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It's Sunday morning in America and that wonderfully relaxed feeling of a long, lazy day lingers in the air. If you want to make the moment last, may I suggest the perfect solution? The Martin Sheen Podcast. Join me, your host, Martin Sheen, for beautifully crafted 20 minute programs filled with never before heard stories of my life, along with personal reflections and poetry that inspires. And season one begins Sunday, October 26th. The Martin Sheen Podcast is the perfect Sunday refresh. A chance to take a deep breath, relax, and know that the stress of Monday may be just around the corner, but not here, not now. So make this your weekly moment of calm as we explore faith, hope, love, and what it means to be human. And know this, this journey is ever unfolding as I invite you to see what's next with me, Martin Sheen. And thank you.

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Hey, everybody, it's Alison Gill. You'll notice I'm not in my regular studio. I apologize for that. I'm on vacation. There wasn't going to be an episode of the Breakdown this week because of that vacation. But this news is too important, so I wanted to jump on and tell you about it. The anonymous donor who made the $130 million payment to Donald Trump to give to the military is connected to Jeffrey Epstein. This is the Breakdown. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Breakdown. I'm Alison Gill. Let me show you how all of this unfolded for me in the last day. By Saturday morning, we all knew, because we'd heard from Trump himself, that some anonymous, wonderful, wealthy benefactor had donated $130 million to help pay the military during the government shutdown. Something, by the way, that Mike Johnson can do and should do, because that's the legal way to pay the troops during a shutdown is to have it go through Congress because they control the purse strings. But Mike Johnson doesn't want to come back to work right now. So that's interesting, because then he'd have to swear in Adelaide Grijalova and they'd have 218 signatures on the discharge petition to release the Epstein files. So my first thought was maybe this anonymous donor is tied to Epstein somehow prompting him to help pay the troops so that Mike Johnson didn't have to come back to work and do it the proper way. It seemed plausible that rich men associated with Epstein might do anything to help prevent Mike Johnson from coming back to work. Then I was like, no, no, surely not. No. That's so transparently stupid, even for this administration. But never underestimate the idiocy of weak and desperate men. Sure enough, Saturday morning, the New York Times reported that it's Timothy Mellon, heir to the Mellon banking fortune that had made the $130 million gift to our government. And that's when alarm bells started going off in my head. Why? Because just 11 days ago an Epstein survivor who's going by Jane Doe to maintain her anonymity filed a lawsuit against bank of America and the bank of New York Mellon alleging they knowingly provided financial services enabling Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking ring. By the way, the bank of New York is no longer called the bank of New York Mellon. They got rid of the melon about a year ago. They dropped it from their name in an effort to rebrand. They said they wanted to simplify their image or maybe they want to dissociate with the name Mellon for some reason. Anyway, I digress. I searched the New York Times article for any mention of this of the suit against bank of New York Mellon in connection with the Epstein sex trafficking ring and there's nothing in there about it now. Reuters reported. On October 15, a woman who says she was abused by the late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein sued Bank of America and the bank of New York Mellon on Wednesday alleging the bank's knowingly provided financial services that enabled his sex trafficking operation for years. The lawsuit against BNY said the bank gave a line of credit to MC2, a modeling agency that the lawsuit said Epstein and French model scout Jean Luc Brunel used to traffic victims. In total, bank of New York Mellon processed $378 million in payments to women trafficked by Epstein. Brunel was arrested in December of 2020 and was oh found dead in his jail cell in 2022. That's according to Parisian prosecutors. Now representative Jamie Raskin also issued a statement about this lawsuit. Quote new lawsuits against bank of America and BNY Mellon allege their system systematic failure to report suspicious activity around Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking operation causing massive harm to victims. A week before these filings we demanded this very information asking why banks for years processed $1.5 billion in Epstein linked transactions without flagging them and filing reports that are required by law. We stand with survivors in exposing the truth about the enablers and co conspirators of this decades long international human trafficking R so it's also interesting