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At vrbo, we understand that even the best of plans sometimes need a little support, so we plan for the plot twists. Every booking is automatically backed by our VRBO Care Guarantee, giving you confidence from the very start. Whenever you need help, it's ready before your stay, through the moments in between and after your trip. Because a great trip starts with peace of mind and maybe a good playlist. But we've got the peace of mind part covered.

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Get ready to rev Those engines the 2026 Les Schwab Classy Chassis parade and car show was back in East Wenatchee, WA. Kick things off Friday, May 1st at 6pm for the big parade plus the after party with live music. Then join us on Saturday, May 2nd at 10:00am at the Eastmont Community park for the car show. It's two days of classic cars, food, music and free family fun for everyone. For all the details, visit eastwanancheewa.gov See you there.

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What's up everyone and welcome to another episode of the Epstein Chronicles. Watching Pam Bondi try to dodge this subpoena in April of 2026 feels less like observing a functioning Justice Department and more like watching a stage crew yank the curtain closed before the audience sees who's standing in the wings. Pam Bondi was subpoenaed by the House Oversight committee for an April 14 deposition about the government's handling of the Epstein files. Then Trump fired her. Todd Blanch became acting Attorney General, and the department quickly informed Congress that Bondi would not be appearing because the subpoena had been issued to her in her official capacity. And that sequence is the part that should make every serious person sit bolt upright. The timing is not merely suspicious in the casual cable news sense of the word. It it's suspicious in the old fashioned common sense sense where a person does not need a law degree to smell when something is rotten. A subpoena was coming due, questions were coming under oath. The official who could answer those questions was removed, and the department immediately tried to convert that removal into a shield. That is not the look of transparency, and what makes it so infuriating is that this didn't happen in a vacuum. Bondi had already become a symbol of the administration's collapsing promises on Epstein transparency. Are we going to act like she hasn't already taken the public on a carnival ride of insinuation, delay, selective release, and bureaucratic tap dancing? Lawmakers from both parties had already made clear that the release process was incomplete, error ridden and deeply unsatisfying. Survivors and transparency advocates were already furious. Members of Congress were Already saying the department had failed to meet its obligation and had instead produced confusion, redactions, and damage control. So when the administration suddenly removed Bondi just before sworn questioning, it didn't read like a routine personnel move. It reads like an extraction. It reads like someone getting the witness off the field before the deposition lights come on. And that's why the official capacity argument lands with the moral force of a wet match. Congress didn't subpoena an office chair. Congress subpoenaed a human being who occupied the office when the key decisions were made. Bondi was the one who oversaw the department during this mess. Bondi was the one who had access to the files, the internal deliberations, the release strategy, any excuses. Bondi was the one who could be asked who made the decision when and why. And trying to make pretend that her departure magically vaporizes her knowledge is an insult to the intelligence of everyone watching. It's a technical maneuver dressed up as principle. It's process used as camouflage. And it's the kind of argument people reach for when they can't tolerate the substance of the questions. And let us just be honest about what that sworn testimony threatens in a case like this. Sworn testimony is dangerous to people who've spent months speaking in blur, smoke and innuendo. Under oath, the slogans die. Under oath, the evasions become perjury traps. Under oath, ongoing review has become a date, a name, a memorandum, a meeting or a directive. Under oath, someone has to explain why promised transparency kept shrinking in the managed disclosure. Under oath, someone has to explain why public grandstanding produced so little public clarity. Under oath, someone has to explain whether incompetence alone can account for this fiasco or whether the pattern is too convenient to dismiss as mere bumbling. That's why this moment matters so much. You don't move heaven and earth to avoid harmless testimony. The administration's defenders will say that Bondi was overmatched, sloppy, politically damaged, and ultimately expendable. Fine. Even if one grants every inch of that argument, it still doesn't answer the obvious question. Why remove her when you know she has an Epstein deposition scheduled? Why let the firing function as the predicate for refusing the appearance? Why send the message through DOJ that the subpoena no longer binds? In the same way, why create the appearance of a tactical escape hatch if your real interest is accountability? Why do it this way at this moment? On this subject, the answers offered so far are paper thin. And they require the public to believe in coincidence at the exact point where coincidence has stopped earning the Benefit of the doubt. And when a government asks for blind faith after years of draining the reservoir of trust, anger is not only reasonable, I think it's healthy. This is what