mention is J.D. Vance.

J.D. Vance and Elise Stefanic are extremely similar creatures. Same. Right? It's exact same type of person. They were like the never Trump set, people who were kind of moderate Republicans. They were on the up and up. We were going to have a more moderate Republican party that reached out to Hispanic. that reached out to minorities, different kind of Republican Party. And then they turned on a dime and went for Trump. He gets to be vice president. She gets nothing. She taps out.

Does that mean, though, that her confidence in the future of this Republican Party in which she has invested her entire soul that she thinks it's going down post-Trump? No. No. What do you think? This is purely a function of J.D. had Peter Thiel's money behind him. and then he was smart enough to realize

that he needed to ingratiate himself with Don Jr. and the Trump of kids so that he could make himself like a, I mean, J.D. is essentially like Owen Wilson's character from the Royal Tenenbaum's. Like, you know, he's the poor kid who lives across the street who's always hanging out in the Tenenbaum households until, like,

they just consider him one of the family, you know? And Elise thought she could just run the inside game. You know, she thought she could just do the thing, work her way up through the party infrastructure and I'll take all the jobs in the house and you know I that's the way she came up basically in the world that was still Kevin McCarthy's world you know where those sorts of things mattered it turns out you just have to like go on some hunting true go do some blow with don junior I like to yeah well this is good so I'd like to make another point about the JD

and Elise comparison that that speaks to like how you got to be careful with the kind of devil you're making the deal with and it does tie a little bit to the Epstein case and the type of person, the type of man Donald Trump is. Like, let's be honest, if Elise was hotter, she might have been the VP. I agree. Really. Like, if she looked at the part better, she looked at the part. Like, she and J.D. are the same.

They did the same stuff. Like, you know, Trump convinced himself because J.D. and Don Jr. were buddies. Like, you're saying, they were, like, fucking hunting buddies. I don't think you did it cook it. I'll just say that so. You know, just so we have. Nobody put on the eye. and he debased himself.

Yeah. He said, like, you know, new, you know, beard. He looked at the part. Like, he made himself look the part of VP. And if you're going to be a woman

that is going to totally throw in with somebody that was Jeffrey Epstein's best friend, that is a stated misogynist. He says he likes to grab women by the you know what. Who only hires lawyers that he picked up at Mar-a-Lago, who are now the people defending him in court, or like former beauty queens that he picked up. up at Moralago, I think this point, I think this point stands.

You threw in with them. I'm not saying it. You know what I mean? I wouldn't pick my VP based on that. I'm just saying that you threw in with a guy who picks his VPs based on how they look the part. And so I do think that's something that, like, you should feel bad about. So like that is how you ended up in this situation.

Like you threw in with a disgusting misogynist pig and you got nothing in part because he's a disgusting misogynist. That's part of it. The other thing, though, that I was thinking about. is, you know, J.D. Vance tweeted recently that there's a difference between being anti-Zionist and anti-Semitic, whereas Elise made her bones. Like her big standout thing last year was pushing back on Harvard and Yale on the protests, right, around Palestine. The problem is they are starting to realize that their base is not a fan, actually, of defending Israel. And so

they need more a J.D. Vance who can say, actually, I'm going to, I need to welcome the Groyper's in. Somebody who has made their bones on, I'm going to stand with Israel, not as good for this version of the Republican party. That is a good point, Sarah. Yeah. And they, and by

the way, that's an important point to make a lot for people in our circles, also, who like do this thing with the Democrats. It's like, they couldn't ever pick Josh Shapiro because he's Jewish and the Democrats are anti-Semitic. Like, to the degree that that is, you know, that there's any truth of that, like, the Same can be sad, really, in that situation.

Like, JD, yeah, JD's a bit, like, willingness to play along with the anti-Semite crowd is a key part of his sustainability. Have you guys read the giant Manhattan Institute focus group? I started to, and I haven't made it all the way through. Okay, because this is the Monday triad. The Manhattan Institute, very Trump-friendly, did something called, everyone wants to know what Gen Z Republicans think. We ask them. And so they talked to 20 GOP zoomers.

