Rep. Raskin Discusses Smoking Gun Findings in Epstein Files
2/14/202626 mincomplete
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1:01They call this the lucky country.
1:03Trouble is there's only so much luck to go around.
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1:30I want to talk about the types of documents that Donald Trump fears the most
1:35in the Epstein files. And it's documents like these where Democratic Congress member, Jamie Raskin,
1:41who got access to that special DOJ facility where they're showing the unredacted files.
1:48But as I'll talk about in a little bit, those are the unredacted files from
1:52the redacted files that were produced.
1:55But the unredacted are still redacted.
1:58And then there's another group of files that just millions of documents, which either have
2:03been destroyed or are being hidden.
2:05So I want you at all to follow that.
2:06But in any event, when Jamie Raskin and other Congress members were able to go
2:11to this DOJ facility, they found documents like this.
2:14Here's how Congress member Raskin describes it.
2:17The Department of Justice has not sent forth its so -called privilege log.
2:21So it's not explained yet why there might be certain redactions that have been made.
2:28I saw one document, which was an email that was sent by Jeffrey Epstein to
2:37Ghislaine Maxwell, which was the foreword of an email that he had received from some
2:42of his lawyers, giving an account of a conversation between Epstein lawyers and Trump lawyers
2:50and others about what had taken place during that 2009 period.
2:58It was during the period of the 2009 investigation.
3:02And Epstein's lawyers synopsized and quoted Trump as saying that Jeffrey Epstein was not a
3:13member of his club at Mar -a -Lago, but he was a guest at Mar
3:17-a -Lago and he had never been asked to leave.
3:20And that was redacted for some indeterminate, inscrutable reason.
3:26I know it seems to be at odds with some things that President Trump has
3:29been saying recently about how he had kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club or
3:35asked him to leave. And this was at least one report that appears to contradict
3:40it. It contradicts it also in a huge way.
3:42Why would that document be redacted?
3:44What's the privilege between Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein emailing each other?
3:50There's no privilege there. But let's ask Pam Bondi what her thoughts are, not about
3:56the stock market going over 50 ,000, but about the cover up of a child
4:00sex trafficking ring. Dan Goldman, Congress member from New York, cross -examined Bondi about that
4:05exact document and watch her response.
4:07I also found an email that I have right here from Jeffrey Epstein to Ghislaine
4:13Maxwell that was unredacted. And it included notes of statements that Donald Trump made about
4:20his prior relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
4:23Now, there is no reason for this to be hidden from the American people.
4:27There is no privilege. There is no attorney -client privilege.
4:31And I see you're checking with your staff.
4:33And I can assure you, staff, this is not under attorney -client privilege because it
4:38was sent from Jeffrey Epstein to Ghislaine Maxwell.
4:41Will you commit to publicly providing the unredacted version of this so that the American
4:48people can understand the extent of Donald Trump's lies about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein?
4:55You're about as good of a lawyer today as you were when you tried to
4:58impeach President Trump in 2016.
5:00Have you apologized for that in 2019?
5:03So, will you unredact this?
5:05Will you unredact this? You're a lead counsel on that.
5:07Privileged. I'm asking you, will you unredact this?
