Front Burner - Epstein’s orbit: will justice come?

Episode Date: February 4, 2026

Jeffrey Epstein’s vast connections with the rich and powerful, the world over, are on full display in the over 3 million files and documents released by the U.S. Justice department late last week.There’s mounting evidence of Epstein’s relationships with people like President Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and tech titan Peter Thiel, as well as behind the scenes dealmaking with global power brokers.Today, we go over the biggest revelations with Politico senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney. We also discuss why so few have been held accountable.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

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This is a CBC podcast. Hey, everybody. I'm Jamie Poisson. So Jeffrey Epstein's truly vast connections with the rich and powerful the world over are on full display in the over three million files released by the U.S. Justice Department late last week. Today on the show, we're going to go over the biggest revelations coming out of the batch so far with Politico's senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney from Epstein's relationship with people like C. Bannon and Tech Titan. Peter Thiel, members of the Trump administration world leaders, his behind-the-scenes deal-making. These documents are littered with really upsetting evidence of the trafficking of women. And I also want to discuss with Kyle where things could go from here. Are we going to see any accountability?

Why is the DOJ saying that the review is over when they previously signaled there are another three million files in their possession? What does he make of the chorus of accusations that this is a cover-up? There's a lot to go through here, so let's get right to it. Kyle, hey, good to see you. Thanks so much for coming on the show. Thanks so much for having me. So I want to go through some of the key findings here so far,

as I mentioned, 3 million files included in this are 2,000 videos, 180,000 images. So the caveat here is that people are still going through all of these files. Like, it's not like we have everything right now. But let's start maybe with what they reveal about the members of the Trump administration, including the president himself, whose name appears in these files several thousand times. Tell me more about that. Donald Trump's name appears voluminously, in part because he's a figure, an object of extreme interest of Epstein himself, who often is talking about Donald Trump and trying to influence him, not directly through him, but through others in his orbit. you know, I think he, even from before he was in politics, I think, you know, obviously they had a

friendship that dates back decades. And so that's always led to questions about how much Donald Trump knew about what Jeffrey F. he was up to with women and then the trafficking. And, of course, the president himself has said he had some suspicions and that's why he excommunicated him from his orbit years ago. But, you know, again, there's, you know, a lot of allegations and questions about their relationship that still persist. What do you think of the latest police of that Steve Miles? And do you think, critics will be satisfied with. Well, they should be because it looked like this guy, Wolf, was a right.

It was conspiring with Epstein to do harm to me. And I didn't see it myself, but I was told by some very important people that not only does it absolve me, it's the opposite of what people were hoping, you know, the radical evidence. The files that have just come out, don't shed a whole lot of new light on that, except that, you know, what we've seen with the FBI and the Justice Department were cataloging a lot of accusations. made against Trump himself, you know, that I think were made in tandem with questions about, you know, the Epstein investigation, what it was going to reveal that Jeffrey Epstein. And so while I understand that these allegations against President Trump were not substantiated, they were things that the Justice Department was monitoring in conjunction with their release of these files themselves. Yeah. Yeah. Also, Howard Lettnick came up in these files, Elon Musk, two people pretty close to Trump in this administration. right now you want to tell me a little bit more about what we saw there yeah sure so i mean like it's almost surprising when someone isn't in the file at this point who is someone of power in washington someone who's exerted any sort of political or financial power over the last few decades

it seems like fstein made it his life goal to ingratiate himself and develop relationships with people who could influence government and politics and finance um and so yeah howard luttnick actually was a neighbor of epstein's and i think uh had downplayed their relationship i say to him massage table in the middle of your house? How often you have a massage? And he says, every day. And then he gets like weirdly close to me. And he says, and the right kind of massage.

And in the six or eight steps it takes to get from his house to my house, my wife and I decided that I will never be in the room with that disgusting person ever again. But I think the files showed they may have had more contact than he had previously let on. So that was 2005. The files released today showed that Howard Lutnik tried to meet or call with Epstein several times after 2005, much longer after. A 2011 email to Jeffrey Epstein from his assistant reads, Howard Lutnik will come see you in 5 p.m. That same year, the heading of an alarm message reads, drinks with Howard Lutnik. And Lutnik also emailed...

