This story was up to date on September 8, 2025, at 8:49pm ET.
When The Wall Avenue Journal reported two months in the past that Donald Trump had written a suggestive letter to Jeffrey Epstein in celebration of the infamous baby abuser’s fiftieth birthday, in 2003, the administration had a alternative of obtainable responses. The technique it went with was indignant denial.
“Democrats and Pretend Information media desperately tried to coordinate a despicable hoax,” mentioned the White Home spokesperson Liz Huston. “Forgive my language however this story is full and utter bullshit,” Vice President J. D. Vance wrote on X. “The WSJ must be ashamed for publishing it. The place is that this letter? Would you be shocked to study they by no means confirmed it to us earlier than publishing it? Does anybody truthfully imagine this feels like Donald Trump?” Trump sued the Journal’s mother or father firm and its proprietor, Rupert Murdoch, for defamation, in search of $10 billion in damages. Within the authorized criticismTrump’s legal professionals accused the paper of “malicious, deliberate, and despicable actions,” together with publishing “a collection of quotes from the nonexistent letter.”
Now that Democrats on the Home Oversight Committee have obtained and shared the letterwhich could be very a lot existent, that strategy seems to have been shortsighted. (White Home Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt dismissed the newest revelation: “As I’ve mentioned all alongside, it’s very clear President Trump didn’t draw this image, and he didn’t signal it.”)
Shopping for Trump’s denial all the time required accepting some shaky premises. First, that the Journala extremely regarded newspaper, would report an incriminating story, with out proof, a few famously litigious man with basically infinite assets. Second, {that a} newspaper owned by Murdoch, a well-known conservative, is in reality a partisan Democratic rag that might say something to harm a member of the opposing get together with out ascertaining its reality. (That is an extension of a long-standing conservative perception that the mainstream media observe the identical journalistic rules, or lack thereof, as partisan conservative media). And, third, that the suggestion that Trump may interact in sexual gratification of a morally doubtful nature is totally out of line.
Even so, on a lot of the political proper, the reality of those premises appeared incontrovertible. Certainly, many conservatives claimed to think about the fakeness of the Journal story so apparent that they anticipated its publication to solely assist Trump.
On the time of publication, the Epstein story had opened a small however notable fissure between the president and his cult following. Now, nonetheless, due to the JournalTrump was as soon as once more the sufferer. By publishing a clearly faux report designed to smear the president, the logic went, the mainstream media had pushed his erstwhile supporters again into Trump’s arms. “Embattled MAGA Rallies Behind Trump After Leak of Alleged Epstein Letter,” reported Axios.
This was not merely the commentary of cynical politics reporters. Conservatives had been loudly declaring that the story had brought about them to reflexively defend the president’s ethical character. “Thank God for Dems and media overreach on this,” an nameless Trump ally advised Politico. Jack Posobiec, who had briefly wavered, declared to Steve Bannon, “We’re so again. Everyone seems to be firing on all cylinders. The MAGA motion is totally united behind this battle.”
Essentially the most puzzling facet of the total-denial strategy is that it robbed Trump’s supporters of any fallback protection. The Epstein letter is eyebrow-raising—“We’ve sure issues in frequent,” Trump writes, closing with the want, “Might each day be one other fantastic secret”—however it isn’t an specific confession. Trump might have admitted to being its writer whereas arguing that the commonalities and secrets and techniques alluded to mundane, or no less than authorized, actions. As an alternative, he described the letter as “false, malicious, and defamatory”—conceding that, if it had been actual, it could be fairly unhealthy.
Guess what? It’s actual. And it’s unhealthy.
When the Journal story first broke, Vance demanded“Will the individuals who have purchased into each hoax towards President Trump present an oz. of skepticism earlier than shopping for into this weird story?”
The episode definitely does inform us one thing about Trump and the necessity for applicable ranges of skepticism. Don’t depend on the president’s cultists to attract the best conclusion.