5:09Privileged. Privileged, of course. I look forward to discussing this more privileged objections sustained my
5:17own it's ridiculous stuff but it's deeply serious well I want to call in Congress
5:22member Jamie Raskin ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee who you all saw at
5:27that committee hearing that Pam Bondi train wreck Congressman I want to talk about that
5:31hearing but let's talk about this document because I've been laser focused on this specific
5:36document because it seems to contradict surprise surprise everything that Donald Trump's been saying and
5:42it does and it was redacted from the public but you were able to see
5:45it can you talk to us about that document well I think it was the
5:48first substantive document that I got to and I think I was the first member
5:54to show up for the the big opportunity to go after the unredacted materials and
6:03you know there are thousands and thousands of such documents in there and it struck
6:10me immediately that it was at odds with what Donald Trump has been saying because
6:14he's been saying you know the minute I learned something went wrong or the minute
6:17he stole one of my employees or you know the story changes of course but
6:21I sent him off you know I cut him off and so on and this
6:24would seem to contradict that at least what he said in that telephone interview was
6:30quite the reverse which is he was not a member of his club but he
6:33was a guest at the club and he was never sent away it sounds like
6:36he was always welcome there and remember they were best friends for more than a
6:40decade so this whole process Ben has been set up as a massive cover -up
6:45it's not designed to get at the truth it's designed with just multiple layers of
6:52obfuscation and trap doors so that it's going to be very difficult for us to
6:57arrive at any coherent sense of what actually took place even in terms of the
7:03crimes being committed against girls and women much less uh the big picture money relationships
7:09and power relationships that structured uh this conspiracy or these overlapping conspiracies as a former
7:16litigator first off the idea that there would be any type of attorney -client privilege
7:21when no attorneys are even copied on there or deliberative process privilege when Epstein sending
7:28an email to gilane what what who's the is is does they work at the
7:32fbi i mean what are they each other's attorneys like what the hell are we
7:35even talking about there but then you go you know another step you know as
7:40as a litigator i look at this message as it being forwarded between gilane and
7:46and Epstein to basically imply and the fact that there's really nothing else written in
7:51it just the message seems to be trump's playing ball he's in 20 minutes he
7:57said what we wanted him to say and nothing else had to even be said
8:03other than look what look what our lawyers are saying that trump did to avoid
8:07having his deposition taken because he's not giving them what they want and i read
8:12it that way how'd you read it i read it exactly the same way um
8:15on the privilege question though i would just take your point which is right one
8:19step further which is that federal law trumps any state privilege in any event so
8:25the whole idea that somebody says oh well there was an attorney client privilege even
8:29though the attorneys weren't involved even though this was being uh released to a third
8:34party who was not part of any potential privilege thereby destroying the whole thing um
8:38leaving all of that aside there's a federal law that compels them to turn everything
8:43over and the only thing that must be redacted is the names of the victims
8:49and of course in more than 100 cases that we know of on tens of
8:54thousands of uh uh pages um there were uh releases of the names the addresses
9:02the phone numbers in some cases even uh the nude images of people who should
9:09have been uh redacted and who were covered by what congress passed yeah when we
9:14talk about a privilege log for our audience out there that you know may not
9:18know what that word means it's basically like a spreadsheet that includes the document number
9:23and then it gives a description why it was that this document's not being produced
9:28and because if it is a privileged document you're not going to specifically write out
9:32all the specifics about what's said in the document but you give a little description
9:36this is privilege because of attorney client privilege between this person and that person and
9:41you give a description and we do that all the time in litigation that's just
9:44part of what you do if you're withholding documents the epstein transparency act requires a
9:50report to be prepared precisely on these redactions and part of the cover up here
9:55is that that report hasn't been produced and they don't even care that it hasn't
10:00been produced like it's literally built into the law give us a report why you're
10:03withholding and they're like yeah we're just not going to do that yeah so look
10:09um it it came out at the end of the hearing uh because of a
10:13photographer's uh capture of some of the papers in um attorney general bunny's burn book
10:21that they basically had been um tracking our use of their four computers to uh
10:31look into the unredacted uh version of the three million out of six million documents
10:38that were released uh Okay, and this was in the case of Pramila Jayapal, where
10:42they had given to Attorney General Bondi a document that said Pramila Jayapal's search history,
10:50and presumably they had the same thing on each one of us.
10:53In other words, they were looking at what we were looking at before she came
10:57in to testify, so they'd be prepared to answer anything that we posed to the
11:03Attorney General. Well, that's obviously a massive attack on the separation of powers, on our
11:08ability to conduct oversight within our legislative responsibilities, and an insult to the speech and
11:16debate clause and the whole thing.
11:18So we would like to use this as an opportunity for a reset, where we
11:22go back to basics and say, look, this isn't working the way this is happening
11:26right now. This is not a game of hide -and -go -seek.
11:30You've got to turn all these materials over, and we're going to need a completely
11:34new methodology for working this so we can get our staffs involved.
11:39We're not allowed to have our staff involved, and there are all kinds of Supreme
11:42Court cases that say that members of Congress depend on their staffs.
