Interviewing the Congressman Behind the Epstein File Drop - 5CAST (#15) ft. Ro Khanna

Summary

5CAST (#15) Andrew Callaghan w/ Ro Khanna – Interviewing the Congressman Behind the Epstein File Drop

Date: February 20, 2026
Podcast: 5CAST
Host: Andrew Callaghan
Guest: Rep. Ro Khanna, CA-17

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Episode Overview

This episode features an in-depth, unfiltered conversation between Andrew Callaghan and Congressman Ro Khanna, who played a pivotal role in the fight for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files. The main theme centers on the struggle to hold America’s most powerful elites accountable for their connection to Epstein's criminal activities, the systemic coverup across political lines, and the enormous implications of the recent release of millions of Epstein-related documents. The discussion explores not only the specifics of the file releases, but the broader consequences for justice, American democracy, and the future of political accountability.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Battle for Epstein File Transparency

• Resistance from Power (00:13, 19:57): Khanna details the near-impossible fight to get the Epstein files released, highlighting active obstruction from the DOJ, bipartisan political resistance, and specific intimidation tactics used against politicians supporting disclosure.
  • Quote: "They fought us every step of the way. They said Massie and I are cranks, that we're conspiracy theorists, that we have no idea what we're talking about." (00:20, Rep. Khanna)
• Elite Protectionism: Khanna calls out the “Epstein class”—rich, influential Americans whose status allegedly placed them above the law. discusses how the desire to stay in favor with donors caused both parties to resist exposing names from the files.

File Dump Content & Redactions

• Scale of Records (02:11, 06:47): Over 3 million documents released; Khanna argues about half the “most nuclear” content remains redacted, especially names of powerful individuals described in heinous scenarios.
• Nature of Evidence (09:02, 17:08, 53:27): Files include emails exchanging about “naughty girls,” underage victims, and redacted identities of alleged perpetrators.
  • Quote: “You have email after email that has something talking about a naughty girl, an 11-year-old girl... The from is redacted. Like, what are you doing redacting, blacking out that name? Obviously it’s not a survivor.” (53:31, Khanna)
• Redaction Practices (07:27, 53:31): Khanna sharply criticizes the continuing protection of elite names while survivor identities go uncovered.
  • Quote: “Why are names blacked out of people who have sent some of the most incriminating emails?” (71:05, Khanna)

Systemic Corruption & Two-Tier Justice

• No Accountability Yet (12:59): Only Epstein and Maxwell have faced prosecution, despite testimony from over 1200 survivors.
  • Quote: “You think two people raped all these survivors, and then the survivors have told Massey and me the type of people who raped them when they were 15, 16, 17. You’d have to believe that they’re all lying.” (12:59, Khanna)
• American Elite Above Law (07:30, 18:14): Emphasis on the uniquely “rotten” American elite willing to protect their own at any cost, across administration after administration.
• Nonpartisan Fight (21:45, 44:01): Khanna frames the coalition as anti-pedophile and anti-corruption, not anti-Republican or Democratic—insisting on class issues and donor influence as the core problems.

Intelligence, Blackmail, and Global Implications

• Possible Intelligence Connections (11:25, 23:52, 24:14): Open questions about Epstein’s relationships with intelligence agencies, with circumstantial evidence such as meetings with CIA and Israeli officials; calls for a trusted commission to access classified data.
  • Quote: “Julia Brown … says that there are unanswered questions about Epstein’s affiliation to intelligence. And we need to understand that.” (11:25, Khanna)
• Blackmail Operation? (11:11, 54:02): Discussion of Epstein as the nexus of a major blackmail/honeypot operation, possibly compromising leaders for leverage.
  • Quote: “It’s always just seemed really obvious that it was a blackmail operation for intelligence organizations.” (54:02, Andrew)

Specific Individuals & Political Impact

• Big Names in the Files (09:06, 09:35, 18:09): Gates, tech billionaires, prime ministers, finance leaders, and more—Khanna notes surprise at sheer breadth of implicated.
  • Quote: “It caught me by surprise is how many of our elite are in those files. … how close he is to world leaders...” (09:35, Khanna)
• Trump’s & Clinton’s Roles (14:14, 15:49, 16:37): Both parties’ prominent figures are present in the files. Trump’s actual involvement remains unclear and subject of ongoing inquiries—Khanna insists on nonpartisan approach.
  • Quote: “We wanted it to be bipartisan. … it’s about making sure that we get justice for survivors.” (14:14, Khanna)

QAnon, 4chan, and Disinformation

• Files Show Links (02:15, 40:00, 41:03): Discussion of evidence that Ghislaine Maxwell was involved in the formation of /pol/ on 4chan, potentially as a deliberate operation to sow disinformation, associate genuine abuse with outlandish conspiracy, and delegitimize real survivor claims.
  • Quote: “The recent files proved a tangible connection between QAnon and Jeffrey Epstein.” (41:03, Andrew)
• Weaponizing Conspiracy (41:03): Khanna affirms “the instinct of the American people to suspect something was wrong was correct,” but notes weaponized conspiracies redirected blame and made real truths easier to dismiss.

Media, Distraction, and Failure of Accountability

• Culture War as Distraction (30:19): Both see media narratives and polarizing culture war stories as an intentional effort to shift focus away from the elite’s exposure in the Epstein scandal.
• Media Failure (31:46): Mainstream media criticized for not deeply reporting on the major names or pursuing answers—preferring sensational but comparatively minor stories.
  • Quote: “I don’t think there’s been enough coverage of the actual people who have committed these crimes.” (31:48, Khanna)

Congressional and Legal Next Steps

• Investigative Routes (47:25, 48:42): Khanna proposes a Congressional “Epstein Committee” to subpoena, depose, and question under oath those named in the files, starting with the biggest names.
• Limitations (24:39, 48:45): Only a sitting president can order declassification of intelligence-linked material; Congressional committees can be set up on their own initiative for public questioning.

Broader Social/Economic Context

• Class Division & Wealth Inequality (33:20, 60:12): Ties the Epstein scandal to systemic issues like donor-class corruption, inequality, and the failure of America’s “social contract.”
• Local Leadership & Reform (37:34): Support for local leaders innovating on policy and creating well-managed, crime- and overdose-reducing cities, suggesting national models.

The Moral Urgency

• Moral Outrage & Existential Threat (26:09, 75:48): Khanna argues American democracy cannot survive if ordinary people believe the powerful can rape and abuse children with impunity. Calls for a “new moral beginning.”
  • Quote: “This is the fight of our times. This is one of the largest scandals in American history.” (75:48, Khanna)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “They cared more about being part of the Epstein class than they did about the working class girls who were being raped.” (00:00, Khanna)
• “If you want to be in politics, you probably don’t want to offend the billionaires. And that’s why this thing has been hidden for decades.” (01:41, Khanna)
• “So the people who aren’t in the files...if you’re not mentioned in the Epstein files, you don’t matter.” (18:54, paraphrasing a socialite's quote, Khanna)
• “The instinct of the American people to suspect that something was wrong was correct.” (41:03, Khanna)
• “This is a class issue in America. They’re rich and powerful people who believe the law doesn’t apply to them.” (31:48, Khanna)
• “You'd have to believe that all these survivors are lying, and that just doesn't make any sense.” (13:00, Khanna)
• “What I'm trying to understand is what’s the motivation of protecting people? Who are they protecting and why?” (74:12, Khanna)
• “This should be a cleansing of a failed political class and a new direction for our country.” (75:48, Khanna)
• “The American people have been relentless…and as a result, we have half the files released. That's enormous. It shows the power of people still in this country.” (51:34, Khanna)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Timestamp | Segment | |------------|--------------------------------------------| | 00:13 | DOJ resistance and file release obstruction| | 02:11 | Size and significance of the drop | | 06:30 | Survivors’ role, ongoing redactions | | 09:02 | Major names in the files and evidence | | 11:25 | Epstein & intelligence/gov’t connections | | 14:14 | Trump and bipartisan approach | | 17:08 | Explicit evidence, redacted identities | | 21:45 | Nonpartisan, anti-elite coalition | | 23:52 | Intelligence blackmail operation theory | | 31:46 | Media's failure to scrutinize elites | | 44:01 | Both parties implicated; not left vs right | | 47:25 | Calls for Congressional Epstein Committee | | 53:27–53:31| The persistence of redacted elite names | | 54:02 | The blackmail/elite control hypothesis | | 71:05 | Questioning reason for redactions | | 75:48 | Khanna’s concluding “call-to-arms” |

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Podcast Tone & Language

The episode is blunt, direct, and outraged—reflecting the host’s and guest’s disbelief and anger at the elite’s impunity. Khanna is careful to avoid unsubstantiated conspiracies, sticks to facts as much as possible, but does not shy away from hard questions or uncomfortable truths. Both host and guest display a commitment to justice for survivors and a willingness to challenge both Party establishments.

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Conclusions & Forward-Looking Statements

• Central Takeaway: The Epstein file release is a historic moment, exposing a moral rot and two-tiered justice system at the heart of American political and economic life. Accountability is urgently needed—not just for survivors, but to restore democracy’s credibility.
• Future Action: Ro Khanna is pushing for further transparency, unredacted releases, Congressional investigations, and a new American social contract that refuses to tolerate elite lawlessness.
• Call to Listeners: Stay vigilant, keep pressure on political leaders, demand transparency—and recognize that the fight for justice is not over.

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Final Noteworthy Quote

"This entire Epstein class needs to be held accountable. There need to be investigations and prosecutions. And the entire Epstein class needs to be out of our politics. No, no more of their super PAC money and their money controlling politics. And we need a new start, a new moral beginning in America. This should be a cleansing of a failed political class in a new direction for our country."
— Rep. Ro Khanna (75:48)

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For those seeking a fuller understanding of both the contents and high-level implications of the Epstein files, as well as the political realities shaping their release, this episode is essential listening—and the movement it documents is ongoing.

Transcript

[A]

They cared more about being part of the Epstein class than they did about the working class girls who were being. They were begging this guy to invite them to his parties, to his home, to his island. And that's what's sick. Like, how did we produce an elite like that? They need to be torn down.

[B]

Whenever you brought forth the Disclosure act, what was the first reaction of the doj? Wasn't it pretending that there were no files to begin with?

