The Daily Beast Podcast - The Trump Family’s Civil War Could Blow Us All Up

Episode Date: July 7, 2020

Mary Trump legal battles against her uncle might seem like a fun little political soap opera. It’s way more than that, Mary’s lawyer Ted Boutrous explains on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. The attempt to stop her tell-all book before publication—“I think it's really an effort to intimidate people from speaking, to intimidate the press. But also it's a political tool. It's a fundraising tool. It seems to excite people who support president Trump,” he tells Molly Jong-Fast and Rick Wilson. Then! The Beast’s Kate Briquelet—who has broken some of the biggest stories about Jeffrey Epstein’s cabal—joins the dynamic duo to talk about the arrest of Epstein ‘madam’ Ghislaine Maxwell. “There are power players in New York,” she explains “who are very nervous that Ghislaine is going to spill the secrets.” Plus! Does Trump know how to listen to a podcast? Could Kanye’s ‘run for president’ could really, really backfire? How is Ye like Vermin Supreme? And what the hell is “the McKinsey of grift?” Want more? Become a Beast Inside member to enjoy a limited-run series of bonus interviews from The New Abnormal. Guests include Cory Booker, Jim Acosta, and more. Head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com to join now. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi folks, it's Rick Wilson, and welcome to The Daily Beast's The New Abnormal. Hi, I'm Molly Jongfast, a left-wing pundit, an editor-at-large at the Daily Beast. I'm also an editor at The Daily Beast, a former Republican political strategist, best-selling author, and full-time troublemaker. We're here to have fun, sharp conversations with some of the smartest people in media, politics, business, and science that help make what's happening in the country and the world clearer. I'll try to keep Rick to the minimum number of F-bombs and try to keep our... kids, pets, and other wildlife sounds from invading our respective bunkers. Rick Wilson. Hello, Molly Jong-Fast.

I'm concerned today that we have a time restraint. Well, you know, Molly, I just received an urgent email from Eric Trump. Tell me more. That my 500% match expires in 59 minutes and 52 seconds. And there's a little TikTok countdown on the screen. After I finish with the podcast, I may, I don't know, go out and hunt for alligators or move piles of debris around the yard. But I think I will probably miss Eric Trump's deadline,

especially because the person who's subscribe me to the list, I pretty much know when they say Dick Rick, that it's not for me. I am, in fact, Rick, and I am also a dick. But pretty confident I didn't subscribe to the Trump email list. I have to say, I'm subscribed to the Rudy Giuliani email list. Are you? Yes, for his podcast.

I think Rudy's podcasting is a little bit like Rudy's mental health, like a little bit patchy. Well, I think it's probably targeted, unlike our podcast, which reaches people across the fruited plane, which someone said that once before. Rudies is for an audience of one. Which is funny because I don't think Trump knows how to, like, listen to a podcast. Like, you think he knows how to do that on his phone? I mean, that's what Scovino is there for. He claps his hands and says, Digital Caddy, what club should I use for this lay? as y'all may have determined, I know very little of the golf.

Yeah, well, that's one of your many good qualities is not knowing anything about golf. We're big in Canada. The Canadians love us. Well, that's good because we may have to flee there for asylum at some point. I know. That's what I'm banking on. It's like, didn't you get the message with the two speeches this weekend at Mount Rushmore and then at the White House that President Eric Cartman is going to declare race war. Race war!

It's out! See, MJF, you don't listen to it. South Park and Jesse the producer clearly does because he laughed. I watch South Park. I have son, so I've heard every South Park joke ad nauseum. I mean this in no disrespectful way, obviously. It's a clear cultural reference that you need to stay up on. All right, I will watch more South Park, that will be my...

But the thing I am always struck by by a Santa Monica Goebbels speech is that he's not a very good speech writer. Did you think that was Santa Monica Goebbels or was that Steve Bannon? I thought Steve Bannon is out. Oh, he's always getting back in. He's always, he's like herpes. He always comes back. Do you think he's back? Try bandrecks.

If you've got recurring incidences of Steve Bannon. Symptoms include scrofula, cold sores, leprosy, and gout. Hey, by the way, there's Dengue is back in Florida. Did you know that? Dengue, baby! Dengue and brain-eating amoebas. So you're definitely living in, like, the perfect place. Well, clearly, you know, the only thing that needs to come back is the Wakolone.

volcano. Right. It's true. I've wanted to say that joke for so long because there's this semi-mythological thing that a volcano erupted in Florida in like 1908 or something. It didn't, of course, but there was a story in the New York Times that said south of Tallahassee, fires were seen in the night. And natives believe it to be a volcano. The Wakala volcano. It's one of my favorite pieces of Florida folklore. I like Florida. I mean... You're like, shut out. No, I'm actually sort of weirdly intrigued by Florida folklore. I mean, I like Florida for a good two days a year in the winter. My favorite piece of Florida folklore was the Palmetto Man, which is sort of Florida's Bigfoot.

