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      Democrats demand Pam Bondi and Kash Patel be summoned for Epstein hearing

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      Democratic members of the House judiciary committee on Thursday demanded that Republicans summon the attorney general, Pam Bondi, the FBI director, Kash Patel, and their deputies for a hearing into the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein’s death and the sex-trafficking case against him.The letter from all 19 Democratic members on the committee to its Republican chair, Jim Jordan, comes amid a rift between Donald Trump and some of his supporters over the justice department’s conclusion, announced last week, that Epstein’s death in federal custody six years ago was a suicide, and that there is no secret list of his clients to be made public.The US president, who knew Epstein personally, has long claimed that there is more to be made public about his death and involvement in running a sex-trafficking ring for global elites. Last week’s report, together with the justice department’s announcement that nothing further about his case would be made public, has sparked rare criticism of Trump among the rightwing influencers and commentators who are usually among his most ardent defenders.In their letter, Democrats argued that the matter can only be settled if Bondi and her deputy, Todd Blanche, along with Patel and his deputy, Dan Bongino, appear before the judiciary committee.“The Trump DOJ and FBI’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein matter, and president Trump’s suddenly shifting positions, have not restored anyone’s trust in the government but have rather raised profound new questions about their own conduct while increasing public paranoia related to the investigation,” the Democratic lawmakers wrote.“Only a bipartisan public hearing at which administration officials answer direct questions from elected representatives before the eyes of the American people can restore public trust on the matter.”A spokesperson for Jordan did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Democrats have sought to capitalize on the questions raised by the justice department’s announcement, and earlier on Tuesday, House Republicans blocked an attempt by the minority to force release of documents related to the Epstein case.Last week, most Democrats on the judiciary committee signed a letter to Bondi that accused her of withholding some files related to the financier to protect Trump from any damaging disclosures. It went on to call for the release of any documents in the Epstein files that mention Trump, as well as the second volume of former special counsel Jack Smith’s report into Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified materials.In this week’s letter, Democrats argued that only a congressional hearing would resolve whether there is indeed a cover-up over Epstein’s death, or if Trump was just promoting conspiracy theories as he sought an advantage on the campaign trail.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“We must submit to public scrutiny President Trump’s and MAGA’s longstanding claims about the ‘Epstein files,’ new questions as to whether President Trump himself has something to hide, whether he is keeping damaging information secret to protect other individuals or to maintain future blackmail leverage over public and private actors,” the lawmakers wrote, “or, perhaps the simplest explanation, whether President Trump and his Administration magnified and disseminated groundless Epstein conspiracy theories for purposes of political gain which they are now desperately trying to disavow and dispel.”The reignited turmoil over the Epstein case has sparked reports that Bongino, a former podcaster who has long promoted conspiracies about his death, clashed with Bondi and is considering resigning his position at the FBI.Over the weekend, Trump defended Bondi in a post on Truth Social and pleaded with his supporters. “One year ago our Country was DEAD, now it’s the ‘HOTTEST’ Country anywhere in the World. Let’s keep it that way, and not waste Time and Energy on Jeffrey Epstein, somebody that nobody cares about,” he wrote. More

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      How the Trump administration’s handling of the Epstein files became a vehicle for QAnon