11:46Some describe them as our alter egos because we have so many competing responsibilities.
11:51We need staff to help on stuff like this, and we need staff to be
11:56involved, and we need much greater access than we have now.
12:00But fundamentally, as you were saying, we need an explanation for why something like 200
12:07,000 pages have been redacted of the 3 million they turned over, and then what
12:12the hell happened to the other 3 million documents?
12:15The DOJ is saying, well, it's duplicative.
12:18Well, if it's duplicative, just turn it over.
12:19But we know that there's stuff in there that's not duplicative, including the memos relating
12:24to victim interviews. People would call up and say, I've been the victim of human
12:30trafficking. I've been the victim of rape.
12:33And there's a memo made about it.
12:35A lot of those are in there.
12:35And the reason we know those are in the 3 million withheld documents is because
12:40there are women who are survivors who are saying they cannot find them in the
12:443 million documents that have been turned over.
12:46There's also in there various prosecutor memoranda that were created for the original 60 -count
12:54federal indictment that was traded away unbelievably for one sweetheart plea of a state count
13:03of solicitation to prostitution. So they had a huge, gigantic federal prosecution ready to go,
13:12blowing the cover on the whole thing.
13:14And somehow it all got swept under the rug back with Alex Acosta and Alan
13:19Dershowitz and that team working with, you know, people in the DOJ.
13:25And I mean, we really need to try to reconstruct what happened there.
13:28Right. I mean, normally in a litigation, we would take the deposition of a PMK
13:34or a PMQ, a person most qualified or person most knowledgeable, to get the universe
13:40of documents and then direct our document request once we know the full universe.
13:45And then we would issue subpoenas to various other sources, see if things are being,
13:49you know, and there's a whole process there.
13:51So we're trying to now reconstruct a universe of documents where the DOJ is also
13:58serving as their own discovery referee and making these wild privilege claims that aren't real.
14:04But here's what I think we gather, and let's let the audience know.
14:07Three million documents have been produced thus far, and those can be referred to as
14:13the redacted three million, partially redacted, these three million that we've seen.
14:19You have access to technically those three million now in this silo, which is very
14:25difficult to search, which we refer to as now the unredacted.
14:30But there are still redactions within that because the FBI back in March made redactions.
14:35So they took away one layer of it, but the FBI layer of redactions, there's
14:40still stuff that you can't see there, but that's those three million corresponding.
14:44However, there still may be three to five million more additional documents that you don't
14:51even have access to that the DOJ is just saying, we're not turning these over
14:56because we either don't think they're relevant or non -responsive, or they've made the determination
15:01that these don't qualify for the Epstein Transparency Act.
15:05And those aren't even stuff that you've reviewed in the silo.
15:08Those are somewhere else. And who knows if documents are being destroyed, if there's a
15:13literal burn book where they're being burned.
15:16And that could be 25, 50 million pages because a document can be multiple pages.
15:23Do I kind of accurately describe the universe there?
15:26That is the accurate universe of all the different levels of deletion and redaction in
15:32this, the most transparent presidency in American history as it relates to the Epstein files.
15:38So what do we do?
15:38I mean, I saw when Massey and Conner went to federal judges and said, can
15:45you appoint a discovery referee, which I think is a great idea.
15:47But the judges said, you know, we can't do it in the criminal case.
15:51But, you know, we're not taking any position about if a lawsuit is filed, the
15:56DOJ claims you can't file any because the Epstein Transparency Act doesn't have a private
16:02cause of action built in.
16:04They say there's no enforcement mechanism, no.
16:07Judges can touch this. No one yet, as I've seen, has tried to kind of
16:11bring that lawsuit. And then you have FOIA requests that are out there in FOIA
16:15law. So what do we actually do?
16:17Well, you're correct that the original language of the statute does not include a private
16:24right of action. So it also doesn't necessarily give Congress standing to go to court
16:30to vindicate our rights or the public's rights under the Epstein Transparency Act.
16:38So either we're going to have to legislate again, or we're going to have to
16:42give it a try and see how a court responds.
