Donald Trump and his administration have a different definition of “total transparency” in mind, because the White House swooping in to seize control of the Department of Justice’s social media page right as sensitive Jeffrey Epstein documents are being released isn’t exactly what anyone would call subtle.
According to a new report by Axios, the White House has begun managing the DOJ’s account on X (formerly Twitter) as the administration scrambles to meet congressional deadlines for releasing the Epstein files.
The move comes after a whiplash-inducing few days where Trump officials resorted to everything from their usual tactics of crying fake news and pointing fingers at Democrats, to quietly scrubbing at least 16 files from the DOJ website — including a photo featuring the president — all in an effort to control a narrative that keeps slipping through their fingers.
The Justice Department, under Trump’s directive, has apparently learned a new trick, which I’m going to refer to as “selective skepticism.” It has cautioned that some documents contain “untrue and sensationalist claims” made against Trump, specifically the ones submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election. “If they had a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already,” the department insisted, per CNN. Funny how that didn’t apply when photos of Bill Clinton surfaced on Friday. Then the DOJ was happy to suggestively label a redacted person in a hot tub photo as a “victim” of Epstein’s abuse.
Gaslighting the taxpaying public, one tweet at a time
The messaging is clear enough for everyone to wrap their heads around. Documents implicating Democrats? Totally credible. Documents mentioning Trump? Obviously fabricated hit jobs that lack even a “shred of credibility.” It’s the kind of logic that only works if you don’t think about it for more than three seconds, and the Trump gang is definitely betting on the fact that most people won’t.
Meanwhile, CNN also reports that frustration is mounting within Trump’s inner circle over the botched handling of the entire Epstein saga. The president himself spent Tuesday afternoon on the golf course before returning quietly to Mar-a-Lago, so you know that he’s counting on the MAGA faithful to overwhelm the voice of reason in the online discourse.
Even Marjorie Taylor Greene, once a staunch Trump supporter, essentially called him “evil” for refusing to release the files. “This is horrifying. Trump called me a traitor for fighting him to release the Epstein files and standing with women who were raped, jailed in stalls, and trafficked to men,” she wrote on X. “Only evil people would hide this and protect those who participated.” You know you’re really going through it when you lose MTG on an issue.
If this alleged takeover of the DOJ social media pages turns out to be true, it raises fundamental questions about how much control the president should even exercise over law enforcement institutions, especially if he’s a possible suspect himself. After so many years, the public deserves the transparency that was promised to them regarding Jeffrey Epstein. What they’re getting instead is the White House controlling the message, which is somehow both predictable and concerning.
Happy holidays, America. The government is definitely not hiding anything.
(featured image: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
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