What is that again? The Palmetto Man is Florida's Bigfoot, also known as the skunk ape. Is it? We're going to spend a whole show on how fucking weird Florida is. But anyway, moving on. We're going to do a show on trolls eventually so we can put Florida in there because it is the troll state. I do think it's interesting.

So we had this Rushmore speech. We had this insane speech in Washington where he said that they're coming for your freedom, which is okay. And then we had Mike Flynn doing QAnon pledges on the internet. The Digital Warrior Pledge. Okay. So the Digital Warrior Pledge, you'll see a lot of three-star icons in your Twitter feed with the Digital Warriors. They believe that Q has called them to serve as digital warriors. I guess it's the great rebranding from sitting on your couch, taking Oxy, waiting for disability check to clear to digital warriors. But, you know.

Can we say, can he say that? All right. Hey, man. And they have to take an oath. We talked about this last week, but for some reason it's become even more elaborate, the digital warrior oath. That I will bear truth, faith, and allegiance to the same. That I take this obligation freely.

That I take this obligation freely. Without any mental reservation. Without any mental reservation. purpose of evasion or purpose of an agent and that I will well and faithfully and that I will well and faith here's the funny thing is like Mike Flynn was the subject of much of the Q obsession and a lot of the Trump deep stater obsession and now he has become an active participant in this pantomime of reality that uses him as this martyr figure in the center of it it wasn't that he was planning to kidnap a Turkish national to return him to Erdogan to be murdered or that he was chit-chatting

with Russia's ambassador about national security matters and whatever other side deals he had. Sergei Kisliak. Is he still alive? He's just resting. Okay. Just checking. In all of these things, he's suddenly become this character. We're like one cycle away from Q&on conventions where Mike Flynn is the speaker to feature.

I agree. He's going to be touring. And there are numerous Q&N congressional candidates. We talked about this, but I mean, it is still just shocking. Oh, look, there are going to be people in Congress. who Kevin McCarthy is going to put on committees where they have access to classified intelligence who are fucking QAnon people.

Yeah, we're going to have people crazier than Devin Nunes in Congress soon. What broke Devin's brain, Molly? We can ask our guest this afternoon. Oh, our guest is going to be good. We have a good guest. And by the way, if you're listening from the Trump campaign, you're going to want to alert Donald and the family attorneys because you'll be interested in what comes next.

Who do you think from the Trump campaign? Is it Jason Miller who's listening to this? They have minions who fired up the chain to Murtaugh and Miller. But remember that ad I made a few weeks ago about Brad Parscal? Yeah, you love, yes. What's happening with Brad? Brad's basically about to familiarize himself with, would you like the deep wax and undercoding with that?

I think that's a car reference and not like a black waxing. Yeah. No, it's not that waxing. Although the idea of Brad Parskow waxing people's lady business is disturbing on so many levels. So many. Welcome to Bannon's House of Beauty. I'm Brad. I'll be your waxing technician today. We've like entered the mind of Rick Wilson.

I'm already in a damn mood this week. But no, the Q thing is just growing like a cancer. But here we are. The President's son's girlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle, tested positive for the coronavirus. We're going to carefully talk about Gilfoyle in a peripheral and not inappropriate. way. Okay, Rick, are you prepared? I want you to know that I'm a man of... I'm worried.

Enormous personal discipline on certain matters. So worried about this topic. You know, Molly, as much as I want to make all the jokes in the world about it, because I find the jokes to be hilarious and wrong, which is why I love them, there is something here that is an actual lesson. Yeah. And the people around the president are slowly getting infected by this, in part, because they are going to events like the Tulsa rally.

They're going to events like the Rushmore rally. And it will inevitably stalk closer and closer into somebody they give a shit about and somebody they care about. And apparently Kimberly Gilfoy was asymptomatic. Right. And you know what? God bless. I don't want anybody on a goddamn respirator. I don't want anybody to die from this thing.

Exactly. We've got enough loss in this country. We're going to clock 200,000 people well before the summer is over. If Trump was a normal human being, he would say, wow, the consequences of what I'm doing to get reelected, leading people to behave in ways. Look, it landed with people that I know and love. Right. But unfortunately, I don't think it ever will.

Yeah. And I also still am not going to forgive Don Jr. For wearing those goddamn socks with loafers. I'm not. I'm just not going to do it. I mean, I think it's interesting that the campaign has switched the messaging now, and now they're saying, like, coronavirus, we just have to live with it. And it's this larger, like, we can't do federal government stuff.

