President Donald Trump berated a reporter for asking about convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein before a Cabinet meeting Tuesday.
The Department of Justice on Monday released nearly 11 hours of surveillance footage from outside Epstein's prison cell, asserting the video supports the conclusion that the disgraced financier died by suicide in 2019.
Before Trump and Cabinet members met to discuss issues such as the deadly flooding in Texas during the Fourth of July weekend, a reporter asked Attorney General Pam Bondi about allegations Epstein had worked for an intelligence agency and about a minute gap in the released video.
As Bondi began to answer, Trump asked whether he could interrupt.
"Are you still talking about Jeffrey Epstein?" Trump asked the reporter. "This guy's been talked about for years. You're asking? We have Texas, we have this, we have all of the things. And are people still talking about this guy, this creep? That is unbelievable. Do you want to waste the time? And do you feel like answering?"
"I don't mind answering," Bondi responded, before the president continued.
"I mean, I can't believe you're asking a question on Epstein at a time like this where we're having some of the greatest success and also tragedy with what happened in Texas, it just seems like a desecration," he said before extending his right hand in Bondi’s direction. "But you go ahead."
The attorney general then answered the questions posed to her.
"First, to back up on that, in February, I did an interview on Fox, and it's been getting a lot of attention because I said I was asked a question about the client list, and my response was, 'It's sitting on my desk to be reviewed,' meaning the file along with the JFK [John F. Kennedy], MLK [Martin Luther King] files as well. That's what I meant by that.
"Also, to the tens of thousands of video, they turned out to be child porn downloaded by that disgusting Jeffrey Epstein. Child porn is what they were. Never going to be released. Never going to see the light of day.
"To him being an agent, I have no knowledge about that. We can get back to you on that.
"And the minute missing from the video, we released the video showing definitively the video was not conclusive, but the evidence prior to it was showing he committed suicide and what was on that. There was a minute that was off the counter. And what we learned from Bureau of Prisons was every year, every night they redo that video. It's old, from like 1999. So, every night the video is reset and every night should have the same minute missing. So, we're looking for that video to release that as well, showing that a minute is missing every night.
"And that's it on Epstein."
The DOJ and FBI on Monday said Epstein committed suicide and there is no evidence showing he kept a "client list."
Federal law enforcement officials also say no evidence exists that Epstein blackmailed powerful figures, Axios reported Sunday night.
Charlie McCarthy ✉
Charlie McCarthy, a writer/editor at Newsmax, has nearly 40 years of experience covering news, sports, and politics.
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