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Unknown Speaker
Foreign.
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Political Analyst
2025 on Friday, democracy Forward foundation sued the Department of Justice, or doj, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, or FBI, to make it respond to its request for the release of the Epstein files, as well as all communications the administration has exchanged over the files and President Donald Trump's inclusion in them, as required under the Freedom of Information Act. The Democracy Forward foundation filed Freedom of Information act requests on July 28th asking for expedited processing in light of public interest in the files, but the DOJ and the FBI have not responded. The case has been assigned to Judge Tanya Chutkan of the US District Court for the District of Columbia, who presided over Trump's criminal trial for his attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Drawing Chutkan for an Epstein case means decisions will not be weighted in Trump's favor. On Saturday, Trump posted a screed against former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat of California, accusing her of insider trading and calling her a disgusting degenerate who impeached me twice on no grounds and lost. How are you feeling now, Nancy? Since Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on July 7 that the administration would not be releasing any more information about the Epstein investigation, And especially since July 23, when the wall Street Journal reported that Bondi had told Trump in May that his name appears in those files, the president has thrown up one distraction after another. The attack on Pelosi fits that mold, but it is interesting that the president appears to have impeachment on his mind. Also on Saturday, Trump launched new action against Washington, D.C. he has threatened to federalize the nation's capital since the 2024 presidential campaign and now has found a trigger in the alleged carjacking attempt by two unarmed 15 year oldsone girl and one boy on August 6th against 19 year old former Department of Government Efficiency staffer Edward Korostein, also known as Big Balls. Law enforcement officers apparently stopped the alleged attempt while it was in progress and arrested the two youths. But Trump posted on social media a picture that he claimed was corestine covered in blood and wrote that the incident showed that crime in Washington D.C. is totally out of control. Although violent Crime in Washington, D.C. has reached its lowest level in 30 years, Trump announced that he will hold a press conference Monday which will essentially stop violent crime in Washington, D.C. it has become one of the most dangerous cities anywhere in the world. It will soon be one of the safest. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Today he plugged his news conference again on social media and I'm going to make our capital safer and more beautiful than it ever was before. The homeless have to move out immediately. We will give you places to stay but far from the capital. The criminals. You don't have to move out. We're going to put you in jail where you belong. It's all going to happen very fast. Just like the border. We went from millions pouring in to zero in the last few months. This will be easier. Be prepared. There will be no Mr. Nice Guy. We want our capital back. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Two hours later he posted again, appearing to refer to his false claim that Washington D.C. is beset by crime, and also appearing to refer to his new plan to replace the East Wing of the White house with a 90,000 square square foot event space. And then he pivoted to an attack on Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, whom he appears to be trying to hound out of office with complaints about the cost of renovating two buildings the Fed uses. Then he turned back to crime in Washington, saying, the mayor of D.C. muriel Bowser, is a good person who has tried, but she has been given many chances and the crime numbers get worse and the city only gets dirtier and less attractive. The American public is not going to put up with it any longer. Then he turned to his immigration sweeps, saying, just like I took care of the border where you had zero illegals coming across last month from millions the year before, I will take care of our cherished capital and we will make it truly great again. Before the tents, squalor, filth and crime, it was the most beautiful capital in the world. It will soon be that again. Trump seems to be suggesting that he wants to take control over Washington, D.C. the seat of the United States government. That will not be easy, as the US Constitution gives control of the federal district to Congress and a 1973 law permitted the inhabitants of the district to elect a mayor and a City Council. Trump's fascination with Washington, D.C. might also be a reflection of a turn toward a focus on real estate state, the sector in which he is most comfortable as his administration is flailing and his own cognitive abilities are slipping. In the Atlantic today, Peter Wehner and Robert P. Beschel Jr. Noted that people were willing to vote for Trump despite his corruption because they believed he would be an effective leader who would make their lives better. Now, though, the public's faith in his governing ability has plummeted. A recent Gallup poll found his approval rating at 37%, and more people disapprove than approve of his handling of the economy, immigration and government efficiency. The crumbling presidency might be behind the rush to cement the land grab Russia's President Vladimir Putin has wanted since at least 2016. Bojan Panchevsky and Yaroslav Trofimov reported in the Wall Street Journal that Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff, who is not a trained diplomat and does not speak Russian, appears to have misunderstood the terms Putin was offering for a ceasefire. After saying at first that Putin would withdraw his troops from parts of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson in exchange for complete control of Donetsk, Witkoff later clarified that the only offer Putin had made was for Ukraine to withdraw from Donetsk. This is deeply damaging incompetence, former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul posted on social media. Witkoff should finally start taking a note taker from the US Embassy for future meetings. That's how professional diplomacy works. Trump is scheduled to meet with Putin in Alaska on August 15th. If Trump's hope is to chum the news with stories about Washington, D.C. and his relationship with Putin so people forget about the Epstein file, he's not getting much help From Vice President J.D. vance on Sunday morning. Futures with Maria Bartiromo on the Fox News Channel this morning, Vance said, we know that Jeffrey Epstein had a lot of connections with left wing politicians and left wing billionaires. Democrat billionaires and Democrat political leaders went to Epstein island all the time. Who knows what they did? Vance's suggestion that keeping the files under wraps protects Democrats is unlikely to convince the MAGA Republicans clamoring for their release to let the issue go. Indeed, it's hard to imagine any other angle Vance could have chosen that would have poured more fuel on that particular dumpster fire.
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Heather Cox Richardson
Letters from an American was written and read by Heather Cox Richardson. It was produced at Soundscape Productions, Dedham, MA. Recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.