← The Epstein Chronicles
The Epstein Chronicles
Jeffrey Epstein, Treasury Officials, and the Early Cryptocurrency Questions Around Iran (Part 1) (5/12/26)
00:13:12
A recent investigation by https://www.dropsitenews.com?utm_source=chatgpt.com claims that Jeffrey Epstein was consulted by officials within the U.S. Treasury Department during the Obama administration as policymakers grappled with the growing role of...
Loading summary
Transcript1 lines
- [00:00]
A
What's up, everyone? And welcome to another episode of the Epstein Chronicles. I think it's well established at this point that Jeffrey Epstein had his fingers in many pies. And one of the places that his tentacles certainly spread to was the world of crypto. And Jeffrey Epstein was involved in that from basically its inception. And today we have an article from Dropsite News that digs deeper into and how Epstein advised the US treasury on crypto all the way back when Barack Obama was the president. And the treasury officials, they consulted with Epstein about using crypto during negotiations with Iran over the nuclear deal. So I think this article does a good job in really showing you how Jeffrey Epstein was running his own game. This guy was an asset to everyone, a friend to none. This article was authored by Murtaza Hussain and Ryan Grimm. Over the last year, Dropsite has been reporting what mainstream outlets won't Jeffrey Epstein's deep ties to powerful figures in the US Government, the UAE and Israel. Our latest investigation traces those connections back to the Obama administration's efforts to make a nuclear deal with with Iran, revealing Epstein's role in helping the Treasury Department understand the emerging role of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in financing terrorism and evading US Economic sanctions. We're documenting Epstein's financial operations and security dealings that implicate governments around the world. Well, that's good, because remember when Drop Site first started talking about this, it was all about Israel, all about all the time. And again, not to absolve Israel, they have a seat at the table. They most certainly utilized a guy like Epstein. Without a doubt. Where I take issue is when people try to set Epstein up as some kind of Mossad, you know, super spy he was, not that the man was an asset. When you expose that kind of power, those powerful interests come after you. Our Epstein investigations are ongoing, but we can only continue if we have the resources and legal protection to defend this work. Then they give a little link here to donate. So if you click on the link and you like their work, that will enable you to donate and help support what they have going on. Today. Shipping companies are paying cryptocurrency tolls to Tehran for a passage through the Strait of Hormuz as the Iranian government seeks to shield payments from seizure by the U.S. treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control. Roughly $8 billion flowed through Iran's cryptocurrency exchanges last year. And the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps moves billions through foreign exchanges like Binance, where Chinese firms can secretly pay for Iranian oil without fear of US Retaliation. And not to veer too far off the subject here, but what have we accomplished with Iran? Has there been any kind of gains generation? Geopolitically speaking, I don't think so. More than a decade ago, however, the Iranian government was reluctant to embrace cryptocurrency. Suspicious of possible US Involvement in the development of bitcoin, the US Was dubious about the technology as well, seeing it principally as a way to sidestep financial controls. Well, can't have that, right? Gotta make sure that you and I pay every last dollar. Sidestepping the controls, that's only for people in Congress and their friends. The US Government thinks if Iran can use bitcoin to bypass all the sanctions, and Iran thinks this is all a game by the CIA, a spokesperson for Coin AVA, Iran's first crypto exchange, told CoinDesk in 2013. Even so, Iran's national cyberspace center began the process of regulating digital currencies in March of 2014 while looking for hedges against the pressure of U. S. Sanctions. Well, crypto gives you a perfect place to do that. You want to talk about unregulated markets now, they'll tell you it's regulated, but we know the score. How are you going to trace that? Especially when we're talking about state actors like Iran and their government. So crypto, that's a dream come true for regimes like Iran. The US Hesitance around cryptocurrency is evident in emails of Jeffrey Epstein, a figure who was keenly interested in developing cryptocurrency and consulted on it with the U.S. treasury Department. Epstein's interventions came at a time when the US was pursuing a detente with Iran over its nuclear program. And the growth and development of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies were beginning to reshape the global financial landscape. And there's a reason that bitcoin is so expensive, right? You got all these people in the know who jumped in, and the price is just through the roof. Now, me personally, I'm not really a big fan, to tell you the truth. Maybe it's my age, whatever. But I like tangible assets that I can, like, hold. You know, gold, silver, platinum, like that. That's where you're gonna find me. If I'm making investments, that's what I'm doing. And it's not because I don't think bitcoin is profitable. I do. But when you look at all the people, the architects of cryptocurrency, a lot of them are hustlers. So I'll leave the cryptocurrency game to other people. In August of 2014, the same summer Iran began regulating cryptocurrency, Epstein traveled to Washington D.C. for a meeting with the u. S. Treasury department as the Obama administration prepared a new round of sanctions on Iran's energy sector. Epstein was accompanied by Philip west, chairman of Steptoe, a law firm involved in sanctions related work. And if you're wondering why the files were never released back then, this is why. Just like I told you, Epstein was being protected by both sides. They knew that he was an asset, somebody that could help them out in situations like this. And because of that, they were willing to overlook all the disgusting he was involved in. Epstein was more familiar with the issue of Iranian sanctions