[A]

They fought us every step of the way. They said Massie and I are cranks, that we're conspiracy theorists, that we have no idea what we're talking about.

[B]

There was no client list.

[A]

There is no credible information. If there were, I would bring case Yesterday. Finally, Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Nancy Mace to stand with us. They threatened them. They chased Marjorie Taylor Green out of Congress. They called Lauren Boebert into the Situation Room where the Attorney General, Pam Bondi and others said, get off Conor and Massey's district petition. They intimidated folks. Then when we got it passed, they went in a full court press to try to get every Republican to vote against it. And Massey and I had 70 Republicans willing to vote against Donald Trump. And he saw the writing on the wall, so he said, okay, I'll sign the bill. Then they tried to get it amended in the Senate. No senator was willing to stand up for these pedophiles, so they couldn't get it amended. But we fought. We got it passed. So then what did they do? They thought, okay, we'll just do a meaningless dump on December 19th. They'll keep quiet. But we didn't. We said, this is total bs. And so then we pushed. And now finally they've done a real release of the files. I mean, they still have 50% of the most nuclear stuff, but now they've exposed it. Now everyone sees that there are a bunch of rich and powerful people who are above the law in America and that there are two tiers of justice, and that these are some of the most connected people. They're the ones who give money to politicians. Why do you think people didn't want to do what Massey and I did? Because you're offending the donors in this country. If you want to be in politics, you probably don't want to offend the billionaires. And that's why this thing has been hidden for decades. That's why Democrats and Republicans didn't expose this. Let's just be honest. It wasn't just a Trump thing. There were administration after administration that wanted to protect these people, and they're still protecting some of them.

[B]

All right. It has officially been the best week for QAnon grandmas since January 6, 2021. You guys did this to us. I'm of course referring to the recent drop of 3 million Epstein files.

[A]

Today we are producing more than 3 million pages.

[B]

And I'm saying the QAnon thing kind of ingest because evidence in the files does suggest that Ghislaine Maxwell worked directly with 4chan founder Christopher Poole, aka moot, to create the board pol, which set the framework and molded the community that later became QAnon. Makes me think that looking back at those crazy times, it may have all been a psychological operation to feed people half truth and half dumb bullshit to make the whole thing seem totally unbelievable and associate the Epstein flight logs with lizards in the moon and the flat Earth.

[A]

Earth is flat, Jack. Flatter than a flapjack in many ways.

[B]

Yes, the Epstein files are very serious and extreme. They feature lengthy allegations and direct evidence pointing to child abuse involving some of the most powerful people on the planet, many of whom claim they had no connection to EPST Epstein whatsoever and even campaigned on the promise of releasing some of the files. It's been over 3 million documents, as I mentioned, which is a lot to take in. And I, like many of you guys, probably have watched some amazing coverage about certain documents, but have a hard time wrapping my head around what is in all of them. So I figured now was the time to bring somebody on who can give us all a very extensive breakdown about what's going on in the files and what may be coming next as far as judicial consequences for these six sadistic child traffickers. So today we're going to have Congressman Ro Khanna, an actual Congressman, up in the building, somebody from from the House of Representatives, chilling in the house of Channel 5 to help us make real informational content happen. Ro Khanna represents the 17th district here in California, which encompasses parts of the South Bay and Silicon Valley area. But before we dive into all that, I want to let you guys know that we are currently on tour and will be going on tour for the next two and a half months. I'm hosting something called the All Gas, no breaks Channel 5 Carnival, which is a talent show, rap battle slash magician extravaganza featuring amazing talent from across this great nation. And three uncensored documentaries that are to be screened from the All Gas no Brakes Relaunch, and also one special secret Channel 5 documentary. So if you live in a variety of cities across the US and Canada, such as Orlando, Richmond, Boston, Detroit, Madison, St Paul, Salt Lake City, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Philly, Seattle, Louisiana. SF Portland, Austin, Dallas, Denver, Vancouver, Atlanta, El Paso, Phoenix, San Diego, or Albuquerque. You can get a ticket to the show right now at www.channel5news. If you go to our website, you'll see a page or a tab right there that says C5 Carnival, all gas, no brakes tickets. You can cl. Click on that and you'll see a full list of ticket links. So if you want to buy a ticket, I will see you on tour. It's going to be a great time. And I heard these things are flying off the shelf like hotcakes. So now is your time. Now, before we get into the Epstein files, which are very important, I want to share two positive stories. As we know, the news favors negativity because it makes more money and because bad stuff happening also is important too. But the Internet doesn't catch all the good things and good developments that have been happening in America and across the world. So here we go. Our flag first positive story of the day is that overdose deaths are down by over 20%. According to New CDC data. It's been the longest sustained drop in overdose rates in multiple decades. Deaths went from over 110,000 in 2023 to roughly 73,000 last year, which is more than 70 lives saved every single day compared to back at the peak of the fentanyl crisis. So wherever your politics land, it's a massive deal that fentanyl related overdose deaths have gone down. And I'm very happy to hear this second positive story. The US murder rate has hit its lowest level since 1900. In 20 last year, murders plummeted more than 20%, the single largest one year drop on record in modern American history. This year, there's even less homicides than last year. And by the end of the year, the rate is likely to land at about 4 per 100,000 people, which is just fantastic news. And cities that have a reputation for violence historically, like Detroit, Philadelphia and Baltimore, are actually leading the charge and are on the track for their lowest murder rate since the 1960s. And San Francisco, also kind of a controversial city, is on pace for its lowest homicide rate since 1940. Also, other crimes. Crime across the country is down. Carjackings are down 61% since 2023, and shoplifting is down 10%. But nobody really knows exactly why. I will leave that to the scientists. All I know is we have two great pieces of historic American news that have came out this week and you all should know about them. All right, let's get into It. Thank you so much for making the time. I really appreciate it.

[A]

Appreciate you. Thanks for flying up on super bowl weekend.

[B]

Congratulations on helping to get the files released.

[A]

Well, it was the survivors who came to the Capitol twice, but Thomas Massie and I didn't let up. We were called cranks, we were called conspiracy theorists. But we believe that people in those files who did heinous things need to be exposed.

[B]

And how do you currently feel about the amount of files that have been dropped? Is it enough?

[A]

No. I mean, it's the largest release ever and it's showing how rotten our elite were. Some of the biggest names in finance, in real estate, in tech, in politicians. Having gone to Epstein's island knowing that young girls were being raped there. And they're sending emails saying, oh, when can you schedule me for the island? And I mean, it's heinous, but about 3 million files haven't been released. I'm taking a red eye actually back tonight to D.C. and Thomas Massey and I are going to go in tomorrow afternoon to see some of these unredacted files and see why they blocked out names of people who have said, oh, I had a good time with a naughty girl, or I saw a nine year old Brazilian and they have their names redacted.

[B]

And why do you think some of those names may have been redacted?

[A]

It seems that they're protecting rich and powerful people who committed heinous crimes. I mean, this is what people hate about this country, that there is a group of people, rich and powerful people, who are above the law. I call it the Epstein class. I mean, how is it possible that all these people knew Epstein? How is it possible they all wanted to go to his island and they wanted to do it after he was a convicted pedophile.

[B]

So before we get into the, the painstaking process of actually getting these files released, I think a lot of Americans have seen like little snippets of the recent file dump here and there, but are a bit confused as to how to wrap their head around this mass dump of information.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

What do you think are the most important pieces of evidence that every American should see from the recent file release?

[A]

They should look at who all is in the files that emailed Epstein about going to the island. I've said all those people should be hauled in front of Congress. They're some of the biggest names in technology, they're some of the biggest names in real estate, they're some of the biggest names in finance. Partly they're benefiting because there's so Many of them. There's so many people like Bill Gates. They just think that, oh, well, let me just hide. Let me go underground so people don't see that I'm actually in these files. But slowly they're all coming out. And each of these people who are in these files needs to be asked some basic questions. Why did you want to go to Epstein's island? Don't give me bs. Don't tell me, oh, you're there to raise money. I've raised a lot of money in my life. I don't go to islands where young girls are being raped to do that. You can do that in New York City at a restaurant. Why did you go there? What did you see happening? What did you participate in? What did you do? And they need to be answering these questions under oath.

[B]

Who are some of the names that you think are most prominent that were in the most recent, though?

[A]

Well, look, I mentioned Gates as a name that was in the files. Just because they're in the files and they say that they went to Epstein doesn't mean that they're necessarily guilty. But they do need to answer questions. Why were they going to this island? What did they know? Who did they know? And there are tons of names. You know, I don't want to be out there saying the names because people may say, okay, he's just assuming their guilt, but they can just do a Google search and all the names will come up.

[B]

But was there anybody in there that caught you by surprise?

[A]

Gates caught me by surprise in terms of the. The. The. The explicit things. The fact that there's so many people from biggest names in tech, caught me by surprise. Many of them are attacking me or upset at me. They're attacking Massey. The fact that there's so many people in New York, real estate moguls and finance folks, that caught me by surprise. I mean, what caught me by surprise is how many of our elite are in those files. It caught me by surprise that he's talking to someone who's close to the British Prime Minister and getting tips about Britain going to buy Euros, and he's trading on that information. It caught me by surprise how close he is to world leaders, that he's commenting on the Indian Prime Minister meeting the Israeli Prime Minister, that people are talking to him about how to get access for foreign leaders in the United States. It caught me by surprise that he's got pictures of him with the CIA or meeting Will Burns, who's the head of our CIA.

[B]

And you said that you're being attacked for Getting these files released.

[A]

Yeah. Well, look at, look at the number of people, the billionaires who have been attacking Massey and me online on X. In cases of saying they're going to spend against us or try to oust us now, they'll find other reasons to say it. They'll say, oh, I disagree with Roe's position on calling out the genocide in Gaza, or I disagree that he wants to tax billionaires more. They won't say they're doing it because we're exposing the Epstein files. I mean, no one is going to say, yeah, we don't like Massey and Khanna because they're going after the Epstein files. But look at the people criticizing me. And do a correlation between those people and people whose names are in the Epstein files. Look at the people who are spending against Massey and do a correlation. If their name is in the Epstein files. And it's not rocket science why we have these enemies.

