It was an historic morning on Capitol Hill as 10 of Jeffrey Epstein's victims gathered with their lawyers, Congressmen Ro Khanna, Thomas Massie and, um, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and lots of reporters, protesters and concerned citizens to hear the survivors speak out.
Khanna and Massie joined together to organize this press conference along with a push to collect 218 signatures on a discharge petition to force a vote to compel the Dept of Justice to release all of the files in the Epstein case.
As of this morning, it appears that all Democrats will sign on to it, but only four Republicans have agreed to: Thomas Massie, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Bobert and Nancy Mace. Strange bedfellows. (Where are Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Joni Ernst to name a few?)
Some of the survivors who spoke this morning said that if Congress won’t do it, they would get together with the others to compile their own list of names of the alleged abusers.
Then, Marj showed she does possess at least a tiny bit of decency!
Wasn’t that surprising? Unfortunately, more of the comments from the survivors weren’t surprising. They were sickening, but not surprising.
And they were heartbreaking!
While this press conference was happening at the Capitol and these women were speaking the truth, the despicable orange serial liar was hosting the president of Poland inside the ever more garish, gaudy & tacky gold plated oval office, doing what he does best, lying - this time about these women and his bff for 10 years, Jeffrey Epstein.
Well, survivor Haley Robson had something to say about that bullshit. I thought she was going to say that Trump should meet her outside so she could kick his ass. But she had more class than that!
Brad Edwards, Attorney for some of the Epstein survivors pointed out Trump’s hypocrisy in calling the abuse a “Democrat hoax,’ in the Trump historically didn’t believe it was “a hoax,” and questioned his curious about-face…
I could keep going because they certainly did. Oh wait, I did too, on today’s show which you can watch in the video of today’s show via YouTube posted below or listen to in the audio podcast above. Either way, please heart what these brave women said and believe them. They have no reason to lie. And I can think of billions of reasons why the almost-human Dumpster fire does, continually.
Tomorrow on the show, investigative journalist Greg Palast joins me again, this time to talk about the dangerous cuts the still-alive (barely) D’ump is making to the parts of our government whose responsibility it has been to protect and help us. Like FEMA and the EPA and the CDC and the FTC ….
I could go on and I will, tomorrow.
Below the fold, todays News Notes and other news stories that I didn’t get to today.
9-3-25 Wednesday Pres Conference at Capitol with 10 Epstein Survivors, Ro Khanna, Tom Massie, Lawyers Brad Edwards & Brittany Henderson
(I watched the Netflix limited series Unbelievable over the weekend)
Lots of clips pulled
GOP Rep. Thomas Massie files discharge petition to force House vote on releasing Epstein files
Miami Herald: As many as 100 Epstein victims will attend Washington rally Wednesday
Breaking News after show ended:
House Republicans vote to establish new subcommittee to reinvestigate Jan. 6
Lawmakers slipped a resolution into a rule on the House floor that would establish a subcommittee to revisit the events of Jan. 6, 2021, in which pro-Trump protesters stormed the Capitol aiming to prevent Joe Biden's certification as president. Republicans have complained that the previous probe was biased against President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly denied he lost the 2020 election. !!!
Trump
FL first state to life mandates for all vaccinations! Florida's Hack Of A Surgeon General Says State Will Eliminate All Vaccine Mandates, Illegitimately Comparing Them To Slavery
· Snubbing Kennedy, States Announce Plans to Coordinate on Vaccines
· Governors in California, Oregon and Washington said their states would work together on vaccine guidance in a time of turmoil at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
· Pentagon authorizes up to 600 military lawyers to serve as temporary immigration judges
· Newsmax's lawsuit against Fox for anticompetitive behavior, filed in SDFL today
From the lawsuit: 3. Fox employs at least three anticompetitive means to exclude competing providers
of right-leaning video content from the market. First, Fox imposes explicit or tacit “no-carry” provisions on distributors, conditioning access to its commercially critical content on distributors’ concession not to carry other right-leaning news channels like Newsmax and others.