since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and had extensive experience and interest in clandestine movements of capital. In the early 80s, Epstein shared a penthouse office with Stan Pottinger, a lawyer who was moving embargoed arms through shell companies to fuel the war between Iran and Iraq. Epstein also worked at one point for Saudi financier Adnan Khashoggi, who used poorly regulated financial institutions like the bank of credit and commerce international to launder money from COVID arm cells and what became known as the Iran contra affair. And that's how Jeffrey Epstein built the bones of his new operation. He just moved the template over, right? And instead of trafficking guns, let's traffic women instead. According to Epstein's notes from the meetings, officials from the office of terrorist financing and financial crimes wanted the financiers insight into how cryptocurrency could be used for arm shipments and nuclear power proliferation payments. Mind you, he's already a convicted sexual offender, so why is the U. S. Government reaching out to a known predator? There's nobody else that knows anything about crypto, huh? Gotta have Jeffrey Epstein involved. Epstein was not impressed by the treasury officials that he met, describing them in an email to Joy ito, director of MIT's Media Lab, as not very bright and very opinionated. Not an audience I enjoy. He later complained to Katherine Ruemmler, who had recently left her post as Obama's White House counsel, that the meeting was like lecturing at Queens community college. After the meeting, Epstein returned to Steptoe's office to meet privately with deputy secretary of state William Burns, who'd been leading the negotiations to restrict Iran's nuclear program. The next day, Epstein wrote to palantir co founder Peter Thiel offering to arrange a meeting. But between Burns and Thiel. He described Burns to Thiel as the best and most respected diplomat in the administration and by the way, William Burns, he went on to run the CIA, but sure, nothing to see here. It's all just a big contrived joke. The Washington meetings occurred at the exact moment the treasury and State Departments were trying to maximize leverage during the Iran nuclear talks. After the US And Iran extended the joint plan of action In July of 2014, a small window opened for the US to ratchet pressure on Iran before a comprehensive deal was signed. The previous year, Epstein had been working closely with former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak to convince US Officials to strike Iran. It's all a financial decision. For Epstein, chaos is a ladder. And like Littlefinger, he understood that. One week after Epstein's visit, on August 29th, the treasury and State Departments jointly announced a new round of Iran sanctions. The package targeted more than 20 people, companies, banks and vessels accused of supporting Iran's nuclear program, helping the country evade sanctions, or assisting terrorism. On September 4, Burns, who later served as CIA director on under President Joe Biden and a group of treasury officials met with Iranian officials in Geneva to conduct the third round of bilateral talks on a nuclear deal. David Cohen, the undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence at Treasury, credited the sanctions for bringing the Iranians to the negotiating table. Later that month, Burns traveled to New York for more talks with Iranian officials, and he scheduled another appointment with Epstein the same week. After the meeting, Epstein connected Burns and Thiel by email because that's what Epstein did. At the end of the day, he was a facilitator. If you needed something, Epstein was your guy. A girl, some guns, some money, a hookup, a contact. Epstein was the guy to talk to. But everything came with a price. When you're dealing with Jeffrey Epstein, and even from the grave, those bills are coming due. In an emailed statement to Drop Site, a spokesperson for Burns said that he recalled being introduced to Epstein and then he met with him once briefly in New York City. The spokesperson said that Burns deeply regrets ever meeting with him and did not know anything about him before those two brief meetings other than that he was introduced as an expert in the financial sector and offered general advice on transition to the private sector. When Ambassador Burns learned about Mr. Epstein's record not long after those two brief meetings, he was appalled. He never met with him again. They had no relationship. Oh, I don't buy that. Sorry. Whether it was through an intermediary or they were meeting in a clandestine fashion, I don't buy it. The spokesperson also said that Burns did not discuss the Iran nuclear deal or cryptocurrency with Epstein during their 2014 meetings. Well, that's easy to say. It can't be proven one way or the other unless other people were at that meeting. So the denial is certainly the way to go for a guy like Burns. But when people talk about, oh, Jeffrey Epstein was friends with this one in the Mossad or this one over in Russia, they always conveniently leave out that Jeffrey Epstein's biggest supporters and biggest friends and the people that really kept him out of trouble or right here in the good old usa. And I know it's a hard pill to swallow. I don't like talking about it. I don't like saying that I'm not one of these people that hates America. I fucking love this country. And that's why I'm so incensed about what's happening, because this is not the America I want to live in. I do not want to be governed by people like this. Kathryn Rummler, Joi Ito and Peter Thiel did not respond to requests for comment. Well, yeah, they're not gonna say shit. None of them want to talk about it. They want it to go away. But unfortunately for them, that shit's not gonna happen. Not anytime soon. So they can throw up as many roadblocks, as many distractions, as many wag the dog situations as they want. It's not going to change the fact that none of this is going away. So instead of running from it, they should embrace it and answer all the questions and be transparent. But they won't be, because they can't be. And that's because, unfortunately, folks, they've been lying to you for all these years. All right, we're gonna wrap up part one right here. And in the next episode, we're gonna pick up where we left off. All the information that goes with this episode can be found in the description box.