Elon Musk. in contrast, you know, based on my review at least, you know, has some cursory interactions with Epstein, but really kind of kept him at arm's length and, you know, had something came up and would always come up or be, he'd be a little too busy to hang out with Epstein. There's that one email where he talks about wild parties at his island, but it's like not clear if Elon ever went to that party. And I think there is a subsequent email where he says, you know, I'm sorry it didn't work out this time. And, you know, you see a lot. Well, I found it's actually one of the most instructive parts. of the files that we've seen so far, which is the attempt by Epstein to try to get Musk to have some sort of personal interaction with him just over and over again. Hey, I heard you're in the Caribbean this week. Come visit me. Hey, I'll make it, I'll make it so easy. Any day you want, just tell

me, we'll get there. And Elon is constantly saying, I can. My logistics don't work. I'm not going to be on the East Coast that month. I'm like, you know, I don't know when it's going to work. And one of them, Russ goes on to write this. What day, night will be the wildest party on your Island. Now, Musk has addressed those allegations directly on X. He wrote, no one pushed harder than me to have the Epstein files released, and I'm glad that has finally happened. I had very little correspondence with Epstein and declined repeated invitations to go to his island or fly on his Lolita Express. But you see the attempt, and he wants it to have this personal relationship, which I think is how he pulled so many people into his orbit in this sort of personable way,

and then he would get his hooks in them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There is an experience. extensive amount of correspondence between Trump's former chief strategist Steve Bannon and Epstein, right? The connection there isn't new, but this latest tranche really showed how deep it went, right? Thousands of text messages between the two men in 2018 and 2019. And just tell me more about what we learned about that relationship. Well, that to me is one of the most extraordinary parts of what's come out so far is the depth, as you said, depth of their relationship. We knew they knew each other. I think there was some indication in earlier releases that, you know, look, they both found each other useful.

I think Epstein had his connections in finance and around the world, ban on his connections in Washington and to Trump. So they certainly used each other to advance their interests in those spheres. But now what we're seeing is actually that relationship was far deeper and more prolific than we understood. I mean, it seemed like a genuine friendship. They had inside jokes. They would gab about, you know, politics and the latest current events. about each other, about other people. Yeah, early going, the Epstein prosecution, you know,

Bannon would help him sort of message around that. Do you think you're the devil himself? No, but I do have a good mirror. It's a serious question. I'm sorry. Do you think you're the devil himself? I don't know. Why would you say that?

Because you have all the attributes. You're incredibly smart. You remember the devil is somebody knows? The devil's brilliant. You read Milton's, you read Milton's Paradise Lost. No, the devil scares me. And Bannon, of course, has this separate project to try to influence European politics that he developed after he left the Trump White House. And Epstein seemed to be his entree.

He would connect Bannon to powerful people in Europe to try to exert to wield more influence there. Yeah. Yeah. And Epstein's like hooking Bannon up with all this stuff, places, jets and places to stay. Yes. You know, I read this post from researcher Matt Stoller, who you're probably familiar with. He works for the American Economic Liberties Project. I just want to read you some of this post and then get your thoughts on it. Quote, it's clear that Epstein was an entrepreneurial broker across multiple public and private bureaucracies, helping organize under-the-table deals among the legal business, intelligence, and political elites

to allow them to escape the rule of law and traditional conflict of interest restrictions. It's statecraft to allow a superclass. to systematically escape the formalized rules. And just would you agree with that take on, you know, what these latest documents or latest files help reveal? And if so, you know, where are you seeing that? I mean, that's a really artful way to say it because that is, as I've been saying, you know, Epstein made it his entire purpose

to cultivate relationships so that he could wield more influence in all of those spheres, mostly for his own personal benefit, but I think he would help others achieve their ends because it helped him. And of course, it had the second order effect of helping insulate him from his own crimes because he had all these buffers with very powerful people in all those areas, lobbying the key one there. And of course, he would essentially, I don't know about incriminate necessarily because we don't know about criminal exposure per se,