[B]

As far as Epstein island goes, do you see it as more of like a destination for powerful pedophiles, or do you think it's more like the center of a blackmail operation and a power broker base for somebody that was attempting to compromise various political business figures?

[A]

We don't know. There's the honesty. So Julia Brown, who has done the most reporting on this, says that there are unanswered questions about Epstein's affiliation to intelligence. And we need to understand that. Frankly, we won't see that even in the unredacted files because a lot of that information is classified. What I've said is the President, United States should put a trusted leader, like a commission that can look at the classified information and do a report on what exactly Epstein's status was. We need someone who can actually go and look at the classified information and have a clean report who's trusted by the American people. But what we do know is that Epstein was raping young girls on this island. What we do know is that there were parties taking place at this island, at the New Mexico ranch in New York where young girls underage were being paraded around naked. And we do know that powerful men went to these parties while underage girls were being raped. We do know that there were powerful and rich people who raped some of these girls. One of these people whose name I won't mention but is in the files actually fled the United States and is now had raped this person in, in France and now is no longer even in France or the United States. A lot of the people who committed these acts have left the jurisdiction because they were Never prosecuted.

[B]

Yeah. I think a lot of people are seeing all this stuff and seeing these big names and wondering, is there any route toward prosecuting these powerful people? Like, is there any. Is that. Is there court proceedings in motion? Like, is there anything happening to hold these people accountable?

[A]

There needs to be a prosecution. There needs to be investigation. I mean, there have been two people who have been prosecuted, Maxwell and Epstein, and there are over 1200 survivors. Just look at it from common sense. You think two people raped all these survivors, and then the survivors have told Massey and me the type of people who raped them when they were 15, 16, 17. You'd have to believe that they're all lying. What has happened, though, is some people have left the United States who raped these young girls. Some of them have never been investigated. And so the first thing is, we need investigation. What bothers me is that the DOJ is not even willing to investigate. They haven't asked questions under oath of people who've said they're going to the island. Why not investigate them? And then they should, of course, prosecute the people who were involved in raping these underage girls. Even if it was 15 years ago, the statute of limitations hasn't run. And I think they think, let's just move on. Let's just move on. But we will not restore trust in this country if people believe that a few rich and powerful people are above the law. So much so that you can rape underage girls, laugh about it, joke about it, and never face prosecution. And it angers Americans that we have this. Two tiers of justice in this country.

[B]

What was the extent of Trump's involvement in the recent file release?

[A]

Well, look, Massie and I have always said this is not about Donald Trump. It's not about Bill Clinton. The reason we did that is because we wanted to be bipartisan. We wanted it to be transparent. We said, it's about making sure that we get justice for survivors. That said there were documents released that had tips about Trump, and then suddenly that document was taken offline. So one of the questions I have tomorrow is, why was that document taken offline? One of the questions I want to ask Maxwell tomorrow, she's being deposed, is, what did Donald Trump do on the island? Did he have any encounter with underage girls? The problem is, Ghislaine Maxwell said she's gonna take the Fifth. Now, you tell me, how is it her telling what other people did implicating her, and yet she's taking a blanket Fifth Amendment and not answering any of these questions. So my view is release all the files, do an investigation, go where the facts are. But I have never made this political, and neither has Massey.

[B]

But I think the reason that it has that political association is I'm somebody who was covering a lot of, like, QAnon stuff back in the day, and I wanna get into how I feel like, well, there's ev. That Maxwell had, like, her tentacles in the kind of 4chan universe and was sort of trying to move the goalpost and associate child trafficking with, like, Pizzagate and Flat Earth to kind of make everything look dumb and illegitimate, but backing up a little bit. I think the reason so many people are curious about Musk and Trump's involvement is that they were campaigning on, like, releasing the files, draining the swamp, and exposing this global cabal of satanic pedophiles. So I think now we're in this full circle moment where it appears that they are involved in the recent file release or their names are replicated in that sense.

[A]

Oh, their names. And when Massie and I started with the Epstein Transparency act, we thought Trump would support it. Like, he campaigned on this. JD Vance campaigned on it. They went on podcast after podcast saying, we got to release these files. They're rich and powerful people. They raped underage girls. They have no justice. This was a core part of Make America Great Again, of Drain the Swamp. It was one of the top few things they campaigned on. So we thought we'd get his support. Now, he did sign the law that I wrote, but that was after a lot of pressure, and now they are more concerned about protecting rich and powerful people. And he has explained what exactly his relationship was. He should come before Congress just like Clinton is, and take the questions. And Maxwell should be transparent and they should release the rest of these files.

[B]

So was Trump on the island?

[A]

I don't know. Like, I'm not gonna. I'm so careful because I don't want anyone ever say Conor or Massey are out there for conspiracy theories or political things. I only speak about what I know. And the reality is there's no document right now that establishes your point one way or the other. So that's a question he should be asked, but that if you release all the files, we would have much, much more knowledge.

[B]

What particular document in the. In the recent file dump do you feel like is the most symbolic or emblematic of just, like, the level of depravity that was going on on the island?

[A]

Wow, there's so many. But what I would say is the fact that there are these documents where young, where people are Trying to abstinence about being with a naughty girl, being with a 9 year old Brazilian, being with an 11 year old. And their names are redacted, their names are blacked out. And you see these emails of people talking basically about raping or abusing underage girls. That's the depravity. It's not just what happened, but it's why are these people being protected? How are they so powerful? How are they so powerful that someone in the justice department is protecting them? And I am convinced with every fiber of my being that there were more rich and powerful men who raped these underage girls than just Maxwell and Epstein. And their names are being blotted out. That's the real tragedy. And then the second thing is just how many powerful people were involved in this? Like, it's sick. You make a billion dollars, you make all this money, you know, it's not like these rich, powerful people have, have trouble getting a woman in their lives and then they've got to do this.

[B]

So you feel like the billionaire sadistic depravity thing kind of goes hand in hand with being a pedophile.

[A]

I think that the billionaires look horrible in this. I mean, the amount of billionaires that are there with Epstein and going to his island and begging him to go to the island. And then, you know what was so callous? There was someone who was Prince Andrew's former girlfriend. I forget her name. Lady something, you know, I don't know how she became a lady. And she says, oh, you're a loser if you weren't in the Epstein files. Did you see this?

[B]

No, I didn't.

[A]

She says, you're a loser because you weren't part of the rich and powerful club. He knew everybody that was very powerful. So like if you were on the scene and you were powerful, like to be honest, like if you're not in those files, it would be an insult because it just means that you were a bit of a loser. Right. So the people who aren't in the files.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So you, if you're not mentioned the Epstein files, you don't matter. They cared more about being part of the Epstein class than they did about the working class girls who were being raped. They were begging this guy to invite them to his parties, to his home, to his island. And that's what's sick. Like how did we produce an elite like that? They need to be torn down, they need to be held accountable, they need to be prosecuted where they committed crimes. It's not a political issue. I don't care if you're a Republican. I don't think. If you think I'm a progressive Democrat, don't agree with anything I stand for. You should agree that there should be justice in this country.

[B]

Yeah. It's a real full circle moment, I feel like. Because for such a long time it felt like you only ever heard the word Epstein and all the file stuff, like in the conservative orbit, at least for me, because I've been covering this kind of thing for so long, like I mentioned.

[A]

You have? That's right.

[B]

And now we're in the full circle moment where it's like the conservatives and the Republican Party seem to be the one generally running cover for Trump and the other people on the Epstein client list and in the files. But like you said, I don't think it's that political. But at this point, it just seems crazy because it's like, you know, whenever you brought forth the Disclosure act, what was the first reaction of the doj? Wasn't it pretending that there were no files to begin with?

[A]

They fought us every step of the way. They said Massie and I are cranks, that we're conspiracy theorists, that we have no idea what we're talking about. Finally, Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Nancy Mace to stand with us. They threatened them. They chased Marjorie Taylor Greene out of Congress. They called Lauren Boebert into the Situation Room where the Attorney General, Pam Bondi and others said, get off Khanna and Massey's district petition. They intimidated folks. Then when we got it passed, they went in a full court press to try to get every Republican to vote against it. And Massie and I had 70 Republicans willing to vote against Donald Trump. He saw the writing on the wall, so he said, okay, I'll sign the bill. Then they tried to get it amended in the Senate. No senator was willing to stand up for these pedophiles. So they couldn't get it amended. But we fought. We got it passed. So then what did they do? They thought, okay, we'll just do a meaningless dump on December 19th. They'll keep quiet. But we didn't. We said, this is total bs and so then we pushed. And now finally they've done a real release of the files. I mean, they still have 50% of the most nuclear stuff, but now they've exposed it. Now everyone sees that there are a bunch of rich and powerful people who are above the law in America and that they're two tiers of justice and that these are some of the most connected people. They're the ones who give money to politicians. Why do you think people didn't want to do what Massey and I did? Because you're offending the donors in this country. You're offending the people who can write super PAC checks. You've got billionaires saying they're going to primary me. You've got billionaires spending money against Thomas Massie. If you want to be in politics, you probably don't want to offend the billionaires. And that's why this thing has been hidden for decades. That's why Democrats and Republicans didn't expose this. Let's just be honest. It wasn't just a Trump thing. There were administration after administration that wanted to protect these people, and they're still protecting some of them.

[B]

So you built like a pretty much apolitical, nonpartisan, anti pedophile coalition.

[A]

Anti pedophile and anti rich and powerful people skirting the law. Yeah. Like, just because you have a billion dollars, just because you get to have dinner with a president doesn't mean you get to rape underage girls. Like, isn't that kind of how we believe democracy in America is supposed to work? I know in the past with kings and aristocrats, they got to do whatever they wanted. They had harems, but that's not America. Like, in this case, just because you have a billion dollars doesn't make you better than you or me.

[B]

Is there a way to prosecute people like Cash Patel, who tried to, you know, basically say early on that there were no files to begin with and that Epstein wasn't involved in trafficking kids to anybody besides himself? Like, isn't that kind of like a. I don't know if the word is perjury or something like that.