A lot of Hitler talk came up. Yeah. Pro, anti, anti, anti. I mean, pro. But like, you know, look, he was a strong leader. You know, you could say what you want about him. You know, of course, it was probably terrible. But, you know, like, he really knew and he believed in the good of his people.

And. Oh. And this is J.D. J.D. Vance understands. this particular impulse on how you vice signal to be based because he is our shit poster in chief and he understands that being based and vice signaling means you take Nick Fuentes and you give him a wink, not even a wink, you put your arm around him. And for Elise, she was willing to embrace, and this is, Matt, this is actually, this goes to

my theory of the the difference between the America first oh right that's the American first establishment that's what she is and she's starting to see that that is fading that without Trump directly having his hands on you that doesn't have the purchase in the same way the MAGA establishment versus the America first world right which is where JVD understands she's also handicapped by being in New York State where the Groyper stuff doesn't really fly in New York State right even in the Republican circles

whereas like nationally it's a little different right and so she she was at a natural disadvantage but I'm sure she would have done all this stuff if she had figured it out sooner but I don't think she did like I don't think she was reliant and this is I've said this before for people who are just kind of joining like

this is because I have firsthand knowledge of this Sarah mentioned she was an ever-trumper a lot of my friends like when I was were the people that worked for her, were her consultants. I knew, like, a lot of people on her inside circle closer than I did and, like, some others. And she threw them all out and had, like, a 24-year-old, basically an intern, who was a MAGA intern, a named Alex DeGrasse,

who, like, went with it from two years from being an intern to her top political strategist. And he, like, took over the Twitter feed and started, she started tweeting like Trump because he was just like a MAGA kid. And she saw that he understood the base and that all these, like, old Romney advisors, she had did it. And that guy, that same guy, this is part of the reason why I get so much joy about this. It's not just that I take pure joy from

Elisa's pain, which I do. But like, they deserve it because they trafficked in the worst disgusting elements of Maga to win over. And that guy DeGrasse was one of these guys yesterday or this week who had like picked out the random Brown student who was, uh, who was, you know, gender fluid or whatever, was posting his

picture. It's like at least a fun like staffer. is posting this wrong the wrong picture of someone and trying to blame them for the shooting because they're trans and a Palestinian activist or whatever and like that is the shit and that is like totally gross

and irresponsible but that's like the type of shit that she was willing to do to get into Trump's good graces and it was gross and not legal advice but that seems potentially defamatory yeah but but not even that

it's not enough like this is what's crazy about the Elise thing is that despite everything she did all the way she debased herself all the gross stuff she was willing to do it is not enough to stay in the good graces of the america first types that are taking over now um okay two more things well we got we do have some video i think of at least that i do want to show and we're like stepped up to address the crowd twice both times the protesters booed her Get the tomatoes! Okay, that's true.

That's enough. Do we think she's going to go home to her district? Let me, raise your hand if you think Elise Stefaniq is going to go home to upstate New York after this. It's all over. She's going to go to myself. This is a good prediction question, though. What does she do in the wake of this? Doesn't she get the Paul Ryan Memorial Chair at Fox News's board?

I do think it's something like that. Right? Yeah. It's like all these people hate the elites and hate blue cities. She'll live in she'll, you know, either live in Alexandria or in Manhattan. She'll come to Manhattan. My question is, if there is a schism, as Sarah is predicting, between the MAGA establishment and the America Firsters, whose side will at least take? She'll take the MAGA establishment.

Yeah. You think? here's what I think I think they're wrong I think that's why she's leaving yeah I agree I think that they are wrong and luckily we'll all get to hang out together

for three more years and assess this I think the America First side wins I just think that's where the mojo is that's that's that that's at the MAGA establishment side I think they have the advantage actually it's funny it's a lot of Is it.