Second, it imposes financial penalties on distributors if they carry Newsmax or others by requiring the distributors to carry and pay high fees for Fox’s little-watched channels like Fox Business.
Third, Fox inserts a suite of other contractual barriers into its carriage agreements intended to prevent Newsmax and others from competing. These tactics constitute unlawful restraints of trade and flow directly from Fox’s unlawful monopolization of the Right-leaning Pay TV News Market.
DT Oval Office meeting with Polish President while the presser is happening at Capitol
WaPo live coverage: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/09/03/house-epstein-files-victims-news-conference/
Ro Khanna, Thomas Massie & Marj Taylor Greene stood w Epstein (survivors) “accusers” for more than an hour
NY Times live coverage: much better job than WaPo https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/09/03/us/trump-newsMarjorie
Other news:
Trump says he’s set to order federal intervention in Chicago and Baltimore, despite local opposition
Gov. Moore stands firm against Trump's push for federal intervention in Baltimore
More rebukes for prosecutors: Grand jurors refuse to indict 2 people accused of threatening Trump
JUST IN: Trump Reportedly Considering ‘Clearing the Field’ In NYC Mayoral Race For Cuomo Huh? Is Trump running for mayor?? NY Times: Trump Advisers Have Discussed a Job for Adams if He Quits Mayor’s Race
The conversations have also involved Curtis Sliwa with the goal of giving Andrew Cuomo a better chance of defeating Zohran Mamdani in November. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/03/nyregion/trump-adams-sliwa-quit-nyc-mayor.html
AP:
China displays its military strength in a parade on the 80th anniversary of the end of WWII
China showcased its military might in a parade Wednesday marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II as it seeks to wield greater influence on the global stage. Chinese leader Xi Jinping, since coming to power in 2012, has sought to build China into a country that cannot be bullied and is strong enough to stand up to foreign powers. Read more.
Aaron Parnas: (Free Substack newsletter aaronparnas.substack.com updates news headlines 2x a day. Very good reporting!)
A White House official warned Republicans that signing Rep. Thomas Massie’s discharge petition would be seen as “a very hostile act to the administration,” accusing him of aiding Democrats’ “attention-seeking” while the DOJ backs the Oversight Committee’s broader records release effort.
The House oversight committee released 33,000 pages of justice department records on Jeffrey Epstein, including old court filings, police body-cam footage, and interviews involving him and Ghislaine Maxwell.
House Oversight Committee sources said Rep. Anna Paulina Luna posted the same ~33,000 Epstein documents they received—97% already public—framing it as part of a broader effort to block true transparency.
Six Epstein accusers and relatives of Virginia Giuffre urged the U.S. government to release all case files and called on Trump to rule out pardoning Ghislaine Maxwell, criticizing delays in accountability and warning that powerful figures remain unexposed.
More:
Donald Trump, 79, dismissed rumors about his health as “fake news,” saying he spent Labor Day weekend doing media interviews and visiting his Virginia golf course.
A federal appeals court blocked Donald Trump’s attempt to use the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelans accused of gang ties, with a 2–1 Fifth Circuit ruling finding no legal basis for invoking the law absent war or invasion, marking the first appellate decision against the March 14 proclamation.
A Washington, D.C., grand jury rejected Justice Department efforts to indict multiple defendants—including a woman accused of threatening Trump online—marking at least four such refusals in a week and raising concerns among former prosecutors about eroding DOJ credibility, given the rarity of grand juries denying charges.
Lawyers say five men deported by the US to Eswatini—despite having completed prison sentences in America—are being illegally imprisoned at Matsapha correctional complex with restricted legal access, as rights groups challenge the Trump administration’s practice of outsourcing detention abroad and Eswatini faces constitutional challenges over accepting the deportees.