So your grandma and your cousin are just going to have to die. Terrorists only attack the World Trade Center once every 10 years or so. Why bother? What should we do? to respond to it. I mean, our federal government is basically like just flying around the kids at this point. Well, what I just said about terrorist attacks, that's the same kind of low probability, high devastation problem that this represents. Okay. What they want is everyone to get numb and bored and tired and sad and to just feel worn out by the numbers. Oh, another thousand, another 5,000, another 10,000. That's the dark predicate at the heart of their strategy of statues and race war.

They think that you're just going to be numb to the death and destruction because of COVID, and you'll pay attention to a shiny object. And, you know, it's funny because it's like having lived in York City for this entire time, I have had these four friends who've lost their fathers. And you don't forget losing your father. You don't think, like, oh, well, Trump's a good guy. And I got those conservative judges. So sure, my dad had to die 10, 15, 20 years earlier than he would have.

But mega. I mean, I just think this is a losing game. Damn it for Trump. I completely agree. Killing people's parents is not a good look. Should we move on to Kanye? Do we have to move on to Kanye? What else can we talk about it with Gilfoyle?

We could talk about how she's a year older than his stepmother. All I can say is, you do not want to see his Pornhub search history. You were so good for so long. We knew this was coming. Hey, Rick, there's the line. Hold my beer. So we're going to talk about Kanye and his short and likely, ill-fated presidential run. And I've asked our producer, Jesse, to join us because he is extremely

involved in music and has written the number two most popular book on music marketing. So he is going to give us a little bit of context about this Kanye thing. Welcome, Jesse. I'm so glad to be here, like I always am. Rick and I are letting you talk. So my read on this has always been that Trump, the way he maintains attention. When you think of every industry is always learning from porn in music since they say we're who makes the innovation in marketing. And I always thought Trump's constant sustained attention thing came from music. And what we're seeing here with Kanye is there's a theory that doesn't work as well in political

campaigns, which is that you need to make the biggest splash possible of attention when you're a big artist. And this is his craven way of doing it since we've seen that he can't get on the ballot in most states, eight of the biggest states have already closed down. really just a hype thing, but I think this could backfire on him pretty bad because the one thing with doing craven things like this is when you're not vulnerable, like some people, it's one thing, but when you have a shoe line and the family you married into as dozens upon dozens of products that could be boycotted, it seems like a pretty bad idea that if he comes for Biden or is seen as a

tool of his little idol that wears the red hat, this could go really bad for him. You're right about the access to the ballot. Even in the states where he could hypothetically get on the ballot, I can tell you from very, very, very painful experience in 2016, it's almost impossible. Rick was the campaign manager for Evan McMullen, who... Not the campaign manager. I was just in the strategy side. Campaign manager is a different job of serious, organized people. Okay.

As opposed to smart asses. But our campaign manager practically broke his own brain trying to get us on the ballot, and it is so difficult. There are so many traps to it. But Kanye can't get on the ballot basically anywhere, so he is running the same sort of campaign. campaign that Vermin Supreme is running. Who's Vermin Supreme?

Wait. What? You don't know who Vermin Supreme is? No. He's a perennial presidential candidate who wears a boot on his head and promises every American a free pony. You may have my phone. That sounds pretty great.

Team Supreme, baby. Do we all get a pony? Everyone. What if we want a horse? I mean, where does it end? I digress. As someone with more knowledge about horses, the acquisition of the same that I care to acknowledge, if you want to want to.

I can arrange it. Yeah, I don't want to work. What do you think happens? What's your prediction on how this plays out, Kanye? Nothing. At a week, it disappears, right, Jesse? I mean, he's promoting his record, and that's going to... I'm a betting man, and I have $100 on August 1st.

This is gone. Let's also remember, he's apparently never been registered to vote, and he's not registered to vote yet. When does some album come out? We don't know yet. So albums now come out for big artists, when they see that no other artists bigger than them is going to have an album come out that week. And when we see...

see these surprise drops like it's like, oh wow, Beyonce put out a record. It's because they're always strategically doing it so they could stay number one. And basically, this is what every big artist now does is they see a vulnerability and they drop an album. So we can't really know when his album comes out. But it seems pretty clear that it's impending. Wow. I will say this.

A lot of people were saying, oh, he's conspiring with Trump to divide the black vote. Everyone should understand something. Donald Trump's campaign cannot organize a two-car motorcade, much less a conspiracy with Kanye West. This is just vanity and ego at a marketing play. And also, it is like, I mean, I saw people well-meaning tweeting that. And I was like, you know, black voters are pretty savvy. They pick candidates they like. You know, the idea that as a block, they would be moved by a stunt like that is kind of really not.

Racist? Yeah, that was what I was going to say. I think it's really racist. The idea that you could move a block like that because, you know, they could be tricked. It feels really racist to me. There's also something everybody in music marketing knows, which is that most of Kanye's fans are not black. They are white. And look, like everything else, like murder hornets, it's going to be gone in a couple weeks.