16:44Because we saw from Attorney General Bondi's just dumbfounding obstructionist appearance before the Judiciary Committee,
16:53she has no interest in doing anything to move the ball forward in terms of
16:58our understanding of the crimes.
17:00And she's demonstrating absolutely no sympathy or interest in the plight of the victims and
17:06survivors at all. So what we could be seeing potentially is another discharge petition that
17:12would probably have to be instituted that basically says, we're making an amendment to the
17:16Epstein Transparency Act. We've now created a cause of action.
17:20Members of Congress can bring the case.
17:22Something like that is possible.
17:24Something like that is possible.
17:26I mean, and we'll see at that point, of course, the Republicans were drag kicking
17:29and screaming to vote for the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
17:34They did everything they could to kill it.
17:37And then when we brought over enough Republicans, including Marjorie Taylor Greene and Nancy Mason,
17:43Lauren Boebert, as well as Tom Massey, at that point, they could see, they could
17:49read the writing on the wall, they could see where it was going.
17:51And then they all decided they would vote for it so that they would not,
17:54you know, get challenged back home or over it.
17:57And then Trump ran out in front of the parade and said, oh, yes, I've
18:00been leading this all along.
18:02Well, that's a joke. And then, you know, every, the whole world could see that
18:07Bondi is actively sabotaging and sandbagging our ability to get any information out.
18:12So I think we're going to need to keep all the pressure we can on
18:16this at the same time, understanding that there are other ways that information can come
18:21out and will come out.
18:23And that is because of this growing and growingly fierce survivors community.
18:29A final question. When I, during the, during whatever I even want to call that,
18:34I was called testimony of Pam Bondi, but I truly don't even know what I
18:37was observing. You know, a lot of ad hominem attacks directed at you.
18:42She goes, she goes, you know what Raskin, you're not, you're not a real lawyer
18:46Raskin. You're not a real lawyer.
18:48You know, at first I'm thinking to myself, does anybody who's a real lawyer up
18:52there? It's Raskin. I mean, Harvard law, constitutional law scholar.
18:55And then I'm thinking to myself, you don't, you don't have to say whatever you
18:58want to say, but the guy next to you never passed the bar exam who
19:01leads the house judiciary committee in Jim Jordan.
19:03I'm like, so literally the non -real licensed lawyer is the person the Republicans have
19:08chairing that committee, which is a whole, which is a whole other thing.
19:11But how do you deal with that?
19:12I mean, how do you respond to that in that moment, not to take the
19:16bait, to stay focused on the mission, but also knowing that you're speaking to someone
19:21who's be clowning herself? Yes.
19:24Oh man. Well, that's going to take another hour to get through all that.
19:27Just to be fair to Jim Jordan, he certainly never passed the bar.
19:31I'm not certain he ever took the bar.
19:33It's not clear to me whether or not he did.
19:35And I say that because my dad, who was a dazzlingly brilliant man and a
19:42concert pianist, decided he wanted to go to law school and he went to the
19:45University of Chicago Law School.
19:47He went for a very specific purpose.
19:49He wanted to figure out whether law could end war.
19:53And this was in the wake of the Holocaust and Nazism and fascism.
19:58But anyway, and he skipped every class that wasn't related to that, to the point
20:02where the professors would call on him first and everybody would laugh and then they
20:05would start the business of the day.
20:07Anyway, my dad graduated from law school and he never took the bar because, you
20:15know, he wasn't interested in being a practicing lawyer.
20:18So I don't hold that against anybody.
20:19I don't have him, Bondi's snob reaction about people who are not lawyers, whether or
20:25not they went to law school in the first place.
20:28And, you know, a lot of people have risen to my defense by citing where
20:33I went to law school and where she went to law school.
20:35Look, I've been very proud of Harvard these days for standing up against Trump.
20:41That's great. I was ashamed of Harvard for their complicity with apartheid South Africa.
20:47And when we were students there, we were fighting to get Harvard to divest.
20:50And there are lots of professors there whom I loved and whom I love, like
20:55Larry Tribe, who was my constitutional law professor, like Randy Kennedy, like Duncan Kennedy, like
21:02Martha Minow. There are people who I look up very highly to, but then there
21:05are people like Alan Dershowitz who are there.
