Transcript
Clay Travis (0:00)
This is an iHeart podcast.
Buck Sexton (0:04)
Welcome in final hour of the week Clay Travis Buck Sexton Show Appreciate all of you hanging out with us. We're about to be joined by Nicole Parker, former FBI special agent Fox News contributor. But want to fill you in with a little bit of news. Kind of significant if you have been out and have not heard this yet. First of all, Trump is on the ground in Texas touring the flood ravaged area areas around Kerrville. We will update you on anything that comes from that visit if it happens in this hour. Just FYI, that is where the President is right now. Breaking news. While the President has been traveling to Texas, there were Axios initially reported on a blow up inside of the White House between FBI officials Dan Bongino, the deputy director in particular and the Attorney General Pam Bondi over the way that information has been released surrounding the Epstein investigation. There is a belief on the FBI side that the AG's office, Pam Bondi in particular has over promised and under delivered and not been great in terms of her communication on this case. And there are now reports according to our friend Julie Kelly, who I believe is accurate, I trust her reporting on this, that Dan Bongino may have said it's either her or me that is the deputy director of the FBI, maybe also Cash Patel. We don't know exactly how his position is impacted here. And Pam Bondi that Trump needs to make a choice. It's either she stays as AG or our Bongino stays in the FBI. Okay. That is where we are. Nicole Parker, you have heard us talking and discussing all of this Epstein chaos. You used to work in the FBI South Florida office. So let's start with that. To me, the actual linchpin of all of this that has become of a criminal nature starts with that investigation. And I believe it was Acosta was the prosecutor there was appears to have let Jeffrey Epstein off on a very sweetheart deal there. You're from the FBI office down in South Florida. What do you think about the optics surrounding that initial part of this story?
Clay Travis (2:36)
That's a very important element of what's been going on. I'm just going to full disclosure. I don't represent anyone but my own personal opinions. Based on my experience as a special agent with the FBI, I'll make that very clear. I never sensationalize things. I just tell the facts. Sometimes it comes across as boring, but I just tell it like it is based on my perspective. I have never been a big follower of the Epstein story from the civilian side of life. I was a special agent with the FBI in the Miami Division in the Southern District of Florida. And as we know, Palm beach is in the area of responsibility of FBI Miami. Prior to my joining the FBI, this case was, this dates back to the early 2000s. And so I do think it's important for your listeners to remember how much history there is here. This is a sick, disgusting, evil and abhorrent man who abused and trafficked minors for years. And so again, going back like you said, it was back in 2008 actually a very controversial plea deal was signed with the U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Florida, Alex Acosta, involving, you know, the locals as well. And basically if we go back, it was May of 2006 that the state Attorney in the state of Florida, Barry Kushner, charged Epstein with one count of soliciting prostitution. Palm Beach Law Enforcement, Palm Beach Sheriff's Office was concerned about how that was handled. They reported the information to the FBI, FBI Miami Division in July of 2006. So it was referred to the FBI. They launched a full investigation. Again, I was not at the FBI at that time, but I can tell you that when I joined I spoke to agents that were extremely frustrated with how much work the FBI did. And it was not charged by, you know, we all know that the Department of Justice makes the prosecutorial decisions. Again, this is dating back to 2006. In June of 2007 it was actually US Attorney Alex Acosta. At the time he was actually preparing a 53 page indictment against Epstein. Right. So all these FBI agents that have been working so hard are like, oh good, you know, he's going to be held accountable, as he should. They did a thorough investigation. And then In October of 2007, the U.S. attorney worked with Epstein's attorneys and they signed a non prosecution agreement and they it was like a sweetheart deal that he was able to plead guilty to two felony prosecution charges. As we know, in comparison to a sex trafficking charge, that's a little slap on the wrist. As we've seen with the Diddy case, what did he got convicted of is a slap on the wrist compared to the other charges that he faced. So In June of 2008, Epstein pleads guilty to the two lesser counts and he sentenced to 18 months in jail. Again, slap on the wrist. He reports to the Palm County Jail, he's released early and In July of 2019 it resurfaces because they're victims, real victims of this heinous crime, multiple heinous crimes of this man and they come forward and with the MeToo movement it brought a lot of interest and those victims never had justice served properly for what occurred to them. And again, as an FBI agent who has worked these types of investigations, your number one priority is the victim. They have rights, they should be protected. And I appreciate that they resurfaced this investigation. Southern District of New York goes in and In July of 2019, Epstein was arrested at the Teterboro, New Jersey airport as he was coming in from a trip from Paris. And he was charged with sex trafficking of minor girls and a conspiracy to commit sex trafficking. And it dates all the way back to 2002 to 2005, trafficking in Florida Palm beach area as well as his New York residence. So women started coming forward even after he was charged. Over a dozen women come forward and the FBI says, hey, if you are a victim of this monster, basically please come forward. And over a dozen women came forward. So again, he has over 1,000 victims of this nasty, abhorrent, evil thing that he had been doing for years. And we all know he was arrested, he went to jail and then in August of 2019, before he even went to trial, that is when he was found dead in his jail cell in federal prison. And at the time the FBI does a full investigation, it was ruled that it was a suicide by hanging. There were a lot of people that did not necessarily agree with that. We all know that the bottom girl in a sex trafficking ring, there's a bottom girl. She's basically the one that recruits the victims. And that we all know is Maxwell. And she was arrested in 2020. She was the one that helped recruit these minors, underage girls. And In December of 2021, she was found guilty after a four week trial. And she started her prison sentence, a 20 year federal prison sentence. She started in June of 2022. And again, we all know this is a highly controversial case. It was not handled properly in the first place. And again, this is prior to me joining the FBI, but upon my arrival in the Southern District of Florida, there were agents that were extremely frustrated with how this was handled even back into the early 2000s.