[A]

Well, look, Keshe used to come before Congress and explain himself, but here's what he's said. He said that they couldn't release any more files, but then he should have supported Massie and my bill, because Massie and my bill basically gave them the authority to go to the judges and say, look, we want to have the grand jury released. And instead he just said, well, there's nothing we can do. And so I think he owes the Congress an explanation, and he owes him an explanation why he said what he did, why the law that we passed changed it. Because there really were restrictions on FBI and justice for releasing files before the law. It's our law that made it possible. But he certainly owes the American people an explanation. He should come before Congress and. And then he should answer and held accountable. Bam. Bondi is coming this week. I mean, she should be impeached if she, if we don't get the rest of the files. But it's not been a witch hunt.

[B]

Right.

[A]

I could have. Massey and I could have tried to impeach her three weeks ago. Our concern isn't to go after Pam Bondi or just Cash Patel. Our interest is to go after the people who raped these girls and to get exposed. Like, that's my, my motive, not to score points on the Trump administration.

[B]

Yeah, I know your main thing is justice for survivors of this, like, horrific situation. But there's been a lot of speculation, just like I said earlier, about what Jeffrey Epstein's specific role was, because you talk about control in this elite class of billionaires, and I think most people that I talked to think it was some kind of, like, blackmail, honeypot style operation where people maybe didn't know they were getting involved with underage people. They went there, caught on camera doing something horrible. Now they're effectively owned by whatever intelligence apparatus is backing. Do you give credence to that theory?

[A]

I don't think we can rule out that he had connections with intelligence agencies. The reason I say that very carefully is that Julia Brown, who has done more reporting on this than ever, has said she can't rule it out. And this release shows that he met with William Burns. What is he doing meeting with someone who heads the CIA? It shows that he has a picture at the CIA headquarters and Langley. Yeah, no, I mean, it's outside the

[B]

building or inside the building?

[A]

I think it's inside. I mean, the picture is out there publicly, like, why? And there are legitimate questions about his role in connection to intelligence agencies. Epstein also had close ties to our

[B]

own intelligence agencies and Israel's intelligence agencies. That's why there's so much effort in

[A]

trying to stop this. And I do believe they'll try to

[B]

stop it somewhere else.

[A]

The reality is, though, I can't tell you, or Massie can't tell you that, because people say, well, why didn't you pass a law saying declassify the information or give us the classified information? Because the law would never pass. It'd be uncomfortable, constitutional. The only person who can declassify is the President of the United States. Congress can't declassify information. So the President of the United States has to create a commission to look into the classified information with someone we actually trust, not a political hack to do a report for the American people about who was Jeffrey Epstein and what were his connections. And I don't know if Trump's going To do it, the next president should do it. And this should be a central pledge of a President to understand because if Epstein could do it, we're still vulnerable to someone else who may be able to do it.

[B]

It's definitely still happening. If he did it before, he's probably just a fall guy for a deeper situation.

[A]

Well, I, like I said, these are questions that need to be asked. And the next president should be committed to having a commission to find this out. I would appreciate if the President did it, but he can't put like Pam Bondi in charge or one of his political folks in charge. Pick someone in this country, military background, intelligence background, who has the respect of the American people to go look through the intelligence. It can't be Congress. And to do a report on who this. Who it is.

[B]

So you sound optimistic about a future wherein all these people are prosecuted, all the people who are in the files, all the people that helped cover it up. And then we're going to have a president who's going to officially declassify whatever other files relate to who Epstein was working for. You think we could actually have a utopian future like that where the true swamp was drained?

[A]

I'm not Pollyannish. It's going to be really hard. Yeah, but I think this is the central issue in this country because you can't have trust in government if rich and powerful people seem above the law. And if there's not one prosecution out of this, people are gonna say what's going on? Yeah, because it's not like these people just embezzled funds, they raped girls, they showed up at parties where girls, 15, 14 were paraded naked. Like, if you can get away with that, what can't you get away with? And if we are unable to expose and prosecute that were basically letting down the American people's faith in democracy. And that's why I think it is central. That's why Trump won in part. Cuz he said he was gonna go after the two tiers of justice, he was gonna drain the swamp. And that's what the American people want. That's why they identify with Bernie Sanders. Bernie Sanders has the same sort of message on not two tiers of justice. The difference is Sanders actually believes it. Trump, you know, just got in there and like now he's protecting the very people he said he was gonna drain.

[B]

Is there anything in the files about like occult worship and like, like Satanism and stuff like that?

[A]

I haven't seen it. I mean, there's some people I've seen on on online. I mean, I haven't read all, all 3 million of the files, but there's some pretty disgusting stuff in the files in terms of just racism. Ugly comments about people based on their race, their religion. So, you know, I, I mean, people can see that. It's a lens into our elite and it's a lens into how these people talk behind the scenes.

[B]

They're racist on. In the emails.

[A]

Well, there are some emails that are clearly racist. I'm not saying everyone is racist.

[B]

I know that. But I'm saying what particular racial groups did they seem to negativity towards?

[A]

Well, look, there, there are some comments about people this goyer goyism term.

[B]

I think the word goyim is how Jews refer to non Jews.

[A]

Well, there were some very derogatory comments I saw about that. And, and, and like that there, there are other comments in there that not everyone I want but that, that people have made. And, and it's a, it's an ugly look. I mean, look, when Nixon's tapes were released, there were a lot of ugly things in there. This is an accountability mom elite talk and how they talk about women, like, you know, just.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, objectifying young girls.

[B]

Well, that doesn't surprise me given Epstein's track record. I was definitely a little more shocked to see the like, goam stuff. You know, I'm not like necessarily super into conspiracy theories, but it definitely gives a clue as to, you know, who Epstein may have been working for.

[A]

Well, look, I, I have no idea in terms of whether Epstein was connected to intelligence agencies either here or overseas. Obviously it is. Is surprising to me and shocking to me that he had the access he did to foreign leaders. Why is he meeting as many times with Pete Mendelsohn of Gordon Brown? Why is he meeting with Barack Obama? Did he meet Obama?

[B]

Okay, you said Barack. You're not referring to Obama.

[A]

Ehud Barack, the Israeli Prime Minister.

[B]

Making sure Obama's.

[A]

I don't want to get, don't want to strike some conspiracy. Okay, no, I get it. Iraq. And to the point where Prime Minister Netanyahu had to make a statement about the whole thing. You know, why is he meeting and facilitating things for the Indian prime minister? Why is he meeting with people in Russia and trying to arrange meetings with Putin? Like, who is this guy? You know, I mean, like, I don't have that kind of access. I've been in Congress 10 years on the Armed Services Committee.

[B]

Yeah. What was Netanyahu's statement?

[A]

Netanyahu said, well, Barack was undermining Israel and Everything he was doing was not, not for Israel, but undermining Israel. But the point is the fact that the sitting Prime Minister in Israel is having to comment about what Barack was doing just shows how extensive it is. And you know what upsets people in America is we've got people in the cabinet who are sitting there exposed in the files, like this is basically going to take down the British government because of Mendelssohn, one person. And here we've got all these people and we're just like, ah, life goes on. Trump saying, let's move on, let's watch the Super Bowl. How about like we take care of people who were affiliated with a known pedophile who were going and to his home and his events and his parties knowing that he raped young girls. Like, how about we have some reckoning accountability in this country.

[B]

Yeah, you mentioned the Super Bowl. I'm of the belief that a lot of the recently deployed culture war distractions in the media have been to distract from various Epstein related information dumps. You know what I mean? Like the right now, if you look on the news today, it's all about bad money in his halftime show and Trump saying, why do we have a Spanish speaking singer? He needs to get, he needs to get deported back to Puerto Rico which is the US territory, all that stuff.

[A]

And he's just bitter that bad bunny endorsed Kamala Harris last election. Yeah.

[B]

What are some. How have you seen that sort of distraction theater play out over the past few months?

[A]

Well, look, some of it has not been distraction. It's actually been really devastating. You know, just killing people in the Caribbean on boats, having ICE go as rogue as they did in killing Alex Preddy and killing Renee Goode. But some of it is to distract from what the biggest news story is for Times, which is that the most rich and powerful people in this country were caught up with a pedophile and were asking to go to his home, his ranch or his island knowing that young girls would be there like this. It's mind blowing. And Massey said it's bigger than Watergate, it's bigger than Iran Contra and it is a bigger indictment of the American elite. I don't think we've ever had this kind of a scandal that so many people from every facet of society, from Hollywood, from tech, from finance, from real estate, for politicians, were caught up with one guy in raping young girls.

[B]

How do you feel about the mainstream media's coverage of all this?

[A]

I don't think it has gone deep enough in holding people accountable. You know, It's. It's like they put. They're so focused on what files have been released, what files haven't been released. What about all the people who are in the files? What about actually just going through, show the top hundred prominent people and, like, having an analysis of what questions they should be asked and asking them those questions, like, what did you know? Where did you go? You know, all these people suddenly are changing their statements. Oh, yeah, I met him once. No, no, now I met him three times. Because these files are out. Well, like, what's the truth? And why. Why were you meeting him when he was a pedophile? So I don't think there's been enough coverage of the actual people who have committed these crimes. I don't think there's been enough attention on. On the class issue. This is a class issue in America. They're rich and powerful people who believe the law doesn't apply to them, who think they're above the law and everyone else. You know, you get parking tickets, your car gets booted if you don't pay them, right? You go through a red light, you get that camera ticket back home, you pay those things. And here you got a group of people who think the rules don't apply to them. Why? Because they're giving money to politicians. You think they like Epstein's company? I mean, come on, what is it? I mean, I mean, yeah, some of them it's because of the gratification of his island. Some of them is because he's giving a lot of money or influential people are giving money to politics. And there's a donor class, it's an Epstein class that doesn't think the rules apply, that gets to rig the system.

[B]

So the donor class would be like the people who are in charge of super PACs, people who fund political campaigns, invest or provide investment money to big tech companies. That's what you're talking about.

[A]

I'm talking about in the donor class, particularly the people who give money to politicians. You can get millions of dollars in a super pac. One person sees this interview, I don't like Ro Khanna, okay? I'm gonna start a super pac, put millions of dollars in, take him out. That's what they're threatening to do. They're doing it to Massey. They're three billionaires who are funding him right now, funding his opponent. And so you've got all these people with all this money, and most politicians say, well, I can't take that on. And so they think the rules don't apply to them. There Were survivors I talked to were told, don't call the New York police police, don't call the FBI because those agents won't do anything against the rich and powerful. Maria made a complaint to the FBI in 1996 and nothing happened. And they called her a liar. And just because of the files we released, it came out that she was telling the truth, that the FBI sat on this for decades.