but he certainly made people into these unseemly and problematic relationships with him who was clearly, you know, committing crimes and make it more difficult for people to turn on him. Yeah. And I just like, what examples from this latest tranche are you thinking out when you're talking about that? Particularly with his interactions with some of the most prominent European power brokers. It's almost amazing how quickly he would toggle between, you know, locker room banter, which of course is much more sinister when we know what Epstein was up to in his, you know, in his private life with women and underage women. But all and also and flip toggling immediately to, you know, here's how we're going to influence this, you know, parliamentary election. Here's how we're going to get you elevated to this position of power in your government. Here's how you're going to connect me with this person who's going to pursue an agenda that I want, both financial or political.

They have like, you know, again, like almost high school level locker room banter that you don't really think of when you think of, you know, the most powerful elites in the world. And yet that's what they're, that's the kind of conversation they're having while also making these massive. decisions about the future of the world. Isn't for everyone. You need grit to climb this high this often. You've got to be an underdog that always overdelivers. You've got to be 6,500 hospital staff, 1,000 doctors all doing so much with so little. You've got to be Scarborough.

Defined by our uphill battle and always striving to war. towards new heights. And you can help us keep climbing. Donate at lovescarborough.ca.a. At Desjardin Insurance, we know that when you own a law firm, your bar for everything is high. That's why our agents go the extra mile

to understand your business and provide tailored solutions for all its unique needs. You put your heart into your company, so we put our heart into making sure it's protected. Get insurance that's really big on care. Find an agent today at Dejardin.com slash business coverage. You know, one example that I've been thinking about is sort of his deeper relationship.

We learn about this deeper relationship that he has with former Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Barak, how he basically introduces Palantir, the company Palantir, to him. He thought there was two cyber companies. Look out, and even though I know Peter, I've never met Peter Thiel. And everybody says he sort of jumps around and acts of strange, like he's on drugs. Smoking, yeah. He looks there under drugs. However, here's a company called Palantir.

So he thought that Peter would put you on the board of Palantir. Peter Thiel is one of the... You know, what did you see there? That one, for example. Yeah, and I saw, you know, we mentioned Bannon already. One of the first exchanges I came across was Bannon, you know, saying, hey, my guy is in Israel. meet up with your guy, you know, a rock out there, and then Epstein makes it happen or drives to make it happen, you know, and so, you know, I think we see, you know, and Peter Thiel, who, you know,

and Palantir, he mentioned, is someone that Epstein talked to quite a bit and, you know, used as a, kind of link to other foreign, you know, leaders. I think there was some examples of Epstein talking to Russia, Russian adjacent figures or people in the Russian diplomats and, you know, getting intelligence from them about what's going on there and sort of linking that up to Peter Thiel somehow. So he is sort of this intermediary between a lot of different foreign and international interests. Again, as the quote you pointed out earlier was perfect, which is that he's connecting

parts of the world in a way that escapes the normal bureaucracy of these institutions. Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's also, we're talking about Teal here. And there's also this exchange between Teal and Epstein that I found really striking. I want to read you the whole thing. So Epstein writes Brexit, just the beginning. And Teal writes back, of what? And Epstein writes back, return to tribalism, counter to globalization, amazing new alliances.

You and I both agreed zero interest rates were too high. And as I said in your office, finding things on their way to collapse was a much easier than finding the next bargain. What did you make of that? Well, you know, Epstein also has this, you know, you learn a bit about his rhetorical style. As you read enough of these, it's just this sort of flare for drama and paradox. And you know, he always says these sort of half statements and people say, what do you mean by that? And it forces him to explain himself. And then you get that sort of elaborate answer he gave. But it is sort of the clearest thing we get to a worldview, I think, in all of these messages about, you know, what does he draw? And, you know, what is he

driving at? What is his ultimate goal? And I'm not sure whether this is just the goal he wants to explain to Teal and he thinks Teal wants to hear or if this is really his fundamental philosophy. But his idea that, you know, Stoke as much chaos and tribalism in the world as we can, and then we can sort of pick at the wreckage. We can sort of benefit from the remains of that. We could bring up so many names here that have come up in these documents. A real, it's a real who's who, a powerful men, tech billionaires, Wall Street power brokers, foreign dignitaries. And again, just because people are named in these files doesn't mean that there's evidence of wrongdoing. But I wonder if there are any names that are kind of off the top of your head right now that we haven't talked about yet that you think are worth us discussing.