We'll look back and go, oh, that was fucking crazy. That's what you're hoping for the brain-eating amoebas, right? Right. We'll see how that plays out. Duh. I think they'll die out in Florida. The brain-eating amoebas? Yeah, not much.

I think they've already done their work. Well, that's a question. Maybe they've been here longer than we think. Well, with us today, folks, is Ted Boutros. And Ted is a famous attorney, but right now he's famous for being involved in one of the hottest cases of controversies in the country right now. He represents Mary Trump, who is desperately trying to publish a book with Simon & Schuster right now about her infamous uncle. Ted, thank you so much for being with us today. Thanks for having me. It's really great to be with you. And I'm a fan of this enterprise and just

delighted to be with you. We're thrilled to have you, Ted. Okay, so I just read a press release. I got today from Simon & Schuster that said they're actually moving up the pub date two weeks. I saw that too. Simon & Schuster really has sole control now over when the book is published. So I saw that they're moving up the publication date and really looking forward to the book coming out. You know, Mary is still under this prior restraint, this temporary restraining order, but the appellate court lifted it as to Simon & Schuster last week. And then we filed our big brief Thursday. And we're looking forward to this week having a hearing to free Mary to speak out as well.

Can you explain to us in like very simple terms for those of us who are not lawyers, where we're at and how we got there? Sure. It's really remarkable in the sense that in our nation's history, the Supreme Court of the United States has never ever upheld what's called a prior restraint on speech, where the government or a court issues in order to stop speech, to ban a book, to stop someone from speaking. Usually the law, you might be able to get a remedy, you know, breach of contract or defamation claim. But here, President Trump, with the John Bolton book, went for a prior restraint there and failed to try to block that book. And then the next week, two and two weeks, via his brother and his lawyer, Charles Harder, filed an action in New York State Court seeking to block Mary Trump's book and sought what is a classic prior restraint. It's an order seeking to have the court say this book cannot be published. and in the words of the Supreme Court is the least tolerable and most dangerous infringement on First Amendment, right? So it's really extraordinary. It's part of President Trump's pattern that we've seen since the campaign all the way up until now of trying to squelch important speech that he doesn't like. But nonetheless, it's extraordinary. So that's what we're litigating and battling the book's going to come out, though, because Simon & Schuster's free to publish it. So we're very, very hopeful that we'll get everything cleared out by the end of this week so Mary can speak out too.

Have you ever encountered any person or institution or anything where the reliance on non-disclosure agreements permeates every single thing they do, like to the degree it does in Trump world? No. It really is extraordinary, particularly the fusion with the government and the campaign. And, you know, they have a battle going with Amarosa over something she signed during the campaign. As I understand it, they're trying to enforce it against her in an arbitration to ban her from talking about things that happened when she worked for the United States government. And so it's over the top. It's really dangerous for our democracy because what happens in the government and what happens, the government information, even classified information, is our information. And there are reasons to protect it, right? But it is our information. And so when these non-disclosure agreements are used to shield scrutiny of the President of the United States and his family and the government, it's unprecedented. It's dangerous. It violates the First Amendment. He's lost all of these cases, right? He keeps losing. Again, an unprecedented move. President Trump and his team tried to strip away Jim Acosta's hard pass, his press pass to cover the White House, tried to do the same thing to Brian Carrum. And I handled those two cases. And we won because they were flouting basic First Amendment law. They've got all sorts of other lawsuits going that haven't gone anywhere. And I think it's really an effort to intimidate people from speaking, intimidate the press, but also it's a political tool. It's a fundraising tool. It seems to excite. people who support President Trump. That's right. I think you just touched the actual hot core of some

of this is they want to generate a lot of interest among their people that it's the legal system. It's the deep state and everyone else trying to hurt Trump, even though this is, you know, as you pointed out, obviously a First Amendment question. And I guess without revealing too much of what you know about the book, what is it that is making Donald Trump so particularly over the top? Is it the finances or is it the personal stuff? What do you think is causing them the greatest anxiety in this? I would say, based on without revealing anything that I'm not supposed to reveal because of this order from court, from what's been publicly reported, it's a combination of things. One, I think President Trump knows that the more people see what he was like before and

really understand the kind of person he is and was in his actions when he was a business person with his family, but with business people, the more people would be horrified that he's the president. I really think that. It reveals his character. It's very consistent with what we've seen now, I think. And then the finances and the way President Trump and his brother and sister, and some of this is in our brief, treated their niece and nephew. And one of the arguments we have for why this agreement, this confidentiality agreement, the settlement agreement that they're invoking, which I didn't mention when I described the case, they're saying that the settlement agreement that related to Fred Trump, Donald Trump's father's estate and other business entities that Mary and her. her brother had an interest in, had a confidentiality agreement. And they're arguing that that was a ban on Mary talking or writing or speaking out on public affairs for life. It's nonsensical. But it was also, as we argue in our brief, an agreement procured by fraud, which Mary really learned of when the New York Times published that big investigative piece in October 2018. And at the time, Donald Trump and his brother Robert and his sister Marianne, they were the trustees for Mary and her brother. They were