[B]

Are there any super PACs that have targeted you specifically recently?

[A]

There have been people who have said that they're studying up with super PAC back and they will see, we'll see if they, you know, I'm popular in my district and people like me, but there are certainly people on X and others who are organizing. There's a petition, a crowdfund petition going on to get other billionaires to support this. And New York Times had a headline saying they're targeting me to try to oust me this June. So yeah, I mean you take risk when you stand up for these types of things. But to me, you know, my grandfather spent four years in jail Hill as part of Gandhi's independence movement. You know, he, he took on the British Empire. I'm just taking on a group of pedophiles. I mean there's, it's not the same stakes, but I think that you're in Congress for justice and you gotta fight for your principles.

[B]

Do you ever worry about your safety?

[A]

Yeah, look, I've, I've been blessed for so far. I have been fine. And you know, there are a lot of people in our military and all who take much bigger risks every day. I think as a member of Congress, you know, you're not on the front lines. I think about the safety of the, I'm on the Armed Services Committee about the troops who are stationed overseas. They're the ones who are taking the most risks.

[B]

What's your least favorite war?

[A]

Well, the Iraq war was one I ran against. You know, When I was 27 years old, I was the first person to run for Congress against a Democrat taking on the Iraq war. And I have led on getting us out of overseas wars. You know, we should never have been giving Saudi Arabia the arms refueling to go into Yemen. We should never have toppled Gaddafi in Libya, which led to a huge mess. We should have gone after Al Qaeda, but we shouldn't have been in Afghanistan for 20 years. I am against regime change wars. I rather we be spending our money on people here, creating jobs here, health care here. I'm against this Pentagon budget that's going to be over 56%. And it's not going to our troops, it's going to defense contractors. And this is why people are angry. They see this rich and powerful people that basically are getting us into overseas wars that don't follow the law, think they're above the law, that have rigged the economy. You know, income inequality in this country is at its highest it's been in 60 years.

[B]

Didn't know that.

[A]

You know, workers share. The GDP is the lowest it's been in 75 years.

[B]

And does that have to do with like the collapse of the small business sector and like, you know, the minimum wage not rising while the cost of living, like it doesn't contain, it has

[A]

to do with jobs being offshored, industries being offshored, minimum wage not rising, it's still at $7.25. Unions being decimated, the very rich not paying their share of the tax, the fact that we don't, the health care costs have gone up, child care costs have gone up. And so you've got massive economic inequality. People don't have good paying jobs. They can't, they're drowning with health care costs going bankrupt. If someone gets a health care issue and they see a system where the rich are bas buying off politicians where there's no justice and they're angry. That's what, that's why I thought Trump won twice because he said, yeah, I'm going to fix it. We're going to fix everything about our country. And our party was like, well, things are going pretty okay. And people are like, no, they're not going okay. The system is rigged, it's screwed up. And I think now both sides, a new generation have to say, yeah, the system is fundamentally corrupt and messed up and we've got to have, have a different way that actually helps working class

[B]

folks maybe is a bit off topic here, but on a local level, there have been some positive developments in the Bay Area recently. We've covered San Francisco pretty extensively and the overdose rate is way down. How do you feel about the leadership of Daniel Leary and like the new changes in the city?

[A]

I like him. I think he's been pragmatic. I think he understands that you can't just have an open drug culture in a city that that's not the way that you have public safety. He has compassion, but he also understands that, that you can't just go in and smash a Walgreens and take stuff and not have consequences. That if you commit crimes doesn't mean we lock you up forever, but you have to face consequences. So I, I, I'VE he's got work to do still, but I think he has actually done a good job. Have you talked to him?

[B]

No, I haven't yet. But you know, it's like we covered SF when it was kind of at its worst like in that era, like in the, in the couple years after the pandemic when it was really struggling to rebound. We filmed most of that stuff like in the Tenderloin and elsewhere.

[A]

I saw some of that.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. And I've heard that like things have really for the better in San Francisco. If you look at the homicide, property crime and overdose rates, they've just really

[A]

all dipped down since the 1990s. There hasn't been a successful mayor, I would argue, of San Francisco other than Dan Lurie. He's the first person who has taken on issues of homelessness, issues of crime, issues of vacancy. He's actually turning it around.

[B]

I just love mayors as well. Like the mayor of Baltimore is also really great. And Greg, we talk about, you know, national change. Do you think that like really good local level management of like city funds and stuff could create a national, national change? It's sort of like a mosaic of well run cities could come together.

[A]

I do. I think we need good mayors like a Dan Lorre. Look, Matt Mahan, I don't agree with everything, but he's doing a good job in San Jose. He's also been someone who's tackled crime, tackled homelessness. I think having strong leaders, I think going after some of the waste and the fraud and the abuse that takes place in city governments and state governments is important so that we have, have transparency so that people know where their money is going. And at the federal level, you know, the two biggest places, the black hole in my view is the defense budget. They haven't passed an audit for seven, seven times they failed an audit or Medicare Advantage. You know how that works. They, they tell people you're sicker than you actually are and then they bill the government for the person being sicker than they actually are. I mean it's just being total ripped off. So I think we have to go after waste, fraud and abuse in city, state and, and federal governments.

[B]

So back to the Epstein files a little bit. This is something I found really interesting. So I don't know how much you looked into this, but Ghislaine Maxwell had a relationship with the founder of 4chan, Christopher Poole. His name online was moot and it basically showed that she was instrumental in moderating a board called Pol P O L and that was one of the really early incubation locations for what became QAnon. And the Q drops, I didn't know that. And the Q drops really, really almost resemble the reality of the recent Epstein file dump, but they just include 10% of the craziest stuff you've ever heard in your life, and it delegitimizes everything else.

[A]

Now it's so interesting.

[B]

So what. What they sort of did is effectively associate, like Anunnaki lizard theory about, like, like snakes in the moon controlling our minds.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Flat earth with, like, elite child sex trafficking.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And kind of put everything in the loony bin and created these useless rabbit holes for people to dive down.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And I just find it super interest. The recent files proved a tangible connection between QAnon and Jeffrey Epstein.

[A]

I had no idea about that, that more people need to know that. But the reality is some of the people who suspected that there were pedophiles that were being protected by the federal government turned out to be right. Like, there are a lot of rich and powerful people who were involved with a pedophile who were going to an island where pedophilia was taking place. Place and face no consequences and actually were involved in making government decisions. As Epstein's file shows, he's talking to all these politicians. So the instinct of the American people to suspect that something was wrong was correct. Now it was in QAnon's case, it was presented with all of these conspiracy theories that are patently false. Like they're, you know, they just went after things that make no sense or the pizza gate or, you know, naming particular people. But I didn't realize that that could have been an intentional effort, you're saying, to discredit the parts that are true of rich and powerful people engaging with a pedophile.

[B]

Yeah. It's almost like when people are guilty of something, they will, like, almost sort of self confess a little bit and blame somebody else really intensely. Like Most of the QAnon drops pointed everything to, like, Hillary Clinton.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like as far away from Trump and all these people as possible. And now it seems like the conservative establishment, or at least like the MAGA establishment, was a lot closer to Epstein than we previously thought.

[A]

Absolutely. And Hillary Clinton had literally, from everything I've seen, nothing to do with them. She's going to testify. People are going to ask her. No, Clinton is in the files. Bill Clinton's in the files, and he owes explanation to the American people. But, yeah, that's why it was always seen as, like, targeted on her and not on the actual People who were on the island or doing these terrible things.

[B]

What are some of the inroads that you've seen between Maga and Epstein?

[A]

Inroads meaning relationships? Look, I mean, there are obviously people in the Trump administration like Lutnick and others are all over these files. There are people like the Secretary of. I think it's the Secretary of Navy that was. Now it comes out that he was on Epstein's plane. Obviously there are tons of mentions of Trump in the files. There are people who are huge funders of his who are all over the files. People from Silicon Valley, some of these tech bros who funded him, all over the files. So. So the question is, what were they doing? What did they know and how do you expose it? And the reality. There are a lot of Democrats too in there. Right. I mean, and that's why it took both Massie and me. It took people saying, we're not going to care if this takes down our own party. There are a lot of people who are upset at me because it's hurt some of the biggest donors of the Democratic Party or are mentioned in the files. Right. So I think it's not left or right anymore. It's sort of why do we have a corrupt elite and how do we restart our country around basic principles, which is no one is above the law. You can't just be a billionaire and buy access to a politician. You gotta have a democracy that actually works and represents people.

[B]

Yeah, I think this might be a watershed moment that finally breaks the two party system. I mean, at least I hope so, because I'm of the belief that the elite class in the country has a vested interest in making sure nothing changes. And that can be like establishment Democrats and conservatives. And I feel like this is all symbolized by Epstein and the files and all this stuff because it's almost like this gridlock. They've engineered this like ultimate compliance situation where it seems like you have anybody rich enough in the country is somehow wrapped up in this whole thing. It's almost hard to even think of who could be an outsider at this point. Obviously they exist, but it's like Bill Gates, Stephen Hawking. You go down the list, you're like, damn, who's not in this? Who has more than a billion dollars?

[A]

You know, I was talking to someone who's the son of a billionaire and he was like, I was just holding my breath and I was so relieved that my father's not in the files. He's like, I didn't think my father would do anything dumb at the parties. But I was like, just. Was he part of this? Because, like, everyone is part of this. Right. And it's staggering to me, that should be the headline. The headline is all like, do they release the files? Do they not release the files? The headline should be, how are, like, every powerful person almost in America part of, like, Epstein's network?

[B]

Like, what.

[A]

What's going on? On.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

How are they all part of this?

[B]

How long did the DOJ have access to these files for?