that Donald Trump mentioned multiple times that the donor didn't want to be identified. This is from the BBC. Trump had previewed the donation on Thursday while also declining to identify the donor, saying quote, he doesn't really want the recognition before leaving for Asia on Saturday, Trump told reporters at the White House that the donor is a great gentleman, a patron, a patriot, and a wonderful man who doesn't want publicity. Quote, he prefers his name not be mentioned, which is pretty unusual in the world I come from. In the world of politics, you want your name mentioned. Boy, you're talking about his anonymity an awful lot, Mr. Trump. Trump also kept pushing the point that this was to help pay the military. But $130 million amounts to about $100 per service member. One time payment, hardly enough to keep Mike Johnson at home for very long. So keep your eye on Ghislaine Maxwell and the Wall Street Journal. Excuse me. See if any more Epstein stories leak and whether Trump will pardon her for her silence amid these hundreds of millions of dollars in donations in the name of the military or his ballroom, which is, I'm pretty sure, nothing more than a slush fun laundromat for bribes. But I digress. So while I'm here, I wanted to mention something else pretty big that happened this week, and it has to do with volume two of Jack Smith's final report. That's the one that has to do with the classified documents. This week, Jack Smith went to paper. That means he wrote a letter. He wrote a letter to Jim Jordan and Chuck Grassley, not only about the Republicans mischaracterizations of his work, but about volume two, which Judge Cannon is still blocking from being released. We've never seen it. It's never been released to the public. We've seen volume one. So now Jack Smith himself has brought up volume two in this letter in response to being asked to testify behind closed doors. This is pretty massive news, as you may know. My very first podcast, a long time ago, 2017, it's eight years ago, which a podcast, by the way, that was investigated by the first Trump administration. That very first podcast was about the Mueller investigation. It was called Mueller, She Wrote. And that's how I first met former Deputy Director of the FBI Andy McCabe. It was back in 2019 when something so shocking happened, or at least seemingly shocking, that he agreed to appear on the podcast. And you'll laugh at us. But the shocking thing was that Robert Mueller went to paper. He wrote a letter to Bill Barr. He was mad that Bill Barr had mischaracterized his findings, saying that Mueller exonerated Donald Trump, when in fact the opposite was true. It did not exonerate Trump and the report said that. So he wrote a letter to Bill Barr about it. I think he made a couple of phone calls too. And as much as we joke about strongly worded letters back then and in general, it's unheard of for a Department of justice employee to put on the record on paper that they disagree with the Attorney General. It was so unusual. Andy McCabe made an appearance on the Mueller she wrote podcast in 2019. It's called Mueller Goes to Paper. It's out there. You can listen to it if you want. So years later, I would end up posting a podcast with Andrew McCabe about the next special counsel investigation into Trump by Jack Smith. The podcast was called Jack. Jack Smith was appointed in November of 2022. He indicted Donald Trump in 2023 in two cases. One for Trump's attempt and his role in overturning the 2020 election results, and one case for his unlawful retention of classified documents under the Espionage act and the subsequent obstruction of justice in that investigation. Now, Jack Smith had two trials on the calendar ready to go well before the election. The January 6 trial was scheduled for March 2024. The classified documents trial was scheduled to go in May of 2024. But as we all know, Trump filed a motion to dismiss both of the cases, especially the January 6 case. He filed to dismiss that case on immunity grounds. Presidents have absolute immunity. It's unreviewable. And the Supreme Court, the oligarchs on the Supreme Court not only took the case, they sat on it and delayed it for as long as they possibly could. They scheduled oral arguments for the very last possible day they could have oral arguments in that term. They announced their ruling on the very last possible day you can announce a ruling in 2024. It was July, all told, about a seven month delay just to grant him immunity. And by the way, with the caveat that there would be another year or two of litigation over exactly what parts of the case were subject to presidential immunity that would be decided by the Supreme Court themselves. So not only does the President have immunity, but we get to decide after multiple back and forth filings whether what you think is not immune is immune or not. And we get to decide that. And that's going to take another year or two. Guaranteeing all of that guaranteed that that case was not going to happen before the 2024 election. Now, stunningly, in the documents