real time institutional rot looks like to ordinary people. It doesn't always arrive with smash windows, a smoking gun, or a cartoon villain confessing into a hot microphone. Sometimes it arrives as a letter. Sometimes it arrives as as a staffing change. Sometimes it arrives as a lawyer explanation for why the person everyone wants questioned can no longer be questioned on schedule. The mechanics are bloodless. The effect is not. The effect is that the public sees the same old trick in a newer suit, power rearranges the furniture and then acts offended when people notice that the room still stinks. And the rage that this produces is not irrational. People have spent years being told to wait, trust the process, respect the review, and stop asking impatient questions. Then the review drags. The process malfunctions. The disclosures come out partial, mangled or embarrassing. Sensitive materials mishandled. Key answers never quite materialize. Then, just when one central player is supposed to sit down under os, the administration tries to turn firing into an escape route. That's not the kind of thing that calms public suspicion. That's the kind of thing that pours gasoline on it. And what launches me into orbit is the sheer brazenness of it. It's not subtle, it's not clever. It's not some master class in invisibility. It's a clumsy maneuver executed in broad daylight and then defended with a straight face, as if everyone else is supposed to nod along like sedated fools. It's. It's the bureaucratic equivalent of wiping your fingerprints with the curtains while the neighbors are watching through the window. The insult is not only the act itself. The insult is in the assumption that the public is so exhausted, so divided and so numb that it's going to accept any explanation, no matter how flimsy. And that contempt for the public is part of the scandal too. And of course there's also a larger moral obscenity at work here. Epstein's not an abstract policy dispute. He's not paperwork inconvenience. He's not a communication problem to be managed until the next news cycle arrives. This case sits at the intersection of wealth abuse, institutional protection and so called elite impunity. Every evasive move by the government in this matter tells survivors and the public the same ugly thing. It says that powerful systems still treat truth as as negotiable when the wrong names may be attached to says that embarrassment to the ruling Class can still outweigh full candor. It says that transparency is advertised loudly and delivered stingily. That is why every procedural dodge in this case feels morally radioactive. And one of the most frustrating parts is that this administration once benefited politically from the language of exposure. It was all about sunlight, disclosure, and finally pulling back the curtain. It was all about telling the public that the old gatekeepers had hidden too much and protected too many. Yet when the moment came to prove that this rhetoric meant something, the machinery reverted to the same ancient religion of self protection. Suddenly there were caveats. Suddenly there were constraints. Suddenly there were technicalities. Suddenly the spirit of openness shrank into the letter of convenient avoidance. The sermon was transparency, but the sacrament turned out to be concealment. And that's why Bondi's removal can't be judged only as a personnel matter in the context of this case. Timing is substance. Sequence is evidence of mindset. Optics do not merely accompany the event here, they're a part of the of the event. If an administration cared about clearing the error, it would have leaned into testimony, not sidestepped it. If it cared about rebuilding trust, it would have welcomed sworn answers, not generated fresh ambiguity. If it cared about puncturing suspicion, it would have avoided creating a storyline that practically writes itself. Instead, it chose the route that most naturally reinforces the very accusations it claims to resent. And that is political malpractice at best, and something far darker in appearance at worst. And listen, there's a reason that members of Congress are still pressing the issue. The committee has not simply shrugged and walked away. Reporting indicates lawmakers from both parties have continued to insist Bondi should testify and have discussed pursuing the matter through her personal counsel, with some openly floating contempt if she refuses. That matters because it tells you that this is not merely fantasy of angry observers on the sideline. People with institutional standing, subpoena power, and access to the record also see the move as unacceptable. They're not treating it like a harmless scheduling hiccup. They're treating it as a live accountability fight. They understand what every citizen understands instinctively. When someone is suddenly too unavailable to answer the most important questions, suspicion deepens rather than dissolves. Now, Todd Blanche stepping in does not magically solve the legitimacy problem either. A new face at the podium that's already corrupted does not answer for the old decisions. It doesn't erase who controlled the release process when the central controversies were unfolding. It does not explain the redactions, the emissions, the delays, the public over promises or the internal rationales. It certainly does not cure the appearance that the department is trying to reset the board without ever completing the game already in progress. You can't swap the dealer in the middle of a rigged hand and then call the table clean. The cards are still on the felt, the players still in the room. The public is to load answers from the people who handled the deck.