supposed to be protecting them. And as we argue in our brief, they grossly undervalued key assets in ways that no one could have ever thought your crusties or your aunts and uncles would ever do. And in the law, that means the agreement is void and not enforceable. So finding out those things about the person who's supposed to be the leader of our country and the free world, it just really explains a lot, I think. I think we'll explain a lot. And I'm just talking about things that are in the public record and I don't want to go farther than that. But that's really, I think, the essence of why President Trump doesn't want anyone to see this book. Imagine that. Donald Trump engaging in shenanigans with finances.

I am just stunned and shocked and appalled by this revelation. Yes. We already know the story of him cutting off the nephew. Isn't that sort of known where he cut the insurance for the nephew had cancer treatment? Yes, it was widely reported. President Trump has talked about it, which is one of the reasons it's so absurd and doesn't hold water for him to be invoking. disagreement. They claim that the settlement agreement bars any of the people who signed it,

including Donald Trump, from ever talking about their relationships or the disputes or anything having to do with that agreement. And that terrible episode where they cut off the medical protection for Mary's brother's son, who had severe medical problems, has been discussed. President Trump has talked about it. And he even, even when the Daily Beast broke the story that this book was coming out, President Trump, on his own interpretation, was breaking the agreement. he claims can give way to a prior restraint. He said there's a non-disclosure agreement. That's supposed to be confidential. He said he has a great relationship with Mary's brother. So it's just ridiculous to say that Mary Trump shouldn't be able to talk about these issues, particularly now that Donald Trump is the

President of the United States. And Rick, you're right. It's, it is not shocking that President Trump was engaging in shenanigans with finances, but it really does round out the picture, I think, in a graphic way when you look back and say, how did this happen? How did we have someone who is attacking the First Amendment who is ignoring facts in the truth in the White House? And it all sort of makes even more sense when you look at his behavior now as to if you look back. Sure. I'm kind of obsessed with Charles Harder because he keeps popping up in all of these cases with this undertone of trying to wreck the First Amendment and trying to go after free speech and trying to, as Trump likes to do, talk about expanding the power of libel and expanding the power of whether or not you can bring a free speech. do, as Trump likes to do, talk about expanding the power of libel and expanding the power of whether or not you can bring a defamation case or a libel case against a reporter or an individual based on your attitude and your whim and all that. I mean, the Gawker case is what sort of me is sort of obsessing about the guy. But he's an interesting counterparty in this. He really is. I mean, he was involved in the Gawker case, which against Hulk Hogan, which produced this big verdict and then settled. So it was a demonstration that you could get a jury to issue a big verdict. That was a privacy. case, but in this context, based on speech. Can you just for one second talk a little bit about the Gawker case

and what happened there and how that sort of changed a precedent and if we can come back from that? Sure. It was a case down in Florida involved a publication by Gawker, the dissemination of a videotape that depicted Hulk Hogan having sex, just to put it in those terms. And Hulk Hogan sued based on privacy violations, not defamation, but said he was so injured and this hurt him. And there was all sorts of other evidence out there that he was perfectly happy to talk about those sorts of things and expose himself to the public. But they were able to get to a jury and get tens of millions of dollars in damages in a verdict. And it really was pretty shocking because the law still is very protective of what people do reveal themselves publicly when they're a public figure.

When they have stepped out like that, privacy protections are very much diminished. So it was a warning shot. And it didn't involve anything that was false. And so that was the beginning. of what I think has been a resurgence of libel law and defamation. David Nunez has something like six defamation. He's like the little brother to Trump in terms of libel law. Molly's favorite. Yes, he's just unbelievable. And they're just frivolous lawsuits.

And President Trump, as you remember, and I think Rick, you were referring to this in the campaign said he want, we need to open up the libel laws and make it easier to sue. Justice Thomas issued just a concurring opinion in a procedural case where it was really just kind of gratuitous, but said maybe we should look at overturning New York Times v. Sullivan, which is the cornerstone of American First Amendment law, which was, again, a scary prospect for freedom of speech in the country. So these are really serious issues. And when you have the president, you know, the campaign suing CNN and the Washington Post, the New York Times for opinion pieces, it's very serious. And I think it does flow. And Mr. Harder has been at the forefront now. He