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      The release of the “Epstein client list” has long been the holy grail for the Maga movement. Supposedly, this list, once released, would incriminate a veritable who’s who of liberal elites complicit in Jeffrey Epstein’s child sex-trafficking operation and expose the moral rot at the heart of the Democratic establishment.The mystery surrounding the Epstein files also became a vehicle for QAnon conspiracy theorists to push their ideas about a “deep state” cover-up of a network of global pedophiles into the broader tent of the Maga movement.During his campaign, Donald Trump promised on several occasions to declassify the Epstein files, which would include the “list”. Before they joined the government, Trump’s FBI chief, Kash Patel, and deputy FBI chief, Dan Bongino, spent years on podcasts and TV appearances winking at QAnon and Epstein conspiracy theorists and demanding the files’ release, even suggesting that the Biden administration was withholding them to protect its own.Then, on the heels of the Fourth of July holiday weekend, the justice department quietly dropped a bombshell in the form of a memo. A “systematic review” of the Epstein files by justice department officials “revealed no incriminating ‘client list’,” the memo stated, nor did they find evidence that Epstein blackmailed powerful figures. The memo also affirmed that Epstein died by suicide in his Brooklyn jail cell while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges in 2019.Since the memo’s release, Maga has been in turmoil – and some of Trump’s most loyal foot soldiers have been in open revolt against his administration, accusing it of now being part of a cover-up and calling for the resignation of the attorney general, Pam Bondi, over her handling of the Epstein files.On Truth Social, Trump offered a stern rebuke to his detractors, claiming that the Epstein files were actually a hoax, because they were written by “Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration”.But not everyone’s buying it.“This is the worst response I’ve ever seen from President Trump,” said the rightwing commentator Benny Johnson. The disgraced former general Michael Flynn, considered a hero by the QAnon movement, wrote: “@realdonaldtrump please understand the EPSTEIN AFFAIR IS NOT GOING AWAY.” The rightwing commentator Matt Walsh called Trump’s statement “extremely obtuse”, adding: “We don’t accept obvious bullshit from our political leaders.”Maga’s obsession with the Epstein files is an indication of how the core ideas associated with the fringe QAnon conspiracy – that a shadowy cabal of government elites is working to cover up a global child sex-trafficking operation – have taken root in the broader pro-Trump movement.QAnon took a long tradition of antisemitic, “deep state” and “satanic panic” conspiracy theories, put them on steroids with a pro-Trump flavor, and assigned the enigmatic Q, supposedly a government official with top secret clearance and a penchant for posting on 8chan, at the helm of the movement.“The unique thing about QAnon is that you had an anonymous poster on an anonymous chatroom putting out clues for people to try to solve,” said Joseph Uscinski, a political science professor at the University of Miami specializing in the study of conspiracy theories.When QAnon emerged in 2017, allegations against Epstein had been swirling for over a decade.Epstein’s arrest in 2019 on federal charges was a boon for QAnon. The movement quickly sought to incorporate information about the case into their propaganda. The case also surfaced a trove of digital media that QAnon sleuths could pore over looking for “clues” – such as photographs of Epstein with various public figures (including many with Trump), Epstein’s flight logs and aerial images of his private island.“Epstein engaged in crimes, but I think there’s a whole fantasy lore surrounding it that goes far beyond any available evidence,” said Uscinski.Jon Lewis, a research fellow at George Washington University’s program on extremism, told the Guardian that as “QAnon and Maga have become increasingly intertwined in recent years, we have seen the embrace of increasingly fringe conspiracies and extremist narratives like ‘Pizzagate’ and ‘Save the Children’ by mainstream political figures.”These narratives turned out to be useful for Trump and his allies, who harnessed simmering suspicion of establishment figures and cast the former reality star as the only person brave enough to take on “the deep state”.“As Trump and other prominent Republican figures amplified QAnon content and used it as a political cudgel against Democratic politicians like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, they were providing legitimacy and approval to the very same conspiracy theorists who are now decrying Pam Bondi and the justice department,” said Lewis.Tensions over the Epstein files have been building since February, when Bondi went on Fox News and said Epstein’s client list was sitting on her desk “right now for review.” A week later, at a press event at the White House, Bondi handed out binders that she promised contained “declassified” Epstein records to two dozen Maga influencers. The influencers quickly realized there was basically no new information in them. In response to the ensuing backlash, Bondi said that the FBI had failed to disclose a tranche of Epstein files, and that she had ordered Patel to compile them.Months later, in June, Elon Musk – amid the dramatic feud with his former friend Trump – claimed without evidence that the reason the Epstein files hadn’t been released in full was because the president was implicated in them. (Musk has since deleted the post.)The scale of the current Maga meltdown “certainly shows the significance of Epstein conspiracies within the broader QAnon pantheon”, said Lewis, and “should lay bare just how deeply the disease of the QAnon movement has seeped into a Republican party which has welcomed its most conspiratorial, antisemitic, reactionary fringe into Congress and the executive branch with open arms”.The backlash Trump is facing is a leopards-eating-faces moment for the administration.“This was a conspiracy that Donald Trump, Pam Bondi and these Maga extremists have been fanning the flames of for the last several years, and now the chickens are coming home to roost,” the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, told reporters Monday.Uscinski noted that’s “the interesting thing that happens when you use conspiracy theories to get into power”.“Because conspiracy theories should be aimed at the people in power, right? They accuse powerful people of doing something wicked behind the scenes,” he added.In Trump’s case, he “spent the last 10 years building a coalition of largely conspiracy-minded people in the US”, said Uscinski. “So in order for him to keep these people engaged and donating and going to his speeches, and voting for him and voting for Republicans, he has to keep pressing the conspiracy theories.”But experts are skeptical that this current Maga meltdown will have any lasting impact.Trump’s overall approval rating hasn’t fluctuated dramatically over the past week. In fact, it’s almost at exactly the same place it was at the same point in his first administration.“[Trump’s supporters] are disgruntled, they’re upset and they’re going to express that on social media. But they’re not going to abandon him, because he’s the only game in town for them,” said Uscinski.He compared the current moment to the backlash Trump faced back in 2021. After courting favor from anti-vaxxers, Trump was booed when he announced during a live Bill O’Reilly interview that he had received his Covid-19 booster shot and urged Americans to get theirs.Despite the importance of the Epstein files to the Maga and QAnon movements, Lewis thinks that “it’s unlikely this outrage will last”.“The culture war will move on to its next target … and the rage machine will follow with conspiracies and vitriol,” said Lewis. “It’s much easier to be angry at an immigrant than to wonder whether you’ve been lied to for the last eight years.” More

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      Does Kash Patel deserve to run the FBI? Of course he does – and I’ll take a lie detector test to prove it | Arwa Mahdawi

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      ‘Once upon a time, in the land of the free, there lived a wizard called Kash the Distinguished Discoverer.” That piece of verbal wizardry is the opening line of a children’s book trilogy called The Plot Against the King (aimed at children aged three and above) by a Mr Kash Patel. The first book, published in 2022, is like Harry Potter for conspiracy theorists. Kash helps King Donald battle Hillary Queenton and a “shifty knight”, who have been spreading lies about the king working with the Russionians. In the final book in the trilogy (The Plot Against the King 3: The Return of the King) a couple of villains called Comma‑la‑la‑la and Baron Von Biden make an appearance.Not so long ago, publishing deeply weird books about the president while also promoting wild QAnon conspiracy theories would get you put on some kind of watchlist. Now it gets you a top job as the guy in charge of watchlists. Patel is not just a children’s book author; he is also the director of the FBI. His chief qualification for the role appears to be his extreme devotion to President Donald Trump. He certainly didn’t have any FBI experience before getting the job as head of the agency.I don’t know if Patel suffers from impostor syndrome – a condition that normally afflicts overqualified women – but he does seem a tad insecure. Last week the New York Times reported that Patel’s FBI has “significantly” increased its use of lie detector tests to screen employees for loyalty. According to the Times, some people have specifically been asked if they’ve ever been rude about their boss; “disparaging Mr Patel or his deputy, Dan Bongino … could cost people their job”. Woe betide the FBI underling who admits that they think Patel’s official photo on the US Department of Defense website (which has been much-memed online) looks as if he’s just been caught smoking joints behind the bike shed and is trying his very best to act sober.Polygraph tests, which track physiological reactions (eg did your heart rate spike?) while you answer questions, are notoriously unreliable. They can be successfully gamed by people who know how they work and are adept at controlling their bodily responses in high-pressure situations. You know, people like FBI employees. That said, it’s certainly possible that the FBI is secretly in possession of infallible lie-detecting technology (called something like WaterboardingAI™?).While Patel may come across as insecure, paranoid and generally doolally, he is not always wrong. In his 2023 opus Government Gangsters: The Deep State, the Truth, and the Battle for Our Democracy, which is written for “grownups”, he writes about how power works in Washington.“I regularly used to tell people that the fastest way to move up in the government is to just screw up, and the bigger the screw-up, the bigger the promotion,” he writes. “Every person implicated in your mistakes has an interest in covering up what they did, so they will promote you. That means the people at the very top are usually the most immoral, unethical people in the entire agency.” No comment there.Anyway, I think I’ve screwed up myself. Like a dimwit, I’ve just realised that all of the above might sound a tad disparaging towards Patel. Which, as a British-Palestinian on a green card that’s up for renewal, was certainly not my intention. So, just to clarify, Kash, I’ve been writing in English-English. While American English tends to be blunt, the king’s English is a whole different kettle of fish.When we say, “That’s very interesting,” for example, we often mean it’s absolute tripe. When we say “quite good”, it means either that something was indeed quite good or that it was actually quite disappointing – you’ve got to read the room. Calling something “not bad”, on the other hand, often means it’s very good.And, of course, the British are also very fond of sarcasm, which Americans can sometimes miss. So, with the greatest respect, Mr Patel, I do not think you are an idiot. I think you are a “distinguished discoverer” and the greatest FBI director to ever walk God’s green Earth. And I’ll even take a lie detector test to prove it. Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist

      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

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      Tuesday briefing: What Trump’s ‘massive’ weapons deal for Ukraine means for the war – and for Putin

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      Good morning. It looks like the bromance between Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, is over. Maybe for good.Last night an exasperated Trump said he had finally had enough of “tough guy” Putin’s refusal to give him what he wants: an end to the war in Ukraine. The United States, he announced, will start selling what the Nato secretary general Mark Rutte, sitting alongside him at a White House press conference, called “massive numbers” of weapons to Ukraine to help it defend itself against Russia.Trump also delivered an ultimatum to Putin: agree to a ceasefire within 50 days or face – you guessed it – tariffs.Yesterday’s press conference with Rutte is a sign of just how much has changed in the past six months. It was only in February that the world witnessed the excruciating spectacle of Trump and his vice-president, JD Vance, humiliating and belittling the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, at the Oval Office before a live global TV audience of millions.For Ukraine’s supporters in Congress and in Europe, this is a moment of victory with the US now firmly diplomatically and militarily in Kyiv’s corner. The issue is the extent to which Trump’s antipathy towards Putin translates into long-term support for Kyiv, and whether the extra military clout ends up being enough to turn the conflict decisively in Ukraine’s favour.For today’s newsletter, I talked to Dan Sabbagh, the Guardian’s defence and security editor, about what the breakdown in diplomatic relations between Trump and Putin could mean for Ukraine and the prospects for peace. That’s after the headlines.Five big stories

      Middle East crisis | A feud has broken out between the Israeli government and the military over the cost and impact of a planned camp for Palestinians in southern Gaza, as politicians attacked the former prime minister Ehud Olmert for warning that the project would create a “concentration camp” if it goes ahead.

      UK news | A senior coroner’s officer who first reviewed the deaths of babies at the Countess of Chester hospital for Cheshire police in 2017 has said she believes Lucy Letby has suffered a miscarriage of justice. Last month, Stephanie Davies wrote to Cheshire’s senior coroner that: “I am now extremely concerned that the convictions of Ms Letby are wholly unsafe.”

      NHS | Wes Streeting has said resident doctors’ strikes would be “a gift to Nigel Farage” before a meeting with the British Medical Association this week where he will seek to avert industrial action.

      UK news | Constance Marten and Mark Gordon have been found guilty of the manslaughter of their newborn daughter, who died after they took her to live in a tent in freezing wintry conditions to evade social services.

      Media | A report on the behaviour of Gregg Wallace has substantiated 45 allegations made against the former BBC presenter, including claims of inappropriate sexual language and one incident of unwelcome physical contact.
      In depth: ‘Tonally, today we saw a very, very different Trump’View image in fullscreenAs relationships go, it’s fair to say Trump and Putin’s status has now shifted from “it’s complicated” into more definitively hostile territory, as the former’s frustration with Russia’s refusal to budge in the stalled peace talks seems to have reached a crescendo.“I don’t want to say he’s an assassin, but he’s a tough guy,” Trump said yesterday as he announced the new US arms sales to Ukraine, noting that several of his predecessors had also become disillusioned with Putin.“Tonally, today we saw a very, very different Trump when it comes to Russia,” said Dan Sabbagh. “Up until yesterday there was this feeling that he still believed he could get Putin to the table and make some kind of sweetheart peace deal but all of that seems to have gone away. Diplomatically it is a decisive shift.”What military support did Donald Trump announce?Although neither Trump nor Rutte put a number on the value of the weaponry heading Ukraine’s way, Trump said “top of the line” equipment would be arriving to Ukraine’s European allies very soon.The US will provide a number of Patriot missile systems – a long-range, all-altitude, all-weather air defence system to counter tactical ballistic missiles and aircraft – funded by Germany and other Nato partners.Considering the almost nightly bombardment Ukraine and its people are coming under, this is likely to be very welcomed by Ukraine and would be a significant step in helping Ukraine to defend itself.Trump also threatened tariffs of “about 100%” if a deal isn’t done to end the war in 50 days.How have relations soured between Trump and Putin?After Trump won his first term in 2016, his admiration for Putin’s strongman image and insistence that the Russian president wasn’t such a bad guy set the US on a wholly different course in terms of its willingness to engage with Russia.The start of his second term was characterised by hostility towards Ukraine and its president, Zelenskyy – whom Trump branded a “dictator” – and a desire to negotiate one-to-one with Putin about a ceasefire and end to the war. Only this month the US briefly halted shipments of arms to Ukraine because it said its own stockpiles were too low.Still, over the past month Trump has been increasingly bewildered at Putin’s refusal to give him the peace deal he so desperately needs to make good on his boast that he can end the Ukraine war – even if not in his promised 24 hours. While Ukraine has buckled to US demands such as signing a minerals deal, Putin has given Trump nothing of any substance (apart from, of course, a flattering portrait). Trump’s sense of betrayal has only increased as Putin has stepped up his attacks on Ukrainian cities. Putin “talks nice but then he bombs everybody in the evening”, Trump said at the weekend.Dan said the new arms package that the US has announced for Ukraine was Trump’s attempt to claw back some leverage over the Russian leader. While it remains to be seen what difference it can make militarily, this is a diplomatic turning point in relations between the two superpowers.“For me, the fact that he’s agreed in principle to sell weapons to Ukraine is more important than any threat about tariffs,” said Dan. “Some Ukrainian analysts have been saying that they thought that Putin has overplayed his hand with Trump and I would agree with that.”What does this mean for Ukraine?Dan said that after his public humiliation in the Oval Office, Zelenskyy was quick to act on advice from European leaders to appeal to Donald Trump’s ego. One fascinating detail in an Axios report yesterday was that one of the things that seems to have worked in Zelenskyy’s favour with Trump was him wearing a suit instead of his usual military attire at the recent Nato summit.“After Zelenskyy walked into that ambush he swiftly realised that he had to be patient because Putin himself would prove to Trump that he was not a good-faith actor, which so far appears to have played out,” said Dan.While the US arms sale for Ukraine is, undoubtedly, a sign of better relations with Washington, Dan also agreed with the assessment that the new shipment was probably more to do with Trump’s anger and frustration at Putin than deep-seated support of Ukraine.“I don’t think Trump thinks he’s fallen out with Putin,” said Dan. “It could be that in a few days or weeks, if Putin starts making noises again about being prepared to make concessions, we could see Trump flexing back.”Dan thought it was significant that Trump brought up his wife, Melania, at the press conference saying that she had been sceptical about their friendly phone calls all along. “Even if he was just musing aloud it was an acknowledgment that at the heart of his family there has been someone just prodding him out of the idea that Putin was serious about peace.”How could this influence the outcome of the war?Dan said that without a concrete dollar amount in the billions attached to what the US will sell Ukraine’s European allies, it is hard to get a firm understanding of just how potentially decisive this military support to Ukraine could be.“The real question is how much these new US weapons will make a difference to the war and improve Ukraine’s ability to fight the kind of war it needs to fight, which is a hard defensive war that will allow it to remain stable and better counter these Russian missile attacks,” said Dan.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionDan said what is clear is that Russia is setting itself up for engaging in a “forever war” until it achieves its objectives, whatever the cost. “Russia just hopes to just grind Ukraine down,” said Dan. “It seems prepared to stomach casualties of more than 1,000 per day and has organised itself around a war economy that could keep going for a long time.”Could the US starting to send “massive” amounts of weaponry to Ukraine make the Kremlin think again?Dan doesn’t think so. “Militarily at the moment it doesn’t appear to be a decisive intervention and my instinct is that Russia isn’t going to stop and that Ukrainians have to come to terms with the fact that nothing is going to change any time soon.”What else we’ve been readingView image in fullscreen