You know, I searched a lot for his efforts to meet with members of Congress and meet. with people that sort of had influence over domestic policy in the United States. And I found that there were a lot of times where he would just, members of Congress to him, those are among the least powerful people he was probably meeting with or trying to influence. But you'd see he was trying to, he would consistently try to squeeze in dinners and phone calls with just random,

people who had maybe had power over the appropriations process and might have something to do with the business policies he cared about. Just try to whine and dine people. as much as he could. And he saw that quite a bit. Yeah. Yeah. And I, you know, you mentioned the Europeans earlier. I think it's probably worth us mentioning Peter Mendelsohn specifically, right? Because there are these bank records that appear to show three separate payments of $25,000 from Epstein J.B. Morgan account to Mendelssohn's account. This is the UK's former ambassador to

the United States. And he has now stepped down from the Labor Party. He will never grace their chamber again. But Peter Mandelso's, Mr. Madison's misconduct means punishment won't stop there. Kirstama told Cabinet Ministers that he was appalled at the email revelations. He said Peter Madelson's conduct passing on government information had been disgraceful. Saying he couldn't recall receiving thousands of pounds would be seen as gobsmacking by the public. He also said he thought there were more revelations to come. I'll just do a couple. Richard Branson is in there talking about, you know,

loving to see him as long as you bring your harem. You know, Branson has gone on to say that he was with Epstein was with these three adult women and that he, like, had nothing to do with any of this and thinks he's discussing. New York Giants co-owner, Steve Tisch is in these quite a bit. Bill Clinton shows up. Yep. Bill Gates. Yeah. And the Andrew Mountbatten Windsor.

And now there's like this really creepy photo of him kind of kneeling over this young woman. woman, right? And, you know, now another woman has come forward saying that she was like shipped to the UK to have sex with him. You know, just on the, the women or the girls, what do we see in these documents, you know, what kind of evidence is there that show us how Epstein was using women in all of this? That is what this is all about. This is about this massive sex trafficking operations. that he ran essentially. And, you know, the question that has animated this from the beginning is what other powerful people benefited from this and knew about it. And of course, the view of the Justice Department is there are no chargeable crimes to come out of this.

But what about people who just should have known or should have known better and were in, you know, or did know and didn't care and participated in some way? And that is the picture that's still coming together. but as we see, you know, there was very open. I mean, people, everyone seemed to know that Epstein had scandalous, you know, in involvement with women and young women. And so there was always jokes about that between him and the men that he would talk to, you know, of course, not ever expecting that these would all see the light of day.

And I think that's just a through line in many of his prominent relationships is how easily he would talk about, you know, sexual relationships with, with women. And I don't think it was ever some overt and explicit admission of the crimes he was committing. But it was, you know, gave you a sense of knowing about those crimes now. Flip it he was about all of that. Yeah. Yeah. And then also there were these nude photos released that the DOJ, I mean, they're facing all these criticisms for being unbelievably incompetent for releasing this stuff. after the DOJ accidentally revealed the names of nearly 100 survivors. The New York Times also reporting that dozens of images of young nude women were also released by the DOJ. The department says thousands of those documents are now off the website, but lawmakers want information. You know, there's this one email that I flagged.