21:09And Dershowitz, I think, is just a walking scandal in the legal profession in terms
21:16of the things that he's done and the things that he said.
21:19And I think that the whole Epstein debacle shows that only further.
21:23So look, all of which is to say, when she says you're not a real
21:27lawyer or, you know, you're a washed up lawyer or whatever.
21:30I mean, again, all that stuff we have to try to disregard the ad hominem
21:34mentality. which we understand are a logical and rhetorical fallacy, and instead look at the
21:41underlying meaning. And what makes somebody a real lawyer?
21:44What makes somebody a good lawyer or a great lawyer?
21:46Well, I tried to gesture at that in my opening remarks, in my opening statement,
21:50where I said, you have to identify with the people who are the victims of
21:55injustice and criminal violence and not with their perpetrators.
21:59And if all you do is serve the people in power, which is what Pam
22:02Bondi does, then you are not a good lawyer, much less a great lawyer.
22:08You're just, you know, a hired gun, and you're willing to do anything for people
22:13who will implicate you in shameful actions.
22:17And unfortunately, that's where she is with Donald Trump and with Kristi Noem and the
22:23things she's defending, you know, American citizens being, you know, gunned down by their own
22:29government and this massive cover up that goes back now a couple of decades in
22:35terms of a global international human trafficking reign.
22:40And so I would say to her, if you're going to stand with the victimizers
22:45and not the victims, then you're not a real lawyer.
22:48Well, I'll just say this one thing, too.
22:50I don't hold it against anybody for not taking the bar exam or even not
22:55passing the bar exam. So I don't want to be this bar, but I will
22:58say this. That doesn't mean you have to serve, Congress Member Raskin, as the chair
23:04of the House Judiciary Committee.
23:07And the example of your father, I don't recall him being the number one person
23:11on the Judiciary Committee. But I'm just, I'll give you my preference, the person who
23:15has the most important job in the Judiciary Committee, like dealing with, like, laws, I
23:20want that person to pass the bar exam.
23:22That's where I'll... Yeah. Well, sometime I'll come back and I'll talk to you about
23:27my dad's career because he was also indicted during the Vietnam War period.
23:31My dad worked for President Kennedy and he left President Kennedy and he founded a
23:36think tank called the Institute for Policy Studies.
23:38But he was indicted with Dr.
23:39Spock and William Sloan Coffin and some other people for a conspiracy to aid and
23:43abet draft evasion. And, you know, my dad's position was that it was an illegal
23:48war in Vietnam and had never been declared and there were war crimes taking place.
23:53And he was the one who really upheld the banner of legality and international law
24:00in that trial. And ultimately, all of them had their convictions dissolved.
24:07But my dad was the one defendant who was acquitted by the jury because he
24:12essentially put, he and, you know, one of his lawyers, Telford Taylor, who was the
24:16war crimes tribunal lawyer, of course.
24:19But they put the government on trial for being at odds against the rule of
24:25law. So I think it's important to stand up for the rule of law.
24:29Obviously, you don't have to be a lawyer to do it.
24:31And as we've seen from all the lawyers swirling around Donald Trump, whether it is,
24:36you know, Ed Martin or it's Pam Bondi or it's Rudy Giuliani, there are a
24:41lot of lawyers who can do some very discreditable and outrageous and unethical things.
24:48And then there are a lot of people who can stand up for the law
24:51and the Constitution who decided never to go to law school or never had the
24:55opportunity to. Well, two great lawyers who are going to be very jealous after this
24:59interview, Harry Littman and Michael Popak, because the new legal AF with Ben Micellis and
25:05Congressmember Jamie Raskin is coming soon.
25:08My new co -host, Congressmember Jamie Raskin, I appreciate all the work you're doing in
25:12all seriousness as the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee.
25:15And thanks for fighting back, pushing back, and we're grateful for all the work you
25:19do. Thank you, Ben. And thanks for what you do every day.
25:21The press is not the enemy of the people.
25:24You're the people's best friend and you're a great example of that.
25:27Thank you so much. Everybody hit subscribe.
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