      This feature by Keith Stuart is a fascinating deep dive into how creative video games like Minecraft and Animal Crossing can help Ukrainian refugee children understand and cope with trauma. Craille Maguire Gillies, newsletters team

      This interview by Ruaridh Nicoll with the Guardian’s Gaza diarist, the anonymous writer who catalogued his life during the five months of the war, is a devastating but urgent read about his life under fire and how he escaped into exile. Annie

      John Merrick is pointed on how “a new chorus of ‘declinism’” is becoming part of the national consciousness once again – and with it comes racialised undertones that distract us from the true causes (it’s not migrants) and solutions (hello, wealth distribution). Craille

      I absolutely hoovered up this beautiful ode to Pamela Anderson by Caitlin Flanagan in the Atlantic (£). A gorgeous piece of writing about her love for Anderson and what she can teach us about resilience and grace in the face of industrial-levels of misogyny. Annie

      Thanks to Rukmini Iyer, who has not only solved supper at my house with her recipe for cashew rice bowls with stir-fried tofu, but helped me see what I might do with kimchi, an ingredient I enjoy but don’t often reach for. Craille
      SportView image in fullscreenCricket | England beat India at Lord’s to take a 2-1 lead in the series after a tense final day. Third Test: England, 387 & 192, bt India, 387 & 170, by 22 runs.Football | The president of Fifpro has described the Club World Cup as a “fiction” and compared Gianni Infantino to the Roman emperor Nero, as the dispute between the players’ union and Fifa continued to escalate.Cycling | Ben Healy rode himself into the ground to become the first Irishman in 38 years to wear the yellow jersey, as Simon Yates claimed victory in stage 10.The front pagesView image in fullscreenThe Guardian print edition leads with “Trump issues warning to Putin as he does deal with Nato to arm Kyiv”. The Telegraph says “Trump threatens China over Russian oil” and the Financial Times has “Trump threatens 100% trade levies if Russia does not end war in 50 days”. The Daily Mail splashes on “The killer aristocrat” and further offers “Revealed: why daughter of privilege had four children taken into care”. “Arrogance of monster parents” – that’s the Metro about the same case. The Daily Mirror’s top story is “Sacked Gregg: I won’t be the last” while the Times runs with “New grant to push sales of electric cars for net zero” and the Express predicts “Next tax raid will ‘pick the pockets’ of the grafters”. In the i paper you can read “UK to offer new bumper mortgages for £30,000 earners as Reeves sweeps away crash rules”.Today in FocusView image in fullscreenThe law change that could transform toxic workplacesZelda Perkins was Harvey Weinstein’s PA – and has spent the last eight years campaigning against the non-disclosure agreements used to silence abused employees. Now she has won a major victory. Alexandra Topping reportsCartoon of the day | Ben JenningsView image in fullscreenThe UpsideA bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all badView image in fullscreenFussy eaters are often mocked and, as Jason Okundaye writes, they are misunderstood. “I am of Nigerian heritage after all, and I grew up eating and loving a range of dishes – abula, efo riro, bokoto – that would probably flip the stomachs of many Europeans on sight.” What stresses him out are ordinary foods with textures he finds unpleasant: nuts in desserts, cheese, oats, tuna, brown bread. “But I eventually grew tired of my own fussiness”, he admits, and so he made one small change: every week, he would eat as much of a food containing a single ingredient he had previously avoided, a kind of culinary exposure therapy. It’s still a work in progress: he’s overcome his nut aversion thanks to baklava but can’t stomach the oats in Hobnobs. But while he “recently braved the evil mayonnaise, and heaved so violently that I thought I was dying”, Okundaye gives himself full points for trying. His old dislikes, he realises, are a matter of taste – not a reason to panic.When he’s not forcing food down, Jason edits The Long Wave, our weekly Black life and culture newsletter – make sure you sign up here.Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every SundayBored at work?And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow.