case, Judge Cannon, a Trump ally and appointee, as we know, created a secret docket using email and helped Trump stall that case at every single turn. Now, ultimately, she granted Trump's motion to dismiss the charges on the grounds that Jack Smith was not appointed properly and not funded properly, which nullified the charges. And after the election, Jack Smith filed his final reports to Merrick Garland for January 6th in the documents case, then resigned from the Department of Justice, but not before saying he could bring these charges again in the future. Because Trump's election as president would only pause the statute of limitations. It would hold it because you can't indict a sitting president. You can't prosecute a sitting president. So that would pause the clock on the statute of limitations. Now, that idea has not been litigated in court yet. I doubt the Supreme Court would let you. But it could be litigated if Democrats win in 2028 and appoint an attorney general that would be willing to reanimate this case and litigate as to whether or not it could be brought again. Because Trump's term as president paused the statute of limitations. Otherwise, the statute of limitations would be long expired. But the judge in the January 6th case, Judge Chutkan, didn't block the release of volume one, the January 6th report, so Merrick Garland released it. But Judge Cannon did block the release of volume two, and she continues to block it to this day, even though the cases are long over. So I've been worried about what would happen to Jack Smith's work, his files, and volume two after Trump won. Maybe Trump would sweep in and destroy all of it. Because I know that you will all remember Democrats in the Senate were asking for volume two of the report when they were considering Kash Patel for FBI director. Because he's in there. He's in that volume two report, volume two of that report. So we all kind of figured that any hope of seeing volume two was lost because the DOJ refused to hand it over for advice and consent on Kash Patel. I wondered if it even still existed. Maybe it had been destroyed. But this week, Jack Smith mentioned it in a letter. He went to paper in a letter to Jim Jordan and Chuck Grassley because, like I said, they asked him to appear before the committee behind closed doors, which for Republicans usually means, we'd like to interview you in private and then lie to the public about what you said. And Jack Smith knows that. So his attorneys wrote a letter saying, we'll testify in public on a couple of conditions. Here's the letter. We have received Chairman Jordan's October 14, 2025 letter and are aware of Chairman Grassley's interest in testimony from our client, Jack Smith. Given the many mischaracterizations of Mr. Smith's investigation into President Trump's alleged mishandling of classified documents and role in Attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election, Mr. Smith respectfully requests the opportunity to testify in open hearings before the House and Senate Judiciary Committees. During the investigation of President Trump, Mr. Smith steadfastly adhered to established legal standards and Department of Justice guidelines. Consistent with his approach throughout his career as a dedicated public servant, he is prepared to answer questions about the Special Counsel's investigation and prosecution, but requires assurance from the Department of Justice that he will not be punished for doing so. To that end, Mr. Smith needs guidance from the Department of Justice regarding federal grand jury secrecy requirements and authorization on the matters he may speak to regarding, among other things, Volume two of the Final Report of Special Counsel, which is not publicly available. In addition to provide full and accurate answers to your questions, Mr. Smith requires access to the Special counsel files, which he no longer has the ability to access. With the guidance and Access described above, Mr. Smith is available to testify in an open hearing at your earliest convenience. Did you catch that? He wants to know if he can talk about volume two in public, and he wants access to all of his old files, his work product. And like I said, for months, Andy and I were worried that Trump would come into the doj, destroy all that evidence against him, including Jack Smith's files and the as of yet unseen volume two of his report. So here now, Jack Smith is formally requesting his files, which should be preserved at the Department of Justice, seemingly daring this administration to either deny they exist or. Or deny him access to his work that's necessary to come before Congress and testify. It's a pretty masterful move by a man that can run mental circles around anyone in the Trump administration, though that is a low bar. But you could say Jim Jordan and Chuck Grassley will ignore this request. They might just issue a subpoena and then refer Jack Smith to the Department of Justice in a criminal referral if he refuses to comply with the subpoena. But I doubt he would do that. They could answer, censor