[A]

Well, they've had them for decades, so multiple administrations. Multiple administrations. And it's. It's. And this is where I've been honest. I've said that this is not just a Donald Trump thing. This is multiple administrations that have sat on this, that have ignored these survivors. I've gotten to know these survivors personally. Now, I first spoke out about this in 2019, but I didn't get passionate about the. This until this year, where I met with all these survivors, and I was like, wow, this country has really shafted them.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And they have been saying this since 2007. Their lawyers, like Bradley Edwards, have been talking about this for decades. And now I understand the reluctance to release these files because you're basically exposing the American elite. You're exposing the people who fund the system, the political system. System. And so obviously you're going to be careful. And then they hide behind it. Well, they're not guilty. Well, they haven't been charged. Okay. Yeah, they haven't been charged. No one is saying just you hold these people to jail, but maybe you should investigate them. Maybe you should let the American people know what they've been up to.

[B]

Well, the hard part is who would investigate them? It would be the Department of Justice. Right. Like to bring federal litigation forward. But. But they'd have to sort of investigate themselves because they're the ones who've been ignored, ignoring all this information for so long.

[A]

Well, look, they'd have. They're two different things. There's a political leadership that has ignored the. The information, but there are U.S. attorneys who aren't taking orders from the political class. And if they just allowed for investigations to be opened up by some of the U. S. Attorneys where people are being asked questions. Not just because you email Jeffrey Epstein saying, I want to go to your mansion, I want to go to your island. I don't want to go to your parties, doesn't mean you're guilty of a crime. But don't you think you should at least be asked, did you go. Go. Were they underage girls? Do you know if their underage girls were being raped, who else did you see? Like, that's how you do an investigation. So people are saying, oh, row, is this a witch hunt? No, it's not a witch hunt. Yeah. I'm not saying every single person in the files ought to be prosecuted. I'm not saying. But I do think every person who's talked about going to these places should be investigated, asked questions.

[B]

And what is the route to actually investigating and being able to depose all the people that have potential connections to Jeffrey Epstein?

[A]

Well, there are two different routes. One is Congress. We should open up an oversight subcommittee called the Epstein committee and basically haul in front of Congress through subpoena power everyone who's been mentioned in these files to have them testify to the American people under oath.

[B]

Everybody wants that to happen, you know,

[A]

and that maybe that's what makes news today, that. That I believe we should actually call for that. And Comer should call for that. You know, he should take credit for it. He's the chair of the committee. I mean, Garcia, when he becomes chair next, if we take Congress. But Comer should call for that. I'd support him. We'd get a bipartisan vote, establish the Epstein subcommittee, appoint Democrats, appoint Republicans on it, and start one by one by one. You can start with Bill Gates just because he's the prominent name, but start 100 people and ask them questions. You know, you're so focused on the Clintons. I'm glad the Clintons are testifying, but that's not going to answer. Get these people in front of Congress. If this president isn't going to do it, the next president should make two commitments. Commitments that they are actually going to investigate this in terms of where the law leads with the Justice Department and that they're going to appoint someone, as we discussed, to look at the classified information and give a report to the American public that they can trust about what Epstein's status was and what actually took place. No one can do that other than an American president because that information is classified.

[B]

Wow. So only executive power could allow this subcommittee to be created.

[A]

No, the subcommittee can be created by Congress.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Two separate executives issues. Comer can do that tomorrow. He can say, I'm going to create a subcommittee to have Epstein hearings. We're going to start Epstein hearings tomorrow. That's what we should do. That's what any normal, functioning democracy would do. You should do it in the House and you can do it in the Senate as well. But, you know, start with the House. Comer is the one who's been leading the calls on getting Bill and Hillary Clinton? Why not do it for everyone separately? The President needs to be able to look at the question that you have and so many people have, what are Epstein's ties to intelligence? What did he work for?

[B]

Gotcha. So if those two things happen in tandem, it would be like the most robust, robust investigation.

[A]

It would be the most robust. And then the third is that the Justice Department needs to give their US Attorneys the green light that they can investigate as well. People who could have gone to the island based on the files. If the Justice Department, you know, wants to open up new investigations, career prosecutors, they should be able to do that.

[B]

And do you think any of that will happen?

[A]

The calmer one. I don't understand why it wouldn't happen. I mean, it's the right politics for him. It's not substantive. I don't know what. What his hesitation would be. Maybe he'll see this and he'll agree. I would support it. It'd be by bipartisan. Yeah, he should do that. If he doesn't do it, then when we take back the House, Garcia should do it. In terms of the president, you know, it should happen, but maybe it'll take a new president. I don't know. I don't know why the president is hesitant to appoint someone when he campaigned on this, or Vance should. You know, who's been silent and all this is J.D. vance. Like, what happened to him?

[B]

He's talking about antifa somewhere.

[A]

You know, it's like he campaigned on all this stuff. He was the populist, the hillbilly elegy. I'm going to be for the forgotten guy. No, I mean, like, that was his whole thing.

[B]

I remember.

[A]

And like, doesn't he want to have, like, does he, like, not have any statement on Epstein? He's been silent. Like, why doesn't he say, okay, I'm going to lead a call for the intelligence information to be investigated and for there to be a report. You know, maybe I should do something as vice president.

[B]

So you're saying that Trump could snap his fingers right now and be able to tell the American public who Epstein worked for?

[A]

He could. And look, he has to be careful on classified information. But if I were advising him, I say pick someone who is not political, who is not one of your lackeys. Say, I'm appointing this person to look through and investigate all the intelligence to make sure that our secrets aren't compromised in any way and our troops aren't put at risk or our intelligence Officers aren't put at risk. But I want there to be a clear report on who Epstein was, about what his relationships were. And I'm giving this person six months with a commission to come up with a report. And then you have the report and you have him testify in front of Congress. There still will be people who won't believe it, but at least that's what we've done when we've had. Had these kind of cases in the past. And at least people will say, okay, there was some effort at transparency.

[B]

Do you think that, like, if, if the people are angry and frustrated enough that that pressure could in turn make the government take that sort of action? Or do you think they're just going to keep trying different distractions and, and moving the target and switching the goalpost to a different place forever until we just move on?

[A]

They're trying the latter. It hasn't worked. Yeah, you know, they, they thought, they didn't think we'd be talking about this now. They, they tried. Remember, they shut down Congress early over this. They shut down Congress in July to get Epstein to go away. They didn't think Massey and I would bring the survivors to the Capitol. There's no way Donald Trump thought he was going to sign Ro Khanna's bill, a Bay Area Democrat that he's going to sign. There's Epstein Transparency Act. We forced a lot. Not because Massey and I are some kind of legislative wonder kids, because the American people have been relentless, and as a result, we have half the files released. That's enormous. It shows the power of people still in this country. So if people continue with this kind of advocacy and concern and raising questions, then I think drip by drip by drip, we'll get some of these actions. If people say, okay, we've had enough, our attention span is done, let's move on, then it won't be possible. But I don't think that's the case. I think that these files have actually just deepened it. And people are talking about this in, you know, at bars, at super bowl parties. It's like, gotten through to the popular culture. Culture, yeah.

[B]

How do you feel about some of the, the public reception in response to the files? Are you surprised?

[A]

The biggest surprise I think people have is what we talked about. How many people are in it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like, I, I think people felt like, okay, there would be a few names, and it's actually helping the people in it because there's so many, we can't keep track. Like, any one of these individuals would be a front page story. But I, I, I hope people see the ad that the survivors have done. It's a Super bowl ad, but they didn't have the millions of dollars to put it on TV so they can see it online. And they're talking about how they're not going to rest until the files get released. And that 3 million files being redacted is not right. And the thing that's been redacted is what everyone wants to know, which is who are these people who committed pedophilia? Like why are you redacting names of people in emails? We're talking about 10 year old or 8 year old girls.

[B]

So just to clarify, most of the redactions are powerful people. It's names that redact it's names.

[A]

I mean look, some of the redactions may be legitimate. They're survivors have to be protected. But you have email after email that has something talking about a naughty girl, an 11 year old girl and it said the email to Jeffrey Epstein. The to is not redacted. The from is redacted. Like what are you doing redacting, blacking out that name. Obviously it's not a survivor talking about raping or abusing a naughty young girl. Who are you protecting? That's the biggest question for me.

[B]

It's always just seemed really obvious that it was a blackmail operation for intelligence organizations. That's the only thing that could possibly make sense. Why else would you be protecting someone who's a pedophile? It has to be sort of this like, I don't know, like cancerous web of people that all have dirt on each other. And obviously the goal is to maintain elite control of society, but they're engineering compliance through this advanced blackmail operation.

[A]

I, for six months haven't speculated. I'm not, I'm not going to speculate, but I will just say that you can't rule out his connections to intelligence agents, agencies and there are a lot of unanswered questions and we need to have a transparent report about it.

[B]

Yeah, I know that you can't speculate because your job is to like represent survivors and get more files disclosed. But it's like most people, if they knew their friend or uncle or something was a pedophile would just be like, yeah, that guy's a pedophile, prosecute him. They wouldn't be like, make sure his name doesn't appear on anything. Like what? I know there's a lot of evil people in the world, but I'm not, not every single person can be an evil pedophile.

[A]

Well look, there was another thing though, which, which is that this guy was giving a lot of money. He had access to a lot of people with money. And it does show kind of a moral myopia where rich people were more interested in being part of the club and being part of that Epstein class than calling him out because they didn't want to lose access to other rich and powerful people. So what their motives are, what this guy's motives are, there are huge questions. And it's not people like, well, why are you worried about something in the past past? Well, first of all, it's because they're 1200 plus survivors. So like we have to care about justice. But it's also because if we don't fix this, if we don't have some sense that rich and powerful people are going to play by the rules and follow the law, then how do we restore any sense of trust in our democracy? Like, we've got to understand what happened here. What our vulnerability is, is are we still vulnerable to this kind of total manipulation or, or have we fixed it?

[B]

Do you think there's going to be a Nuremberg moment maybe five, ten years down the line?

[A]

I think there should be a truth and reconciliation moment. Not just, by the way, about the Epstein class, but a lot of things that have gone wrong in this country for people who have violated the law. When it comes to ICE abuses, when it comes to war crimes, we need a truth and reconciliation. But on Epstein in particular. Yeah, I think a new president could do that and it should be for Democratic accountability and for survivors.