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      How the Jeffrey Epstein row plunged Maga world into turmoil – a timeline

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      The Department of Justice’s announcement that it did not have a list of Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged clients, and that the convicted sex offender was not murdered, has plunged the rightwing world into turmoil.Conservative commentators and media figures, some of whom spent years pushing conspiracy theories about Epstein’s death, have accused the government of covering up the hedge fund manager’s crimes, with calls growing for Pam Bondi, the attorney general, to resign.The saga has pitted Trump, who was friends with Epstein for many years before later disowning the financier, against his base, with the president pleading over the weekend for his supporters to “not waste time and energy on Jeffrey Epstein”.This is how we got here.Epstein charged6 July 2019Epstein is charged with federal sex-trafficking crimes in a Manhattan court. Prosecutors allege that Epstein, who was taken into custody, “sexually exploited and abused dozens of minor girls” from 2002 to 2005 at homes in Manhattan and Palm Beach, Florida. Epstein pleads not guilty.The charges come more than a decade after Epstein and the Miami US attorney’s office reached a deal that ended a federal investigation involving at least 40 teenage girls. Epstein pleaded guilty in 2008 to state charges, served 13 months in jail and registered as a sex offender.Epstein dies10 August 2019Guards find Epstein dead in his cell at Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan. On 16 August New York’s chief medical examiner rules that the cause of death was suicide by hanging, but lawyers for Epstein say they are dissatisfied with the medical examiner’s conclusions.Trump shares conspiracy theory on Epstein death11 August 2019Trump shares a tweet from rightwing comedian Terrence Williams, which claims Bill and Hillary Clinton were involved in Epstein’s death. After criticism, Trump doubles down, telling reporters:“The question you have to ask is, did Bill Clinton go to the island? Because Epstein had an island. That was not a good place, as I understand it, and I was never there.” Trump adds: “So you have to ask, did Bill Clinton go to the island? That’s the question. If you find that out, you’re going to know a lot.”A spokesman for the Clintons says the family knows nothing about the crimes committed by Epstein, who was known to have a number of famous and powerful associates, including Prince Andrew. Trump himself was friends with Epstein, and in 2002 said he had known Epstein for 15 years, describing him as a “terrific guy”. The pair later fell out following a bidding war on a Florida property.The theories spreadAugust 2019The official ruling that Epstein committed suicide does little to quell conspiracy theorists. Much of the commentary, particularly from the rightwing, focuses on Epstein’s relationship with liberal figures, including Clinton.The phrase “Epstein didn’t kill himself” begins to spread online, with Joe Rogan and even Republican members of Congress posting it on social media.Maxwell charged29 December 2021Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s ex-partner and longtime confidante, is convicted of sex trafficking. The judge says Maxwell is “guilty of one of the worst crimes imaginable: facilitating and participating in the sexual abuse of children. Crimes that she committed with her longtime partner and co-conspirator, Jeffrey Epstein.”Epstein documents made public3 January 2024A trove of court documents identifying associates of Epstein are unsealed. The documents, which had been filed as part of a lawsuit against against Maxwell in 2015 by one of Epstein’s victims, Virginia Giuffre.Bill Clinton, Michael Jackson, David Copperfield and Donald Trump were among those named in the documents – although none of the men were accused of wrongdoing. Giuffre claimed that Epstein and Maxwell forced her into a sexual encounter with Prince Andrew at age 17, and Giuffre sued Prince Andrew over the alleged sexual abuse. The suit settled in early 2022. Andrew has denied any wrongdoing.Trump asked about Epstein on campaign trail3 September 2024Trump, running for president, is asked in an interview if he would declassify “the 9/11 files” and “the JFK files”. He says yes. Trump is then asked if he would declassify “the Epstein files”, and initially says yes, but adds:“I think that [declassifying the Epstein files], less so, because you don’t know – you don’t want to affect people’s lives if there’s phony stuff in there, because there’s a lot of phony stuff with that whole world.”List on desk21 February 2025In an interview with Fox News, Pam Bondi is asked: “The DoJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein’s clients, will that really happen?”Bondi replies: “It’s sitting on my desk right now to review.”Bondi will later suggest she was referring to Epstein case files, not a client list.Some files released to conservative influencers27 February 2025After Trump and JD Vance pledged during the 2024 election campaign that they would release files relating to Epstein’s crimes and contacts, the Department of Justice [DoJ] gives a group of conservative commentators binders labeled “The Epstein Files: Phase 1”. The files contain little new information, leaving conspiracy theorists disappointed.Bondi describes the documents as the “first phase of files”, and in a statement the DoJ says it “remains committed to transparency and intends to release the remaining documents upon review and redaction to protect the identities of Epstein’s victims”.Musk accuses Trump5 June 2025Amid a row over Trump’s proposed tax bill, Elon Musk posts on X: “Time to drop the really big bomb. @realdonaldtrump is in the Epstein files. That is why they have not been made public.”Musk later deletes the tweet.No client list7 JulyThe DoJ announces that Epstein did not keep a client list, and said no more files related to his sex-trafficking investigation would be made public. The department releases an 11-hour video of the scene outside Epstein’s cell during hours before and after his death, showing that no one entered or left the room. But a minute of footage is missing, prompting further speculation. Bondi says the missing minute is due to the Bureau of Prisons resetting the video.Backlash begins7 JulyRightwing media and commentators begin to lash out at the DoJ. Laura Loomer, the 32-year-old conspiracy theorist whose influence over Trump has come under scrutiny, accuses Bondi of “covering up child sex crimes”. “NO ONE IS BUYING THIS!! Next the DOJ will say ‘Actually, Jeffrey Epstein never even existed.’ This is over the top sickening,” Alex Jones, the rightwing commentator and conspiracy theorist, writes on social media. On Truth Social, the rightwing, Trump-owned platform where people are usually united in their praise for the president and his administration, numerous users criticize the government over Epstein.Row at the White House9 JulyDan Bongino, the deputy director of the FBI who spent years pushing conspiracy theories about Epstein’s death, reportedly clashes with Bondi at the White House. Bondi accused Bongino of leaking to news outlets, after NewsNation reported that the FBI had wanted to release more information on Epstein “months ago”, but was prevented from doing so.Resignation reports11 July NBC News reports that Bongino is considering stepping down from his post at the FBI amid the Bondi row.“Bongino is out-of-control furious,” a source told NBC News said. “This destroyed his career. He’s threatening to quit and torch Pam unless she’s fired.”Trump calls for calm12 JulyTrump writes a lengthy Truth Social post pleading with his supporters.“What’s going on with my ‘boys’ and, in some cases, ‘gals?’ They’re all going after Attorney General Pam Bondi, who is doing a FANTASTIC JOB! We’re on one Team, MAGA, and I don’t like what’s happening. We have a PERFECT Administration, THE TALK OF THE WORLD, and ‘selfish people’ are trying to hurt it, all over a guy who never dies, Jeffrey Epstein.”Trump adds: “One year ago our Country was DEAD, now it’s the ‘HOTTEST’ Country anywhere in the World. Let’s keep it that way, and not waste Time and Energy on Jeffrey Epstein, somebody that nobody cares about.”The post is the first time Trump has been “ratioed” on Truth Social: more people comment on the post than like it, which typically suggests disagreement. More