It's from one of like Epstein's assistants and it's half redacted. But the headline at the top is just like girls. And then it really seems to list all of these names of what seem you would assume to be girls because it's under that heading being flown to Paris for whatever event from other countries. And then there's just this list of guests. And it just raises enormous amount of questions. Yeah. And I think, you know, I noticed it too, actually, in the conversation. he was having with European officials, I seemed like to me that there was a bit more of a

loose talk about women. Like there was a Slovak politician who actually had to resign over similarly. You mentioned Mendelsohn. This man, I think his name is Lysak, had to resign. He was someone who talked to Epstein quite a bit. And the two of them would talk about, you know, the women in Epstein swimming pool at the island and talk about, you know, in sort of degrading ways. the women that they had involvement in and as though, you know, not just in like a, you know, thought, exercise kind of way, like they had actually talked about experiences

they had together and, like, the very, in a sort of derogatory way. And I think that was something that, again, it was the through line of a lot of these conversations, but it did seem like when he spoke to his European context, he was even more open about that. And, you know, we talk about using women as a,

sort of a tool of his influence. You alluded to this earlier, this comment back in September, I think, from FBI director Cash Patel, he told this Senate panel, who, if anyone, did Epstein traffic these young women too besides himself? Himself, there is no credible information. None. If there were, I would bring the case yesterday that he trafficked to other individuals. and the information we have, again, is limited.

So the answer is no one? For the information that we have. In the files. In the case file. And this was part of Patel's defense for ending the review on the case at the time. But just like, once you see all of this, you know, what do you make of those comments now, right? The idea that there's no – because you look at them and you're like, well, it seems like there's lots of threads that they could be pulling right now. It does.

And, you know, look, this is the crowd. that came into office saying, we're going to expose all of this and exposed the cabal that was with, you know, with Epstein and participating in his crimes, not just, you know, being unaware of his crimes,

doing nothing, but actually participating in his crimes. And then they flipped pretty abruptly to say what he said, which is that there's nothing here. They weren't even going to release these files. And now they have to because Congress required it by law.

And so, you know, you would think that this is the group that would have, you know, been the ones to say, no, we're going to go back into this and charge the people who need to be charged. And so maybe, you know, maybe there really isn't enough to amount to a case beyond a reasonable doubt. But there's so much here, it seemed like there was so much that really hadn't been pulled. Yes. Files that Congress got from the Epstein estate that the FDOJ said, we never saw these files.

It's like, well, it's hard to imagine that the investigation could be complete and there could be no chargeable crimes. if there were big caches of files that were never even reviewed. And so it does seem like there's major questions about that. Yeah, yeah. How hard has anyone been trying here, basically, to actually investigate this? Which I suppose leads me to our next question, which is one of accountability. So, of course, Epstein died in prison. Galane Maxwell was charged and convicted as his longtime co-conspirator, convicted of sex

trafficking, though she's now seeking a pardon, I believe. And just like, what else could happen technically on this, on this front in terms of accountability? Well, I think, I mean, criminally. Criminally. That's a big, that's the big question. Because I think right now, the best form of accountability that we're seeing is just the exposure, which is, you know, some consequences for people. Although, you know, this is a separate thing we could talk about, but I think the, as you noted, look, Mendelssohn resigned. This Slovak politician I mentioned had to resign. there's been more consequences on the Europe side of the equation that are happening on the American side at this point. That may change, but that's been sort of a notable, I think, distinction.

But, you know, I think there's going to be immediate questions about are we seeing the full, you know, breadth of the material, what is not being provided? What is the Justice Department not providing? And why are the redactions that they put in there appropriate? Are they shielding people who shouldn't be shielded? There is a draft indictment in these three million pages, about 55, 56 pages from the Southern District of Florida, sometimes not dated precisely in the mid-2000s, that would have charged Jeffrey Epstein with serious federal crimes, plus three other co-conspirators, their names are redacted. And to me, that's the document that's most interesting to me.