him, and say, we can't give you any of this stuff because it's been dismissed without prejudice. The charges can be brought again, so we can't release any of it outside of the Department of Justice. But either way, I guarantee you Jack Smith has considered every single possible response to his letter, and he's already got the responses ready to go to whatever Jim Jordan and Chuck Grassley or any of their lawyers or staffers in the House or Senate might have to say about it, up to and including everything they aren't even smart enough to consider. Jim Jordan Chuck Grassley, Pam Bondi, Donald Trump, Kash Patel, anyone who works for them up to it, including Todd Blanche, are just no match for Jack Smith. And I've never seen a former special counsel more willing to discuss his investigations in public. At least not a special counsel that's on the good side. Now, something else pretty amazing happened this week. If you've been watching the Breakdown these past few episodes, you've seen me mention this guy a bunch. This is Gregory Bevino. He's. I've mentioned him in pretty much every episode of the Breakdown. He is the Trump troglodyte admonished in his employee file for calling immigrants filth and trash and scum. He was in charge of the LA Ice Invasion, MacArthur park, that whole thing. Now he's in charge of Chicago's Midway Blitz. This is the guy who lied in court saying he witnessed somebody hit an ICE agent when the video actually showed the ICE agent hitting the person. And the jury took an hour to acquit that guy. Well, this week, Judge Ellis, the judge who issued a restraining order in Chicago against ice, barring them from detaining and using force against journalists, members of the clergy and protesters unless there is probable cause that they're committing crimes and prohibiting them from deploying tear gas without multiple warnings, which prompted her to modify her restraining order against these thugs by requiring the use of body worn cameras. That Judge Ellis, she just this past Friday ordered Kristi Noem to produce Gregory Bevino in person for a hearing on October 28th. He's accused of deploying tear gas without giving warnings. So I'm looking forward to that. Also this week in the case of Kilmar Abrego, Mr. Abrego's attorneys have subpoenaed Todd Blanche himself to answer questions in a hearing. There's a two day hearing for Mr. Abrego's motion to dismiss the case against him for human smuggling on the grounds that the prosecution is vindict and selective. That's set to take place November 4th and 5th. They've subpoenaed Todd Blanche. We learned this from a filing from the government that they intend to file a motion to quash. Todd Blanche says that the reason he's going to file a motion to quash, the reason he shouldn't be called in to testify is because he's just far too important. He's just far too important, which means he only has to testify in very extraordinary circumstances because I'm so important. Mr. Abrego's lawyers responded, saying the defense will respond more fully to a motion to quash once it's filed. But the government would do well not to ignore what is obvious to everyone else. The circumstances of this case are extraordinary. And there was a lot of other extraordinary news this week. The destruction of the East Wing of the White House. Trump sending Department of Justice election monitors to California and New Jersey. We all saw that coming. More lies from the Department of Homeland Security about peaceful protesters attacking ICE agents. The White House saying the president's number one priority is his ballroom. I'm not joking. In addition to the ballroom in the Rose Garden patio, is the president looking at any other renovations or significant kind of projects here at the White House? Not to my knowledge, no. But he's a builder at heart, clearly. And so his. His heart and his mind is always churning about how to improve things here on the White House grounds. But at this moment in time, of course, the ballroom is really the president's main priority. There's a government shutdown out of control. Inflation, increasing consumer prices, increasing energy prices. Food prices are going up. SNAP benefits expire on November 1st. Our health premiums are going to double, triple, even quadruple in some cases if the Affordable Care act subsidies expire. And his number one priority is his ballroom. So for all that news that I wasn't able to get to here on this abridged version of the Breakdown, please check out the Daily Beans podcast. Comes out every day. It's free to listen to, it's free to subscribe. News with swearing. You can get all of this information and I'll be back next week right here with a full show for you, a full episode of the Breakdown back in my studio, Promise. So thanks for watching this mini version of the Breakdown. We'll see you next week. Foreign Love this video support independent media and unlock exclusive content ad free videos and custom emojis. By becoming a paid member of our YouTube channel today. You can also gift memberships to others. Let's keep growing together.