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      US supreme court allows Trump to resume gutting education department

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      The US supreme court on Monday cleared the way for Donald Trump’s administration to resume dismantling the Department of Education as part of his bid to shrink the federal government’s role in education in favor of more control by the states.In the latest high court win for the president, the justices lifted a federal judge’s order that had reinstated nearly 1,400 workers affected by mass layoffs at the department and blocked the administration from transferring key functions to other federal agencies. A legal challenge is continuing to play out in lower courts.The court’s action came in a brief, unsigned order. Its three liberal justices dissented.A group of 21 Democratic attorneys general, school districts and unions behind a pair of legal challenges had warned in court papers that Trump’s shutdown efforts threatened to impair the department’s ability to perform its core duties.Created by Congress in 1979, the Department of Education’s main roles include administering college loans, tracking student achievement and enforcing civil rights in schools. It also provides federal funding for needy districts and to help students with disabilities.Federal law prohibits the department from controlling school operations including curriculum, instruction and staffing. Authority over these decisions belongs to state and local governments, which provide more than 85% of public school funding.The department’s Republican critics have portrayed the department as a symbol of bureaucratic waste, underlining the need for smaller federal government in favor of greater state power.In March, Trump sought to deliver on a campaign promise to conservatives by calling for the department’s closure.“We’re going to be returning education, very simply, back to the states where it belongs,” Trump said on 20 March before signing an executive order to close the department to the “maximum extent” allowed by law.Trump said that certain “core necessities” would be preserved, including Pell grants to students from lower-income families and federal funding for disadvantaged students and children with special needs, though he said those functions would be redistributed to other agencies and departments.Trump in March directed that the department transfer its $1.6tn student loan portfolio to the Small Business Administration and its special education services to the Department of Health and Human Services.Although formally eliminating the department would require an act of Congress, the downsizing announced in March by US education secretary Linda McMahon aimed to slash the department’s staff to roughly half the size it was when Trump took office in January.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBoston-based US district judge Myong Joun, an appointee of Democratic former president Joe Biden, concluded in a 22 May ruling that the mass firings would “likely cripple the department”. He ordered the affected workers to be reinstated and also blocked the administration’s plan to hand off department functions to other federal agencies.The plaintiffs, Joun wrote, are “likely to succeed in showing that defendants are effectively disabling the department from carrying out its statutory duties by firing half of its staff, transferring key programs out of the department, and eliminating entire offices and programs”.The Boston-based first US circuit court of appeals on 4 June rejected the Trump administration’s request to pause the injunction issued by the judge.In a court filing asking the supreme court to lift Joun’s order, the justice department accused him of judicial overreach.The plaintiffs warned that mass firings at the department could delay the disbursement of federal aid for low-income schools and students with special needs, prompting shortfalls that might require cutting programs or teaching staff.They also argued in court papers that Trump’s shutdown effort would undermine efforts to curb discrimination in schools, analyze and disseminate critical data on student performance, and assist college applicants seeking financial aid. More

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      Trump promised to lower energy costs – his tax bill will raise them for people in red states the most