tends not to win or the cases go away or they don't file them, but it's still. has a terrible effect, particularly when they go after, I think. But the question I have for you is, this is largely intimidation, right? Like the law doesn't support what Trump does. He just does it because he has money and lawyers. That, I think, is exactly right. There's always the possible chance that you'll hit it big, but the overriding purpose is intimidation. It's to impose fees and costs on people and have them think twice before they publish something because they don't want to get sued. And that's one of the things that caused the U.S. Supreme Court in the New York Times v. Sullivan case. And then subsequent cases to say, we need breathing space. We don't want people to not speak out because they're worried that they could get hit with a big

verdict or huge legal fees and the like. And that's exactly the principle that President Trump and Mr. Harder are defying and violating. Even if they don't win the cases, President Trump said about Tim O'Brien, when he sued him for defamation, we lost, but hey, it worked out great because we caused him a lot of of pain and made him spend a lot of money. That is wrong. That's what's so sort of incredible to me. CNN was sued by the campaign. That's still going. And it's just ridiculous. You know, it's literally when commenting on what the Mueller report said, you know, like we all get to comment, right? We get to express a review is what we think it means in the Supreme Court has said, that's can't bring a libel case on that. So, but there are cases where entities, you know, Covington and other cases

where the lawsuits are brought and they're going to be really expensive. There's risks there. And again, that has a chilling effect. That hurts freedom of speech and freedom of the press. And there's been this emboldenedment because of the way President Trump has denigrated the media. He even on the White House grounds on Saturday, on the 4th of July, took time out while he was speaking to attack freedom of the press. I mean, that's just outrageous. But it undermines the protections because people then start to doubt its importance and people start to sue more. So it's dangerous. Support troublemakers like us who speak truth to power. Believe it or not, your actions speak louder than our words and our super-egos can get very loud. Visit newabnormal.com to sign up and

become a beast inside member. Today we have Kate Brickole, a reporter at The Daily Beast who has been covering the ickiness of the Jesselan Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein Madness. She's broken a number of stories about Epstein, including his secret charity to fund Harvard and MIT research. Welcome, Kate. Hi, thanks for having me. We're excited to have you. Okay, what is going on? What's going on? As you know, Gulen Maxwell was arrested last week for her alleged role in Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking scheme. And, you know, you can't really talk about Epstein without bringing up Gillen Maxwell. She was believed to be his right-hand woman for two decades. First, she was his girlfriend, then she was his friend in Major Domo. She's accused of facilitating the sexual abuse of underage girls

and also participating in the abuse itself. At least she's been accused of that in civil court filings, but according to the indictment last week, she had helped recruit and groom victims. And this was from a time period of 1994 to 1997, and it involves three different victims who were as young as 14 years old. As I like to say, she seems nice. So here's one of the questions I had. It's obvious that the FBI knew where she was for quite a while. Her whole, like, hiding out by, I'm going to use an LLC to buy this house. That's sort of like fairly low-end, amateur level stuff.

It's clear they knew where she was. What took them this long to finally reel her in? You know, that's a good question. I think after Epstein's arrest and after his suicide, Maxwell was the number one target. And the Daily Beast and other press had speculated that she was in hiding or that she was cooperating with the feds. We now know it was the former. But last week, before she was arrested, I had been interviewing lawyers and victims about how they felt on the one year anniversary of Epstein's arrest, which is today, actually. And a lot of people, had expressed frustration that she was still walking around a free woman. So it's a very good question. Why did they let her get away for so long? Is it that they were building a case that was so strong that this is something she can't escape this time? It's a very good question. One year later, they arrested her and I think everyone's just happy that they finally did. These are federal charges, but as a New Yorker, I have a particular hostility towards Sy Vance.

Sy Vance, who is, of course, the Manhattan DA, who many people are saying, looks the other way when you're rich and famous. Because he has, over the years, managed to not prosecute a number of powerful men who have had sexual assault cases brought against them. Will there be state charges? That's a good question. I do not know the answer to it, but it feels like it's bigger than a state case right now. I mean, especially because the public corruption unit is behind the charges. So it's a good question on the same. state, and it's very disturbing that Syvance apparently never took this case on. I mean,

the abuse that Epstein took part in was known to authorities for decades, right? Maria Farmer first reported what happened to her back in 1996. So why did no one take it seriously at the time? One of my questions about the extent of this case, and look, I look at it in two tracks. One, there's this obvious horrifying behavior that however he got the money he had, he deployed an awful lot of it to sustain this perversion and this exploitation of young women. But I think all the chattering class is interested in, does he have tapes? Did she keep track? Do they know who it was? Can they prove who was there, who partook in the services that Jeffrey Epstein enjoyed for himself? Very good question. Virginia Jufre, who was recruited by Maxwell in 1999,

at Trump's Maralago Resort had previously said that Epstein and Maxwell were asking her to not only perform sex acts with these men, but to get information on them, to pay attention to the details about what these men wanted. Virginia said that Epstein claimed he told her he did this, so they would quote, owe him and be in his pocket. So I think there is some chattering about some sort of blackmail scheme. And Virginia was the first person to kind of allude to this in an affidavit a few years ago. See, there's the dirt. So the big question with this is, who will she dime out on? And can the federal government keep her safe? Where does she go now? When will Bill Barr kill her? Don't yet. All right. Rick is joking. Let the red her show. I don't know if you

know this. About a year ago, well, not long after I've seen Zethmali and I wrote a wrote a satirical piece for The Beast. Then it was Jared and Hillary who did it. Together. The bipartisanship. What do you think, yeah? Well, I mean, all joking aside, I mean, it's a joke, right? But it's not.