[B]

So we talked about the two party system a lot and I was curious about your thoughts on the Democratic Party. Do you think they're going to have any leverage moving forward come the next election to face whoever the Republican frontrunner

[A]

is going to be probably in 2026 or 2028.

[B]

Not the midterms, the next presidential election?

[A]

Well, some. I think it depends on what the midterms happen. With the midterms, I'm pretty hopeful that we'll win back the House and we've got an outside shot of the Senate and then it depends on who we put up. If we put up the same old status quo, like, okay, we're just going to run some saying, let's go back to how things were then I don't think we're going to win. If we put up someone who comes from the progressive populist wing, the Sanders wing, like who's going to call out the corrupt elites, who's going to call out a corrupt class that has used money to corrupt politics, who's going to call out the income inequality, who's going to say it's not right, that a third of the wealth is piled up in Roe's district in Silicon Valley and people in this country don't have health care, they don't have child care, they don't have good paying jobs and is actually going to be for change then I, then I think we'd win. I, I do think, I mean I'm probably going to be, people will criticize me for this, but I think if Bernie Sanders was 15 years younger, he would walk into the presidency. But people want someone who is a change agent, who's actually going to take on the system.

[B]

Is there somebody that comes to mind who you feel like would be a good fit?

[A]

I think there has to be competitive primary. This was one of the challenges that we didn't do in 2024 because of circumstance. Right. I mean, in retrospect, Biden should have announced that he was not going to seek reelection. There should have been a competitive primary. My hope is there'll be 10, 15 people who will run and that'll actually be a person who has real change. But you know, people have a good sense of who someone is just saying, I'm the change candidate. I'm like, I'm a young, good looking person. It's not going to be, it's not going to be enough. Like, what, where do you stand? What have you done? Where have you shown actual courage? What have you done to take on powerful interests? What is your track record? Where do you actually stand on these issues? And then people will be able to

[B]

see you like Gavin Newsom.

[A]

I've supported him for, for, for governor. I mean, we have differences on policy, but I did support him when he ran for governor.

[B]

I guess a better question is, do you think he would have a shot at becoming President of the United States?

[A]

Well, certainly he's one of the contenders. I mean, he's, But I think there will be at least 10, 15 contenders. But I, the question is like if we go with him, I mean, he's been in politics since the 1990s. He supported Hillary Clinton. You know, I think the question, question is are we going to have a change candidate, someone who's actually going to take on the system or a status quo candidate? I don't believe we should be putting forth the status quo candidate. I'd rather we have someone who many people haven't heard of and there are many around the country who's going to be new, who's going to be fresh, who's going to be for change?

[B]

Yeah. How do you feel about the assessment that he's kind of mismanaged California's tax revenue?

[A]

Well, I think there's been certainly waste in California. I mean, obviously the high speed trailing that was supposed to be built 25 years ago still hasn't been built. Obviously the, there's, we have one of the highest homeless populations and we've been spending money ineffectively. I mean, I, I mean that's just an objective look at California governance. Even he would, I would imagine, acknowledge that.

[B]

Yeah, I'm never going to turn my back on California. But it is difficult sometimes, especially when tax day comes and you're looking at your city and you're like, like you said, all these people are being underserviced and you're just thinking about the massive amount of taxes, state taxes and stuff. You know, like when I first succeeded as a small business owner here, you know, like when the company brought in a certain money, like it was like I owed the IRS like a hundred thousand dollars or something like that. And that was a real, it really was a frustrating moment for me. And I know so many young people who are successful who are leaving California the first chance they can to go to a state that's more, you know, friendlier to small business owners who, you know, aren't. Because it's weird because it feels like if you're, if you're uber rich in California, then you don't get, you don't have to pay anything. But if you're on the way from working class to a successful point in your life, it's like really hard to climb that ladder here.

[A]

Well, I totally agree with you. I mean, I think we should be taxing things. The billionaires more in this state instead of some of the people in California are saying, no, no, no, no, no, don't tax the uber rich. And yet the benefit, the burden is often falling on small business owners. And then people look at it and they say, look, it's not effective. You know, we have one of the highest poverty rates in the country. When you factor in cost of living. Energy costs are way too high in this state because of PG&E me. The housing costs are way too high in this state because we haven't built enough housing. The child care costs in this state are too high. And then you don't have enough good paying working class jobs. And so there are issues that, you know, we'll see. Who do you like? Someone for governor who you Have.

[B]

I can't think of anybody that's kind of the issue. But I just know that I'm not going to leave California. I'm sticking it. Sticking it out for the long haul because I really think it's the best state. It's like its own country. But so many people. Like, I tried to live in Arizona for, like, six months. Just came right back.

[A]

Well, I love California. I mean, look, it's not just the weather. It's also people from different parts of the world and living in harmony. It's a sense of innovation and risk taking, but it's got to be in. In partnership with other parts of the country. Like, I grew up in Pennsylvania. I was. I loved growing up in Pennsylvania. Right. And, like, we can't look at ourselves as apart from the American story. It's sort of being. What are we going to do for the. The broader country?

[B]

I also grew up in Pennsylvania.

[A]

You did?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Where were you born?

[B]

Philly.

[A]

That's where. I grew up in Bucks county, in Ben Sel.

[B]

Oh, nice. I was born at Bryn Mawr Hospital, but I grew up in Fairmount.

[A]

So we're both Pennsylvania kids in California.

[B]

Look at us.

[A]

Look at it.

[B]

And you're a little more successful than me.

[A]

I don't know about that. You got much more virality.

[B]

You're a congressman. Isn't there only, like, 435 congressmen?

[A]

But how many. How many successful, like, podcasters are there? Probably less than. Less than 50. That's true. You know what the dumbest thing politicians do is start their own podcast. That's like, no one, no one cares. No one, no one wants to hear a politician on a podcast. So.

[B]

But do you ever wake up and look in the mirror and just think, damn, dude, I'm a congressman?

[A]

You know, I do sometimes, because I'm Indian American and I'm of Hindu faith and my parents are immigrants. And I was told until I was like, 25 that I couldn't get elected to anything in this country. And when I think about my story, I was born in Philadelphia, grew up there, and represent now Silicon Valley, the wealthiest, most innovative place arguably in the world. I think, you know, this is still a pretty decent country. You can. A lot of things can happen in this country.

[B]

So as far as Hindu faith goes, like, what does that look like? Is there a place that you go to to worship? Or you just. It's more. Just like a day, it's more spiritual.

[A]

I mean, when I was young, I would go to the temple. There's Hindu temples, but you know, it's. I call myself a Gandhian Hindu. I mean, the Hindu faith really influenced Mahatma Gandhi, his principles of peace and justice. And that influenced Dr. King in this country with the nonviolence movement. For me, the hand of faith teaches me, like, you do your duty and you don't worry about the consequences. And that my faith actually I think really influenced how I took on this Epstein stuff. Like I felt that the survivors were wronged and like I had to do justice. And I wasn't thinking about how's this all going to play out now. It turned out that we got the law passed and it turned out I've upset a lot of people. But like, your faith gives you that sense of, okay, you're going to do, do what is your duty.

[B]

Yeah, it's especially important right now. I don't know how much time you spend on Instagram and on, on X. Hopefully not as much time as I do, but there's a lot of like weird, like Indian hate stuff happening online. Have you seen some of that?

[A]

I see some of it on X.

[B]

I see some of it fear mongering about like an Indian takeover of Canada.

[A]

Is, is that I. What I usually see is like every comment they'll be like criticizing me and then like they want to like deport Rokhana and I'll have to be like, well, I was actually born in Philadelphia in our bicentenary. But you know, I think some of the anger at, at the Indian American experience is that there are a number of Indian Americans who've done very well, who through hard work, through good fortune and like I said, these. There's an economic divide. Right? In Pennsylvania, where I grew up, like the steel factory shut down in Bristol, there has been a hollowing out of industry. And what we need, if we take on the economic divide, then I think this country is going to be much better at dealing with the racial diversity. That's why I call for a new economic patriotism. Like how do we build up economic opportunity across this country and how do

[B]

you think we do that?

[A]

Well, we need a Marshall Plan for America, a government that says, look, we're going to invest in the new factories in this country, we're going to invest in 1,000 trade schools in this country. We're going to invest in the new care jobs, nurses, child care, elder care, a lot of of that in these communities. We're going to make sure that capital isn't just here in Silicon Valley, that its capital is across the country. We're going to create tech center Jobs, which I've done with other communities so that you can get a job even if you don't have a four year degree and understanding how to apply AI or technology to a small business or a community. But we need, like, we need a Marshall Plan for America and economic development for America, not like we had just for Europe. And I think if a president focused on the economic development of Johnstown, Pennsylvania and Warren, Ohio and Orangeburg, South Carolina and the Southwest, that could bring us together.

[B]

Yeah. So less, less defense spending, more spending on domestic manufacturing.

[A]

Domestic manufacturing, domestic childcare, the domestic care economy, domestic trade schools. Yeah. Less just wars overseas. I mean, I think lift up our, our communities.

[B]

That's interesting that you mentioned that your district is the wealthiest in the country. Is that accurate?

[A]

One third almost of the nation's stock market wealth is in my district. We have five companies over a trillion dollars. Apple, Go Google, Nvidia, Tesla and broadcom. It's about $18 trillion of market cap. And the total stock market in the US is about 69 trillion. So you literally have almost one third of the nation's stock wealth, stock market wealth in my district.

[B]

A lot of guys in the files live around here.

[A]

There are a lot of guys in the files that are around here. Some may be leaving California, but a lot of them are in, at least have spent time around here.

[B]

What's your favorite Indian spot in town?

[A]

I like Shalimar.

[B]

We're going to eat there after this. Shalimar? Yeah, why not? You know what I mean? All right, we'll add a component.

[A]

Can you, can you tolerate spice or not?

[B]

Definitely.

[A]

All right, Shalimar is now like, it's not like fancy. Yeah, it's a little bit of a hole in the wall, but it's got the best kebabs, best lamb chops, best chicken tikkas, you know, And I've let masala chai. In fact, I have my masala chai here. The Starbucks stuff sucks.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like, you got to get authentic masala chai.

[B]

Yeah, I'm drinking a pretty bad coffee right now.

[A]

My McDonald's coffee is not bad.