Trump announced a U.S. military strike in the Caribbean against a Venezuela-linked Tren de Aragua vessel, killing 11 in what he called a narcotics-trafficking mission, while Venezuela’s Maduro denounced the operation as an imperialist bid for the country’s resources and officials questioned the authenticity of Trump’s video evidence.
National Guard troops deployed in Washington, DC, under President Trump’s anti-crime initiative are expected to have their orders extended through December to ensure benefits continuity; while the mission’s duration remains unclear, officials cite significant drops in crime rates, ongoing criticism over the Guard’s non-law-enforcement roles, and costs nearing $1 million per day, as the Trump administration also eyes a separate immigration enforcement operation in Chicago despite legal challenges to prior federal troop deployments.
China staged a massive “Victory Day” military parade in Beijing showcasing new hypersonic missiles, ICBMs and naval strike capabilities, as Xi Jinping appeared publicly with Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un for the first time—framing an anti-U.S. show of unity—while Trump accused the trio of “conspiring,” Taiwan and others criticized the messaging, and Russia struck Ukraine amid the spectacle.
Trump posted a message to China’s President Xi asking him to pass along “warmest regards” to Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, while accusing the three leaders of conspiring against the United States.
The Kremlin denied Trump’s claim that Putin, Xi Jinping, and Kim Jong Un were conspiring against the US, suggesting Trump’s remarks may have been ironic.
· Kim Jong Un brought his teenage daughter Kim Ju Ae to a military parade in Beijing, her first international appearance, which experts see as the clearest sign yet she is being positioned as his successor, marking a calculated “successor debut” on the global stage
· Over 1,000 current and former HHS employees called on Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to resign, accusing him of endangering Americans’ health by ousting CDC Director Susan Monarez, pressuring vaccine policy, and rescinding Covid-19 authorizations without transparency.
Don Moynihan’s Substack donmoynihan.substack.com mentioned by Marcy Wheeler on Friday is excellent… Today’s is about the assault on CDC, FEMA, EPA…
TFN Jonathan Larsen:
Donald Trump may not be dead, technically, but he suffered a death by a thousand cuts legally on Tuesday.
One judge after another confirmed that on a host of illegal actions, Trump is breaking the law, much as he has for decades, only now with the federal government instead of a corporation.
Here are just some of Tuesday’s known rulings on Trump’s crime spree, all of which went against Trump because he’s terrible at presidenting:
Posse Comitatus Act: A federal judge stopped Trump from illegally using the military as police in California.
Alien Enemies Act: Two out of three judges on a federal court of appeals barred Trump from illegally deporting Venezuelans.
Federal Trade Commission: Two of three judges on a different federal court of appeals undid Trump’s illegal firing of a Democratic commissioner.
That makes five out of seven federal judges yesterday calling Trump’s criming criming. The two dissenters were Trump appointees.
Trump’s attempt to fire FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter, a Democratic appointee, may present the toughest challenge. That’s because the law indisputably says no more than three FTC commissioners can come from the same party. Trump fired both Democratic-appointed FTC commissioners back in March. One moved on, but Slaughter opted to fight.
In the Venezuelan fight, Trump’s illegal deportations relied on his made-up rationale for using the Alien Enemies Act. Trump hasn’t shown that he can use the Alien Enemies Act, because he couldn’t prove that Venezuela is actually invading us, the judges said.
America’s up against another funding deadline, which could mean a federal shutdown on Sept. 30 if no funding bill can win majorities in both chambers.
So congressional Democratic leaders Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) last week demanded to be included in the fascist funding talks, calling for a so-called “four corners” meeting.
“The government funding issue must be resolved in a bipartisan way,” Schumer and Jeffries wrote to Republican leaders. In theory, Republicans will need Democratic votes because some Republicans will balk any any spending.
It’s not clear what concession Democrats think they can win in return for helping to pass a spending bill that will advance Trump’s fascist assault on America and the federal government, but Schumer and Jeffries are asking for maybe some of that healthcare money back, please…
Until tomorrow, peace out…
