The current director of the FBI may be taking more bad guys off the streets, but he’s also taking a lot of heat for doing nothing to help expose the powerful people Jeffrey Epstein probably trafficked minors to.
A small number of legislators are trying to fill the gap and do what FBI Director Kash Patel and other law enforcement agencies won’t. Among the most determined is Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky. On Wednesday, during the House Judiciary Committee hearing on oversight of the FBI, he dropped the name of one alleged Epstein client and indicated he knew the identities of 19 more.
Thomas Massie Questions Kash Patel
Massie began by dispelling Patel’s incredible claim that Epstein didn’t traffic minors to anyone but himself. As we noted in previous reporting, this flies in the face of hours of sworn victim testimony, piles of court filings, and thousands of pages of investigative findings. Patel’s attempt to convince the public that Epstein trafficked over a thousand underage girls only to satiate his deviant appetite is an audacious gaslighting campaign that has eroded loyalty and trust of the Trump administration among some of his most hitherto devoted supporters. Within a matter of months, high-ranking Trump officials went from announcing the Epstein files were on their desk to insisting there was nothing more to see.
Patel has aligned all public comments over the last few months to fit within the conclusions of the June 7 FBI memo that said there is no client list, Epstein never blackmailed anyone, and he really did commit suicide.
On Wednesday, Massie scrutinized what Patel said during the previous day’s Senate testimony. Patel had said the problem with further disclosure stems from the original 2006 Epstein case filed in Florida. That case “involved a very limited search warrant or set of search warrants and didn’t take as much investigatory material as it should’ve seized.” He also said the case was built in a way that sealed the material behind court orders and “barred future prosecutions for those involved at that time.”
Massie Not Buying It
But Massie wasn’t buying it. First, he said, the constraints Patel cited “only applied to the Southern District of Florida,” where that agreement was struck. There are piles of information elsewhere, he added:
They do not apply to the Southern District of New York [SDNY], the location of the 2019 sex trafficking indictment, which produced many things, including a series of FD-302 documents, according to victims who cooperated with the FBI in that investigation.
Massie reminded Patel that the FBI has these documents. They are “in your possession,” he emphasized. The documents in SDNY include information of at least 20 men “Jeffrey Epstein trafficked victims to including minors,” according to the congressman. One of the men who allegedly assaulted minors was Jes Staley (formerly CEO of Barclays and a top investor at J.P. Morgan), according to Massie. Then he hinted at the identities of another 19 suspected pedophiles:
One Hollywood producer worth a few hundred million dollars, one royal prince, one high-profile individual in the music industry, one very prominent banker, one high-profile government official, one high-profile former politician, one owner of a car company in Italy, one rock star, one magician, at least six billionaires, including a billionaire from Canada.
All these people are listed in FBI files, “files that you control,” Massie told Patel. The lawmaker then asked Patel if he’s launched any investigations into any of the people identified by the victims. The FBI director essentially said the FBI doesn’t consider those testimonies credible:
I have asked my FBI agents to review the entirety of the Epstein files and bring forth any credible information. And we’re working with Congress not only to divulge that information and produce it to you, but any investigations that arise from any credible investigation will be brought. There have been no new materials brought to me launching a new indictment.
Patel added that this is what two different U.S. attorney’s offices, over three administrations, who investigated those very documents, concluded. Massie pressed him whether he looked over those documents himself. Patel said he hadn’t but the FBI did. Massie asked Patel if he’d meet with the victims. He sidestepped around committing and said the FBI will.
Links to Intel
Massie also asked Patel if he was told to carry out the Justice Department’s September 2, 33,000-page Epstein document dump intentionally on the same day the congressman filed his discharge petition for all the files. That dump included unredacted names of victims, Massie said. They were not happy about that. Patel said he didn’t know the day Massie was referring to and then denied he was instructed to do so.
Massie introduced a number of news articles into the record, including one in which U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Southern Florida Alex Acosta says that he was told that Epstein belonged to intelligence and to “leave it alone”; a second article insinuating Epstein had CIA connections; a third reporting that Epstein’s calendar indicated he met with Barack Obama’s CIA chief; and a fourth article that says Epstein met with former Israeli prime minister and intelligence head Ehud Barak 36 times.
A horde of independent investigative journalists who’ve delved into this case have linked Epstein to intel agencies, including the CIA and Mossad. A report by Alan MacLeod is one of the most recent.
Jes Staley
As for Jes Staley, court documents linked him to Epstein years ago. The Virgin Islands sued J.P. Morgan, Staley’s former employer and Epstein’s former bank, and accused Staley himself of funneling Epstein’s money. The lawsuit revealed emails between the two that “suggest that Staley may have been involved in Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation,” according to reports about the suit.
Court documents said Epstein shared photos of young women with Staley. The two had a discussion that appeared to use Disney characters as code. According to a New York Post report:
“That was fun. Say hi to Snow White,” Staley emailed Epstein in July 2010, according to filings on Wednesday with the US District Court in Manhattan. “What character would you like next?” Epstein replied. “Beauty and the Beast,” Staley allegedly responded, to which Epstein replied: “Well one side is available,” according to the filing.
Staley and Epstein sent each other about 1,200 emails. Staley called his relationship with the pedophile “profound,” according to the lawsuit.
Forced Out Over Epstein
Staley has never been charged with sexual crimes but he was nevertheless “forced out at Barclays in 2021 as the Financial Conduct Authority, the UK-equivalent of the Securities and Exchange Commission, launched an investigation into allegations that Staley misled the agency and the Barclays board about his dealings with Epstein,” according to reports.
A report from March of this year noted that Staley wanted to get back into investing. He testified that he didn’t know about Epstein’s pedophilia, yet admitted to having sex with one of Epstein’s assistants. He said it was consensual but “the age of the assistant was not revealed,” reports say.
As for the Virgin Islands lawsuit, it accused J.P. Morgan of facilitating and turning a blind eye to Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation. The suit alleged that “J.P. Morgan knowingly, negligently, and unlawfully provided and pulled the levers through which recruiters and victims were paid and was indispensable to the operation and concealment of the Epstein trafficking enterprise.”
In the end, J.P. Morgan threw enough money to avoid discovery. The banking giant reached a $75 million settlement with the Virgin Islands and Staley. The terms of the bank’s settlement with Staley are secret.