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      The cost of electricity is poised to surge across the US in the wake of Republican legislation that takes an axe to cheap renewable energy, with people in states who voted for Donald Trump last year to be hardest hit by the increase in bills.As air conditioners crank up across the US during another sweltering summer amid an unfolding climate crisis, rising energy costs will become even more severe for households due to the reconciliation spending bill passed by Republicans in Congress and signed by Trump, who called it the “big, beautiful bill”, on 4 July.By stripping away support for cheap solar and wind energy production, the legislation is set to cause electricity rates paid by families and businesses, many already struggling to pay their bills, to rise by much as 18% by 2035, according to an analysis by Energy Innovation, an energy and climate policy thinktank.Household energy costs, which span electricity and gas use, will rise by $170 on average every year by 2035, the report finds, with Republican-leaning states bearing the brunt of the increases. Bills in Missouri will spike the most, by $640 a year, with the next largest increases – in Kentucky, South Carolina, Oklahoma, North Carolina and Texas – all also hitting states that voted for Trump in last year’s presidential election.Trump won the election, in part, by promising to lower inflation and cut US energy costs in half within a year. In office, he has sought to boost fossil fuel consumption while slashing incentives for clean energy projects and barring them from federal lands.“I don’t want windmills destroying our place,” the president said last month. “I don’t want these solar things where they go for miles and they cover up a half a mountain that are ugly as hell.”But the Republican bill’s wiping out of tax credits for renewables will stymie wind and solar projects that are typically now cheaper than gas or coal, forcing utilities to rely more heavily on existing, inefficient gas generators, Energy Innovation said. This will push up energy costs across the US, particularly in states that have not enacted their own policies to boost renewables.“Demand for electricity is increasing and without renewables we aren’t able to meet that new demand,” said Dan O’Brien, senior analyst at Energy Innovation and author of the new study.“We’ve seen US power prices generally fall over the past 75 years, but with this bill for the first time we will see sustained increases in power costs. Lower-income folks in rural areas in red states will have compounding impacts from this bill – their states voted to pass this but it will really harm them in the long term.”Environmental groups were scathing of the Republicans who voted for the reconciliation bill. “After an election where cost-of-living was the driving issue that pushed millions of working-class Americans to check the box for Donald Trump, it’s mind-boggling that Republicans just passed a bill that will raise costs across the board,” said Lena Moffitt, executive director of Evergreen Action, a climate change advocacy organization, who called the legislation “one of the most catastrophic bills in a generation”.Electricity prices for American households have already increased above the rate of inflation since 2022, with a slew of new data centers for artificial intelligence helping push up overall demand for power. This trend has placed further strain upon “energy insecure” people who struggle to meet the cost of heating, cooling and lighting their homes. Around 34m households, more than a quarter of all dwellings in the US, reported difficulties in paying energy bills in 2020.“A lot of people are struggling and it’s a hardship that’s often not highlighted,” said Michelle Graff, an energy policy expert at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Lower-income people, as well as those who are Black, Hispanic, elderly, have young children or live in poorly constructed and badly insulated homes, are most at risk of this sort of energy insecurity.“For a lot of these folks, even $10 extra on their bill each month will result in difficult trade-offs, such as forgoing medicines or food for their families,” Graff said. “Increasing those bills month after month will have a big impact upon households on the margins.”Electricity price rises are regulated by the states and some jurisdictions offer help to residents struggling to pay their bills, as Maryland did last month.But such assistance is now being stripped away at the federal level, with the Trump administration seeking to eliminate the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (or Liheap), which aids around 6m US households with their bills. The reconciliation bill also deletes subsidies for the construction of energy-efficient homes and upgrades to home cooling, heating and insulation systems.“That is a lifeline for many, many Americans,” Graff said of the Liheap program. “There is this mismatch where the hardships are getting worse while we are cutting assistance for people to address that hardship.”Across the US, utilities have pushed for $29bn in higher rates so far this year, which is 142% more than the same period in 2024, a recent report found. At least 16 states, meanwhile, allow utilities to cut off power to people during extreme heatwaves if they have not paid their bills. Such cutoffs can prove deadly – last month, Shauna Thomas, a 55-year-old woman, was found dead in her stiflingly hot St Louis, Missouri, apartment after her electricity was halted for non-payment.“Air conditioning and access to electricity is life-saving, but in most states there are very limited protections for these shut-offs,” said Diana Hernandez, a researcher of energy and health inequities at Columbia University. “People are reluctant to put on their AC because of the fear of a high bill. It’s easy for them to get into a debt spiral and hard for them to get out of it. This can end up as a life-or-death matter.”Extreme heat is the leading weather-related cause of deaths in the US, with advancing global temperatures due to the burning of fossil fuels causing longer and fiercer heatwaves. This summer in the US is expected to be hotter than the long-term norm for the season, with explosive demand for cooling causing a strain upon the grid in some places – in June, 110,000 people in New York City lost power due to a surge of electricity use during a hot spell.In the hottest parts of the US, lengthy power blackouts could prove catastrophic. If a prolonged heatwave and a blackout hit Phoenix, Arizona, at the same time, half of the city’s 1.6 million residents would require urgent medical help and 1% of the population would die, a 2023 study warned.“Climate change is upon us and as it gets hotter and hotter, there will be more hardship that people face in trying to keep themselves cool,” said Hernandez.“It used to be that people thought about energy access in the winter months, to help keep them warm, but that has changed now. As we keep getting hotter years, this problem isn’t going away.”The White House was contacted for comment. More

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      Trump says he spoke to Dan Bongino after reports deputy FBI director could leave post over Epstein files fallout – US politics live

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      Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. I’m Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next few hours.We begin with news that president Donald Trump said on Sunday he spoke to deputy FBI director Dan Bongino to try to calm an uproar over how the Justice Department handled the probe into the death of accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and his alleged clientele, Reuters reported.Asked by reporters if Bongino remained in his position after reportedly pondering resigning, Trump said: “Oh I think so… I spoke to him today. Dan Bongino, very good guy. I’ve known him a long time. I’ve done his show many, many times. He sounded terrific, actually.”Bongino represents a part of Trump‘s ‘Make America Great Again’ base of support that has long been suspicious of Epstein, whose 2019 death in federal custody has been ruled a suicide. In a joint memo released last Monday, the FBI and the Justice Department said there was no evidence to support a number of long-held conspiracy theories about Epstein’s death and his alleged clientele.Conservative influencers from Laura Loomer to Elon Musk have criticized Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel for their findings, which came months after Bondi pledged to reveal major revelations about Epstein, including “a lot of names” and “a lot of flight logs.”US media, including Fox News and NBC News, have reported that Bongino has clashed with Bondi over the issue and was considering stepping down.Patel and Bongino, a former conservative podcaster, both previously made statements before working at the FBI about a so-called client list and often suggested that the government was hiding information about Epstein from the American public.In other news:

      King Charles has invited Donald Trump for an unprecedented second state visit in September, scheduling the trip for three days when parliament is not sitting and removing the possibility of the US president addressing parliament. The visit is a coup for the White House, with Trump becoming the first elected politician in modern history to be granted two state visits, after his earlier one in 2019.

      However, the US president received a frostier reception when he made an appearance at the Club World Cup final in New Jersey on Sunday. Trump was booed and jeered by the crowd during the national anthem before the match and again while presenting the trophy to Chelsea alongside Fifa president Gianni Infantino.

      The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has called on the EU to “defend European interests resolutely” after Trump threatened to impose 30% tariffs on nearly all imports from the EU. It came as the EU moved to de-escalate tensions after the blunt move by Trump on Saturday. The bloc declared a further pause on €21bn of retaliatory tariffs until 1 August, dovetailing with the US president’s new deal deadline.

      On Monday, in an extraordinary show of force, a convoy of federal agents descended upon Los Angeles’s MacArthur Park. Chaperones from a summer camp hurried children indoors, as protesters and media rushed to the scene. City leaders denounced the spectacle as a “political stunt” designed to terrorize Angelenos who have been reckoning with a relentless onslaught of immigration raids that began in early June.

      Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, said on Sunday that Trump wants to have the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) “remade” instead of eradicated entirely. In a new interview on Sunday with NBC, Noem defended the Trump administration’s response to the deadly Texas floods that have killed at least 120 people, saying: “I think the president recognizes that Fema should not exist the way that it always has been. It needs to be redeployed in a new way, and that’s what we did during this response.”

      Rosie O’Donnell has shrugged off a threat from Trump to revoke her US citizenship on the grounds that she is “a threat to humanity”. The New York-born actor and comedian said on Sunday that she was the latest in a long list of artists, activists and celebrities to be threatened by the US president.

      A new Senate committee report on the attempted assassination of Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last year, described the events as a “cascade of preventable failures” and called for more severe disciplinary action to be taken with the Secret Service in the future. In the 31-page, highly critical findings released on Sunday, the Senate homeland security and governmental affairs committee lamented the mishandling of communications around the rally and said Trump was denied extra security on the day.

      Trump said the US will send Patriot air defence systems to Ukraine to help it fight off Russian attacks amid a souring of his relations with Vladimir Putin.

      Kevin Hassett, the White House economic adviser, said Trump has seen some trade deal offers and thinks they need to be better, adding that the president will proceed with threatened tariffs on Mexico and the EU if they don’t improve.
      Donald Trump’s threat to impose 30% tariffs on European goods would “practically prohibit” transatlantic trade, the EU’s lead negotiator with the US has said.Arriving for talks with European ministers in Brussels, Maroš Šefčovič, the EU trade commissioner, said a tariff of 30% or more would have a huge impact, making it “almost impossible to continue” current transatlantic trade, which is worth €4.4bn (£3.8bn) a day.Expressing disappointment, he said his negotiating team thought they had been close to a deal. “The feeling on our side was that we are very close to an agreement,” as he said the two sides had been negotiating an agreement in principle – the outlines of a deal – for four weeks prior to Trump’s blunt announcement at the weekend.The US president said on Saturday that EU imports would face a tariff of 30% from 1 August, denting European optimism that talks to secure a still painful 10% duty were almost finalised.In response to Trump’s latest deadline, the EU decided to postpone retaliatory countertariffs on €21bn of US goods that had been due to kick in at midnight on Monday until 1 August.Ministers will also discuss plans for a further round of countermeasures, targeting €72bn of US imports to the EU.Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. I’m Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next few hours.We begin with news that president Donald Trump said on Sunday he spoke to deputy FBI director Dan Bongino to try to calm an uproar over how the Justice Department handled the probe into the death of accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and his alleged clientele, Reuters reported.Asked by reporters if Bongino remained in his position after reportedly pondering resigning, Trump said: “Oh I think so… I spoke to him today. Dan Bongino, very good guy. I’ve known him a long time. I’ve done his show many, many times. He sounded terrific, actually.”Bongino represents a part of Trump‘s ‘Make America Great Again’ base of support that has long been suspicious of Epstein, whose 2019 death in federal custody has been ruled a suicide. In a joint memo released last Monday, the FBI and the Justice Department said there was no evidence to support a number of long-held conspiracy theories about Epstein’s death and his alleged clientele.Conservative influencers from Laura Loomer to Elon Musk have criticized Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel for their findings, which came months after Bondi pledged to reveal major revelations about Epstein, including “a lot of names” and “a lot of flight logs.”US media, including Fox News and NBC News, have reported that Bongino has clashed with Bondi over the issue and was considering stepping down.Patel and Bongino, a former conservative podcaster, both previously made statements before working at the FBI about a so-called client list and often suggested that the government was hiding information about Epstein from the American public.In other news:

      King Charles has invited Donald Trump for an unprecedented second state visit in September, scheduling the trip for three days when parliament is not sitting and removing the possibility of the US president addressing parliament. The visit is a coup for the White House, with Trump becoming the first elected politician in modern history to be granted two state visits, after his earlier one in 2019.

      However, the US president received a frostier reception when he made an appearance at the Club World Cup final in New Jersey on Sunday. Trump was booed and jeered by the crowd during the national anthem before the match and again while presenting the trophy to Chelsea alongside Fifa president Gianni Infantino.

      The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has called on the EU to “defend European interests resolutely” after Trump threatened to impose 30% tariffs on nearly all imports from the EU. It came as the EU moved to de-escalate tensions after the blunt move by Trump on Saturday. The bloc declared a further pause on €21bn of retaliatory tariffs until 1 August, dovetailing with the US president’s new deal deadline.

      On Monday, in an extraordinary show of force, a convoy of federal agents descended upon Los Angeles’s MacArthur Park. Chaperones from a summer camp hurried children indoors, as protesters and media rushed to the scene. City leaders denounced the spectacle as a “political stunt” designed to terrorize Angelenos who have been reckoning with a relentless onslaught of immigration raids that began in early June.

      Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, said on Sunday that Trump wants to have the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) “remade” instead of eradicated entirely. In a new interview on Sunday with NBC, Noem defended the Trump administration’s response to the deadly Texas floods that have killed at least 120 people, saying: “I think the president recognizes that Fema should not exist the way that it always has been. It needs to be redeployed in a new way, and that’s what we did during this response.”

      Rosie O’Donnell has shrugged off a threat from Trump to revoke her US citizenship on the grounds that she is “a threat to humanity”. The New York-born actor and comedian said on Sunday that she was the latest in a long list of artists, activists and celebrities to be threatened by the US president.

      A new Senate committee report on the attempted assassination of Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last year, described the events as a “cascade of preventable failures” and called for more severe disciplinary action to be taken with the Secret Service in the future. In the 31-page, highly critical findings released on Sunday, the Senate homeland security and governmental affairs committee lamented the mishandling of communications around the rally and said Trump was denied extra security on the day.

      Trump said the US will send Patriot air defence systems to Ukraine to help it fight off Russian attacks amid a souring of his relations with Vladimir Putin.

      Kevin Hassett, the White House economic adviser, said Trump has seen some trade deal offers and thinks they need to be better, adding that the president will proceed with threatened tariffs on Mexico and the EU if they don’t improve. More