Here's a snippet from it, because it points up the key question, which is why was Jeffrey Epstein given such a sweetheart deal back in 2007 by the U.S. U.S. Attorney's Office. And secondarily, how could it be that still to this day, the only two people ever charge have been Jeffrey Epstein and Galane Maxwell? How about all the other... I guess we don't know what we don't know yet. And that's going to be a process that takes months, if not years, to figure out what else should come out that hasn't yet. Right, because there's also these three million more documents that the DOJ is, I guess, identified, but they're saying that they're done now. They're saying that they're done. And that is, you know, look, I don't know if the courts have necessarily have a role here. This is really Congress passed this law. And if Congress says the law

hasn't been followed, then they would have to take some sort of step to enforce it. But I'm not sure there's the will in this current Congress, you know, to do that. And, you know, so I think they are obligated under the law to explain what they haven't provided and why. And so that'll be actually a big milestone is when we see that initial report as to what they didn't turn over and what the explanation is. Yeah. The House Oversight Committee does have an investigation into Epstein. And what is it doing exactly? And could accountability come from that? I know, like I saw all the headlines of the Clintons who have just agreed to testify in front of that committee after much back and forth. Well, it's a good question. I mean, it's a bit of an uncomfortable spot because, at least as a

Republican-led committee, because their work has actually exposed a whole lot of things that were unflattering for President Trump. And it led to President Trump initially saying, let's move on from this Epstein thing. We don't need the documents. Like, this is a hoax. It's Democrats trying to, you know, incriminate me. You know, these files were made up by Comey. They were made up by Obama.

They were made up by the Biden. You know, and we went through years of that with the Russia, Russia, Russia, Russia, hoax with all of the different things that we had to go through. We've gone through years of it. Of course, the committee put out files. anyway and they subpoenaed people anyway and then Congress passed this law anyway requiring this much more massive release. And so the committee is sort of figuring out like where does it fit here. They have subpoenaed other power players in Epstein's orbit. And they, as you mentioned,

they're pursuing contempt against the Clintons for refusing to testify, although that may be changing now. For months, the Clintons held their ground against Republican chairman James Comer's subpoenas. Comer appearing skeptical that the depositions will actually happen. saying the Clinton's counsel has said they agree to terms, but those terms lack clarity yet again. And they have provided no dates for their depositions. So I think that's where they're at now. But what the end of that process looks like, I don't know. They've got a massive report.

You know, what do they have that maybe we haven't seen yet in the DOJ file? I don't know. What's your best guess of where this goes next? I think, you know, we're still in such an early, days of this that like it's more about continuing to dig through the files and figure out like what does it add up to what is the totality these files tell us about sort of the way the world works and that's like the meta question is you know what are we learning about you know this superclass as as the matt the dollar quote you mentioned yeah that how it operates and you know it does

sort of feed into this whole notion that there's a a cabal of power brokers kind of you know skirting the institutions all over the world. But I think there's that, and then there's just the, you know, the victims, which we, you know, people keep trying to make sure the victims are the front and center of this whole equation, is this is really what it's about is providing some measure of justice for them that they didn't get because Epstein, you know, died in prison before his trial. You know, there's a lot of evidence out there that still hasn't been aired and exposed about who benefited from these women's suffering and their victim, you know,

and being victimized. Just like on your point of making sense of these files and a window into the way the world works, I feel like I'm just like reading you quotes from other people. But just one more. You know, I found it very clarifying myself. It was from Ryan Grimm, a reporter with Dropsite News. And he wrote, the Epstein story is a window into the way a small group of people who nobody elected make unaccountable decisions to enrich and to pleasure themselves with the expense

of the public and at the expense of particular direct victims, like you were saying. This is the public's chance to see some of these people at work. Shame may be the only accountability that we get. That's dead on. And I think, you know, and almost maybe the inevitable answer, which is that if there are no crimes to pursue here, or at least the people who, you know, are charged with pursuing crimes say there's nothing else to pursue here, this exposure and digging through the files and, you know, showing who are these powerful people that may still be wielding influence to this day

that countenance to Jeffrey Epstein that knew or should have known and helped essentially facilitated the victimization of these women if not by their direct action, but through their inaction or through their willingness to keep Jeffrey Epstein in power and use his connections for their own benefit. Yeah, that exposure may be the sunlight, I guess, maybe the accountability that we get from this. Okay. Kyle, thank you so much for this.

This was really good talking to you. I really appreciate it. Boris, I'm happy to join you anytime. All right. That's all for today. I'm Jamie Poisson. Thanks so much for listening. Talk to you tomorrow.

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