[B]

The wealth inequality here, pretty crazy though, for the East Palo Alto. Palo Alto divide.

[A]

Yeah. Although it's not just East Palo Alto. Palo Alto, it's East San Jose, which I represent. Newark, El Viso, Milpitas, you wouldn't know. And you go to some of these schools, Independence High School in, in East San Jose, you wouldn't know. You're in Silicon Valley. And then you go to Homestead where Steve Jobs went, or Cupertino and the world's their oyster. So there's an economic divide here, but then there's the economic divide around the country.

[B]

But I feel like the Bay Area is a mirror of like the most extreme lords and peasants class structure that we have that's reflected elsewhere. But I mean, San Francisco, especially a couple years back, it's like, you know, it's like dystopian. You're seeing there's like self driving cars rolling around like they could, but they can't move because there's someone passed out in the street. And then like there's a guy getting his doordash delivery up to his penthouse that's like almost totally empty and he works from home for like a multinational corporation.

[A]

Yeah, no, it's pretty stark. And it's because we don't have the right social contract. I said we need a new tech social contract. Right. It used to be people like Human Hewlett and Packard with HP and Andy Grove. People were rooted in the community. They went to like Sunnyville Community Services Center. They knew Second Harvest. They knew that they had to give back to the community. It wasn't just all about wealth accumulation and we haven't done that. We haven't had the wages go up fast enough. We have not had people get the healthcare they need. The biggest issue is the housing, though. The cost of housing has been astronomical in this state.

[B]

Is that because of nim? Nimbyism.

[A]

I think it is nimbyism. It's because we've let private equity buy up single family homes. It's because there has not been, in my view any rent caps. Like it's fine to say that we, while we're building new housing, we want to have a rent cap. I mean, In San Jose, 40% of some people's salary goes into rent. So it's a combination of not building enough, letting private equity buy, not having rent caps. And then you just. When you have such extreme wealth wealth in a place, you're going to drive up the, the cost because people are bidding for, for housing.

[B]

Private equity, like BlackRock, you're talking about

[A]

massive real estate, massive real estate firms, Black, Blackstone, others that have bought.

[B]

Oh, I mean, Blackstone. Yeah, but it's all kind of the same.

[A]

It's all the same. It's a ban that it should ban it. Even Trump is saying let's ban it. You know, now he's coming up and saying let's ban private equity for buying single family homes. And that's affecting my area. It's not the Only, only thing, I don't want to demagogue it, it's like you got to build more housing, you got to have some kind of rent cap. You've got to make sure that people have a higher salary in the, if they don't have a four year degree. And you got to bring down the cost of childcare, which is a huge expense here, and you've got to bring down the costs of health care. But that those are the things that make middle class, working class life very hard in California and that have created like a bifurcated structure. It's like that. This is why we have a really silly debate. Anytime people criticize California, the California defenders say, yeah, but we got all the big companies and all the manufacturing and all the wealth generation. All true. And then the people who dislike California say, yeah, but the cost of energy is really high and the cost of housing is really high and the wages aren't keeping up. That's also true. And the reality is we have a bifurcated economy in California and that's why we need a new social contract.

[B]

So you're going to D.C. to tomorrow tonight.

[A]

Red eye.

[B]

So you're taking the red Eye of D.C. tonight. You're going to look physically at Ghislaine Maxwell tomorrow.

[A]

I am.

[B]

Have you seen her before?

[A]

Just on tv.

[B]

So you're really going to look at her?

[A]

Well, I, I'm told she may be on video on Zoom, so we'll see. I don't know if she's coming but. And it's completely wrong what they're trying to do there, this blanket fifth Amendment. They, they want to basically say she's taking the fifth Amendment to everything. Not going to say anything. So today I actually sent Comer seven questions that I want to ask, ask, asking, like, is she really going to take the fifth Amendment to this? Like telling us whether other people, who the co conspirators were, what their names are, like, how does that implicate her? Or telling us who else on the island raped underage girls. How does that implicate her? Like it's so, you know, she's, she answered all the questions when Blanche interviewed her, but now she wants to take the fifth Amendment. So we'll see what we find out.

[B]

And you're going to get to look at the remainder of all the files.

[A]

Yeah. In the afternoon, Massie and I are meeting, meeting up. We're going to go together to justice and we're going to start to see the remaining of the files.

[B]

What are you expecting? Just like more of the same.

[A]

Well, I mean, the first question I'm going to ask is, why are these blacked out names? Right. I'm going to. They don't let you take staff, they don't let you take in electronics. I'm printing out literally the places I want to see, the documents I want to see.

[B]

And when you say ask, you mean, like the librarian kind of who works?

[A]

Yeah, I mean, we'll find out how much access, how we'll get it. But do I physically have to sit there typing in these names? And the searches, you know, they're. They're making it very hard because they don't. Usually you get to take in staff, like lawyers and others who are adept at this, who studied this. Now, Massey and I are going to do what. What we can. But the biggest questions I might have is like, why are names blacked out of people who have sent some of the most incriminating emails at first glance? I mean, if there's an innocent explanation for it, I'll. I'll let you know. I. I can't think of one, but I'm always going with an open mind.

[B]

I'm curious to see who wrote that email that was like, hey, hope you're doing good. Love the torture video. Have you seen that one?

[A]

I haven't seen that one email I've

[B]

ever seen in my life. It's like, hey, hope you're having a great weekend. Love the torture video. Talk to you soon. It's like, what's wrong with these people?

[A]

Yeah, seriously. I mean, some of the stuff is sick. I mean, it's like they're. They're. It's not just that they did really grow some gruesome things. It's that they, like, take pleasure in it or joy in it or a sick thrill in it.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, I feel like to accrue that level of influence and capital, you already have to have, like, taken advantage of so many people. That's just my theory about that. I think maybe by the time they just have these, like, freakish control fantasies that extend to, like, sadistic tendencies, I always imagine, like, their souls are just, like, so rotten that they need to do the worst thing ever to feel something.

[A]

Yeah. Or maybe it's like they need something that's so forbidden, that's so out of normal human life, but. But it's almost like it's not just that they're above the law. They revel in being above the law. They. That's their thrill that they are, you know, ubermensch, or they kind of superhuman, that the rules don't apply to them, that those of us who live by the rules. It's kind of weak, right, that that's how, that's how they almost look. And they're. They. Someone once said to me, like, well, they're. They would be the conquerors in a different age now they're just building wealth. And a lot of conquerors didn't think the rules applied to them. Right. They would do heinous things like rape

[B]

girls and plunder, like Genghis Khan, the Vikings, etc.

[A]

Yeah. Or just conquerors in America and world history. And these folks think that they're superhuman. And the whole democratic project was against that. Right. It was supposed to be that everyone is equal. And that's why this stings. This cuts so deep into our, our culture.

[B]

Have you looked into why Bannon and Epstein were so close and how Bannon had such, like, unfiltered access to him?

[A]

I don't know. You know, I haven't focused as much on that, but obviously there, he's all over the place, files and there's questions of how he was trying to rehabilitate him, I think on some video. And the. I don't. I don't get it. I don't understand what the fascination was. You know, he'd be someone also who would come before the Epstein oversight committee, that we should have, like bring them all in, have them answer questions to the American people.

[B]

So what are the main things you're hoping to get out of tomorrow?

[A]

I want to. I'm going to go specifics, which is if I'm focused on 10 emails, maybe like, can I get the names for those 10 emails and understand why they're redacted and then understand what I'm allowed to say, you know, what Massey is allowed to say if they have been redacted, you know, just push for them to be unredacted and get the information out there. But the reality is, what I'm trying to understand is what's the motivation of protecting people? Who are they protecting and why? And anything I can get to that will. Will be a step forward.

[B]

This is one of the foundational questions when it comes to all Jeffrey Epstein related matters. Matters. Do you think he was murdered, committed suicide, or that he's still alive?

[A]

I personally don't think he's still alive. I was in the camp of 100 that he committed suicide, but I don't know anymore. I now have questions based on these files about what happened. And I'm less certain that we Know everything based on what has come out, based on some of the conversations I've had with survivors.

[B]

What makes you think that he can't be alive?

[A]

I get, you know, I can't rule it out, like as a total possibility just from what survivors have said and others have said. If you were to ask me, I don't think that's the case.

[B]

Yeah, but I mean, obviously as a, as an elected official, you can't go down the conspiracy rabbit hole, but it's very easy to do, especially with 3 million files.

[A]

Well, the problem is that this is what's, what's happening is if you do a selective release, you're just opening up more and more questions and it's not good for those of us who don't want conspiracies. But I, you know, Massey and I have been very careful in not doing that. It's why we genuinely have a lot of trust amongst people and amongst the survivors to, to be pursuing this, because none of this would be possible if it weren't for the survivors. And if I lose the trust of the survivors, then I'm no longer going to be effective.

[B]

Do you have a final message for the American people who are, you know, hoping that at some point they'll get full disclosure and transparency from the government?

[A]

This is the fight of our times. This is one of the largest scandals in American history. It goes to two tiers of justice. The rich and powerful in this country feeling they're above the law. It is shameful and disgraceful that the most influential people in finance, in tech, in Hollywood, in politics were enmeshed with Jeffrey Epstein. That they were doing this when they knew he was a convicted pedophile. They were asking to show up to his home, his ranch or his island, knowing that young girls were going to be there. And this entire Epstein class needs to be held accountable. There need to be investigations and prosecutions. And the entire Epstein class needs to be out of our politics. No, no more of their super PAC money and their money controlling politics. And we need a new start, a new moral beginning in America. This should be a cleansing of a failed political class in a new direction for our country.

[B]

All right, Congressman, thank you so much for your time.

[A]

Appreciate you.

[B]

Awesome. And what was the name of that Indian spot you talked you out?

[A]

Shout Shalimar. Shalimar in Fremont. There's one in Fremont. There's one up in San Francisco.

[B]

All right, awesome, thanks. Which one's better? Probably the one in your district.

[A]

Fremont. One is, is better. But I, you know, I reference SF1's better. SF1's not.

[B]

Channel 5 Live Worldwide, Hollywood and Vine.

[A]

The Authority, Channel 5 News, Channel 55. We don't with custers and 5 is the best number.