We're all worried. We're hoping she makes it to her next court appearance, right? And I think there's a lot of people outside of even public officials. The obvious people who are friends with Epstein are former President Clinton, current President Trump, obviously Prince Andrew. Virginia claimed that she was forced to have sex with former governor Bill Richardson in New Mexico and also former Senator George Mitchell. So those are people whose names have been out there for a while. But, you know, there's also power players in New York City who are probably shaking in their boots as well.

People like hedge funder Glenn Dubin, whose family has had a longstanding relationship with Epstein. I think there's just a lot of people who are very nervous that Gillen is going to spill the secrets. Do you think she will? Well, when faced with the rest of her life, B.I. Bars, I mean, if she's convicted on these charges, that's 35 years in prison, you would think she would squawk, right? I mean, she's used to this high-rolling lifestyle. We saw she bought this mansion in New Hampshire where she was hiding out in cash. I mean, why would she give up any sort of semblance of her life, right? The other day, I read somewhere that she has like $2 billion in the bank. Is that true? Do we know that? So according to the detention memo that authorities released, she had millions of dollars across 15 different bank accounts. I think that's how she was able to buy her New Hampshire property for a million in cash. And the funny thing is that earlier this year, Gillen had filed a claim against Epstein's estate, you know, saying essentially that she's a victim in this.

He promised to always take care of her. She's had death threats and she needs to pay for private security. I mean, it was completely insane that she was trying to get money from his estate. Why would she do that if she has all these different foreign and domestic bank accounts? Well, as a podcast, folks, so you can't see the tiny violin that I am currently playing for Gailen Maxborough. Epstein was a monster of pretty high order, pretty grotesque figure. But in some ways, from what at least the narrative is right now, she was sort of the empowering force. She was sort of the fixer.

I think you called her the Major Domo. It's difficult for me to see where the prosecution says, oh, yeah, you've given up person X. That's better because she seems like she has an awful lot of the responsibility of this. Oh, certainly. I mean, her life will never be the same. And I think when she met Epstein in the 90s, I'm not sure under which circumstances she did, but, you know, she moved to New York for a new life after her family fortune was lost in scandal. And that sealed her fate, meeting Epstein.

I mean, soon after she met him, she was engaged in. this pattern of abuse and spoken to a friend of Gillen who told me Maxwell was infatuated by him. She looked at him as her savior. He helped her continue this life of luxury. Gillen's job was to make connections for Epstein, but she was enjoying his money and what he could provide for her. So I think for the last few years, her connections with Epstein have kind of made her radioactive, especially the last five years or so. But before that, she was kind of still on the social circuits still being photographed with people in Silicon Valley, people in Hollywood. Yeah, I think this is it for her, right? I don't think that she'll ever kind of be allowed back in. I would hope.

Why do you think it's being handled by public corruption and not by sex crime? I'm not an expert on this, but I assume it was assigned to this unit because this unit focuses on crimes committed by government officials or employees. And I think it suggests that this investigation will involve current or former government officials. And we just are waiting to see who that might be. And last fall, we saw the unsealing of a batch of court documents that were previously private. And it showed the names of tons of different famous people who are connected to Epstein, tons of people that Virginia Jufray allegedly was forced to have sex with. And so I think that's just the tip of the iceberg. Right now, there's a batch of court documents that are undergoing a review. And I think

people are still waiting to see which men are going to be named in these court records. There's two different anonymous John Does who are trying to fight the release of these records, right? So who else are we looking at? Does one of them rhyme with Schmallen Schmerchowitz? No, he's not in John Doe. He's in Allen Dershowitz, right? Right, right. Alan Dershowitz claims the release of these documents will prove his innocence. once and for all. So let me ask you one question because this is a, people use the word shocking too loosely.

They use the word incredible too loosely, shocking too loosely. What is the most shocking thing you've discovered and all the things you've covered so far in this case? Wow, that is a difficult question to answer. I mean, there's so many things that I thought would never be real, right? I mean, there's an accusation that Jeffrey Epstein was trying to make his New Mexico compound a baby ranch so he could fill the,

human race with his DNA. As one does. As one does. Yeah, the baby ranch is the most shocking, I would say. I mean, he was trying to get Virginia Jupre to have his and Maxwell's baby. They were saying that if Virginia signed away the rights to her baby and just let them have her baby, she would be covered for life. That was also a shocking accusation.

