23 July 2025, 19:17
MJinesThe Trump Playbook
Trump Playbook On Epstein
Step 1: Have Bondi declare there is no "there there"
Step 2: Tell all the MAGAt "boys and gals" to chill and get back in line
Step 3: Declare the Epstein scandal to be a hoax cooked up by left wing radicals to fool unsuspecting MAGA sycophants
Step 4: Release the MLK files from decades ago and see if folks will scurry off after them
Step 5: Announce that Obama was a traitor and see if folks will scurry off after that claim
Step 6: Have the toady Speaker of the House adjourn the House to avoid a vote on releasing docs
Step 7: Announce that one of your pet DOJ lawyers will meet with Ghislaine to secretly accomplish the art of the deal
Step 8: Weave the word "transparency" into every sentence or at least every paragraph
Step 9: [Stay Tuned]
. . . move along, move along, nothing to see here. Keep moving.
24 July 2025, 19:25
MJines. . . let the "you scratch our backs, we'll scratch yours" dance begin. You vindicate Donny, you get DOJ help to reduce your sentence or get you out. I sort of like the mafia parallel since Trump definitely runs his Administration like a criminal crime family.
[Blanche? Name sound familiar? Yeah, he’s the same fellow that represented Trump in his criminal trial. Sort of like sending your consigliere to cut the deal. Reminiscent of Tom Hagen visiting Frank “Frankie Five Angels” Pentangeli in prison in The Godfather II.]
Maxwell will try to make a deal with Trump Epstein lawyer: Maxwell will try to make a deal with Trump
Story by Susie Coen
The Telegraph
Ghislaine Maxwell will attempt to make a deal with the Trump administration when government officials visit her in prison, Jeffrey Epstein’s former lawyer claimed.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche announced he would meet the convicted sex offender in the “coming days” to find out if she has information about anyone who participated in Epstein’s sex crimes.
“She’s going to make a deal” with the Department of Justice (DoJ), Alan Dershowitz, the Harvard law professor who previously represented Epstein, said.
“That’s the way things are done. They make deals with the Mafia, so I’m certain they are going to try to make a deal with her,” he told The New York Post.
Maxwell was subpoenaed by the House oversight committee on Wednesday to give a deposition from prison on August 11.
“The facts and circumstances surrounding both your and Mr Epstein’s cases have received immense public interest and scrutiny,” James Comer, chairman of the committee, wrote to Maxwell.
Mr Comer said the committee is seeking her testimony “to inform the consideration of potential legislative solutions to improve federal efforts to combat sex trafficking and reform the use of non-prosecution agreements and/or plea agreements in sex-crime investigations”.
Justice Department seeks interview with Ghislaine Maxwell over Epstein case
President Donald Trump continues to battle the biggest challenge of his presidency, the fallout from his refusal to release all the information the US government has on Epstein.
The political storm is something of a gift to Maxwell’s lawyers, who attempted to lean on Mr Trump during a previous conviction appeal, describing the US president as the “ultimate dealmaker”.
Mr Dershowitz, who previously called Maxwell, 63, the “Rosetta Stone” of information about Epstein, added: “She knows everything – not just about the perpetrators but the victims. And she knows about the victims who became perpetrators.”
Maxwell has two potential avenues for having her sentence reduced. The government could file what is called a Rule 35 motion, to request her sentence be reduced by a federal judge based on conduct, including cooperation with the government.
But any request would have to be granted by a federal judge, and Maxwell’s case is being overseen by US District Judge Paul Engelmayer, who was appointed by Barack Obama.
The other option would see Mr Trump himself commute Maxwell’s sentence, or grant her a pardon, which, as the US president, he has unfettered power to do.
Mr Trump has not been implicated in any allegations of wrongdoing, but his close relationship with Epstein has come back into focus since the DoJ ruled there was no “client list” of men who participated in Epstein’s crimes.
On Tuesday, Mr Trump said he was facing a “witch hunt” as he faced mounting pressure to order the release of secret Epstein files.
But a former federal prosecutor who flipped Mafia bosses while working for the government – and helped secure their releases as a defence lawyer, said Maxwell’s case is not so simple.
“This is a situation where she potentially has information on the very person who holds the key to the jailhouse door for her, that is the president of the United States”, Edward A McDonald told The Telegraph.
“It would seem that, unless she exonerates Trump, she is not going to get any quid for her quo, he’s not going to pardon her or agree to have the justice department give her a lesser sentence... and of course, if she exonerates Trump, she’s also going to have to cooperate in other cases, but no one’s going to believe her testimony,” he added.
Mr McDonald, who secured the release of mob boss Joseph Massino in 2013 after he cooperated with federal prosecutors after being handed two life sentences, said Maxwell was “hardly a credible witness”.
Maxwell was charged with two counts of perjury over alleged lies she told the government during a 2016 civil deposition about Epstein.
He said any prosecutor would need to have a “tremendous amount of corroboration” for any potential testimony she might give, which if they had would have already been acted upon.
“If she exonerates Trump, no juror is going to believe her, so the value of her cooperation is going to be minimal, and of course, if she includes Trump, if she implicates Trump, she’s certainly not going to get pardoned,” he said.
Mr McDonald, who played himself, the US Attorney who flipped mob boss Henry Hill, in Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas, said the case is also thorny for Mr Trump, whose supporters will interrogate why he pardoned her if cooperation does not lead to any indictments.
“Even the Trump base is going to say, ‘oh, wait a minute, he obviously has exonerated her, because she kept him out of it,’” he said.
In the event the DoJ requests a sentence reduction, the supervising judge has the power and autonomy to reject it.
Mr McDonald noted that when he was a prosecutor in the early 1980s and convicted the inside man who set up the robbery at John F Kennedy airport in 1978, the judge rejected his request for a sentence reduction for the defendant’s cooperation because it had not led to any indictments.
“He said it was a dollar short and a day late,” he said.
Former federal prosecutors have said the way this case has been handled is extraordinary and has not followed usual procedures.
Mitchell Epner, a criminal defence lawyer who is a partner at firm Kudman Trachten Aloe Posner, told The Telegraph: “I have never seen a case where the DOJ has announced ahead of time that it was going to be meeting with a potential cooperator.”
He also said it was “absolutely extraordinary” that Mr Blanche, the number two in the DoJ, would hold a meeting that is usually carried out by a line prosecutor.
“It definitely seems the impetus here comes from outside the DoJ because this is so foreign to standard operating procedure,” he said.
Mr Blanche was appointed to the plum role at the DoJ after representing Mr Trump during his criminal fraud case in Manhattan.