I mean, it's just shocking to me that Epstein was trafficking underage girls. I mean, some of them didn't even speak English. And even in the Palm Beach police probe back in 2005 and 2006, there were allegations that he bought a woman from her family. And that woman ended up being a co-conspirator in the plea deal. But, I mean, was he buying women from their families and making them his sex slave? It's just incredibly disturbing. I'm just curious, like, how much further into the New York and Palm Beach Society we're

going to drill in these things and how much more we're going to discover. I don't think it's going to be pretty. No. I mean, Jeffrey Epstein as recently as when he got out of jail the first time after his Palm East jail stint, high society people were still welcoming him and still going to his home for dinners. I mean, there was even a New York Times reporter that was supposedly friends with him. And I think it's just very disturbing. I think there's going to be a lot of people in New York who are going to be kind of caught with this whole situation. I don't hate to see. that. No, honestly no. Well deserved is my feeling.

Hey Molly, who's your fuck that guy today? So my fuck that guy this week is the simple son, Eric Trump. The wide gumbed? The wide gums. Eric the slow. Eric the slow. Because on Twitter, which you and I never do, especially not right now while we're doing this, we never tweet during recording an episode.

Almost never. Absolutely never. And our producer never notices that and says, like, what the hell are you doing? But why I want to talk about Eric Trump today was Eric Trump tweeted a picture of Jess Land Maxwell from the wedding of Chelsea Clinton. And it was really tacky. I mean, first of all, it's Chelsea Clinton's wedding. Second of all, Chelsea Clinton has been through the fucking ringer from this Trump family. And third of all, there are hundreds of pictures of his dad with just Len Maxwell.

And so immediately hundreds of people on Twitter started sending pictures of like his dad. There's a picture of Melania and Trump looking very sort of sexualized next to Justlan and Jeff Epstein. I mean, there are just numerous pictures of Trump and Epstein and Justlan Maxwell. And so for that incredibly stupid move, Eric Trump, the simple son, the future of the Republican Party, is my fuck that guy of the week. Rick, who is your fuck that guy? Uday is always a fan favorite. That's right. My fuck that guys this week, Public Citizen came out today with a report about the 40 lobbyists who have cashed in on COVID.

There is a group of about 40 major lobbyists in D.C. We'll put the link in the show notes to the study. I'm not even going to go through the whole list because they are, most people won't know their names. But these are people who are selling to the federal government services of companies, many of which are not even vaguely qualified to provide them, getting billions of dollars of federal money. through these lobbyists who are all close to the Trump campaign. It's guys like David Urban and Brian Ballard. These people are major donors and major fundraisers to Trump. It is absolutely one of the most egregious things I have ever seen as a cash in.

These lobbyists are going to all these firms and saying, hey, if you want to be in the COVID fight, you'd better pay us because we're connected to Trump. We'll decide whose bids live or die. It just tells you that everything Trump said about the swamp was projection. He has made one that is more transactional. more egregious. And frankly, at a moment where we need qualified firms to be able to go and do the work to prevent and to mitigate and treat and hopefully cure this thing, we don't need to have to pay off gatekeepers to bribe Trump. And on the other side of that, we don't need a bunch of

incompetent Yahoo jackoffs who are pushing unproven folk remedies and Dr. Trump's miracle elixir, getting lobbyists to force the federal government to pursue things that are dead ends or ineffective or dangerous. So again, we'll put the show notes up there. But when the vice chair of your inaugural committee and the top fundraisers are the people that are able to clear people to get contracts to the Trump administration, fuck that guy. Fuck all those guys. Well, it's interesting. It's like we continually see when they're not incompetent. They're just kleptocrats. Right. I mean, look, they're one skill set. They're one complete powerful ability to do work is to enrich themselves and the Trump family. When it comes to that, they're fucking McKinsey. They're like, stealth. They're

and managing things that rake off some skim for Team Trump. So they're the McKinsey of Gryft. They're the McKinsey of Gryft. I like it. I think you should patent that or trademark that. On that note, we'll wrap up this episode of the new abnormal from The Daily Beast. In future episodes, we'll be talking with smart folks from The Daily Beast and beyond from media, culture, politics, and science who will help us understand what's happening

to our country and the world. We hope you'll subscribe to us on your favorite podcast app and share the show on social media. We're just getting started and don't want you to miss an episode. If you'd like to follow us on Twitter, I'm Molly Jongfest, and he's the Rick Wilson. Thanks so much for listening, and we'll see you again on the next episode. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star-studed The Daily Beast podcast at the Daily Beast.com slash podcasts. If you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber. Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and support all of your podcasts as we

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