Jim Acosta (3:48)

Let's go quickly to a reporter who has been, you know, leading the charge on, on this reporting front. That's Tara Palmeri. Tara, your excellent substack also focuses on things besides Epstein. We'll talk about that in a second. Because you got this great story out on Pete Hegseth and how Republicans up on Capitol Hill, they're not so impressed when maybe if you put a camera and a microphone in front of their face, they might say something. But if you ask them privately, they'll say something very different. But since we're on this subject, and there's your story right there in the red letter in substack. But I was just talking with Congressman Ro Khanna about Epstein, and I know you were, you were getting connected and so on, so maybe you might have missed this part of the conversation, but Congressman Khanna was just saying a few moments ago about that, you know, that Julie K. Brown story about the shredded documents that were, I guess they were found or talked about around the death of Jeffrey Epstein. Congressman Khanna said that he has concerns as to whether or not Epstein actually committed suicide, which I hadn't heard him say. Maybe he's already said that. But what do you think about all of this?

Tara Palmeri (4:57)

You know, Jim, you and I, we're not conspiracy theorists. We're real reporters. We've been doing this for a long time. And I don't. I wouldn't say this lightly if I, I didn't have suspicions at the very least that Jeffrey Epstein did not kill himself. You know, obviously, his brother, Mark Epstein, has been trying to prove this. He's tried to, you know, hire doctors to run autopsy reports to prove that. That there were so many things that went off that were wrong around the time of his death. The fact that the guards were missing, the fact that there's. The missing minute now we see there was a little, you know, orange blob that walked through past his cell, essentially, and that was missing minute that we didn't see. You know, there were just so many coincidences around the time of his death. And he was actually complaining days earlier that he was afraid of his. Of his cellmate, that his cellmate might kill him. That's something like a man who wants to kill himself. That's someone who's trying to preserve their own life. Also, Jeffrey Epstein believed he lived above the law, as you could tell from the way he acted for decades, and actually did live above the law. So why would he think that suddenly the law had caught up with him? And so, you know, I. I think there are just so many irregularities. I mean, there was another interview with. Believe there was a man who was working on the video tech, and he was a former Marine or someone who was. He was like a military officer of a pretty high rank, and he was working on gathering the footage from inside of the facility, The. The videotapes. And he was alarmed by the way that they were handling the tapes, as if they didn't care if the content would be wiped from it. And he. He testified about that. Sorry, I don't have that in front of me. But that was also really alarming to me when I saw that There was just. It was almost like a willful recklessness or a real strategy to try to get rid of this person. Obviously, he was dangerous alive. He held on to a lot of secrets, and it just. Every single day, we get more and more information. And, you know, Julie, I worked with her on a podcast called Broken Jeffrey Epstein. And she has long believed that Jeffrey Epstein did not kill himself. And she was the one who actually kind of got me to opening, you know, my mind to that, because she has done such great reporting on this story and really knows it inside out. There's just.

Jim Acosta (7:33)

Yeah. Because it sounds crazy when you think about it.

Tara Palmeri (7:35)

Yeah.

Jim Acosta (7:36)

You know, and I'm not a conspiracy theorist either. You know, I just, you know, sometimes I just think these things don't add up and so on. And I. And. And on the Epstein thing, for the longest time, I thought, well, how could they kill him? In a jail. But it, that does happen. So people do get killed in jail all the time.

Tara Palmeri (7:52)

Pedophiles are at the bot. They're at the bottom. Like, I mean, literally, they are killed all the time because they're, frankly disgusting people and they disgust even other prisoners who kill them. And so it's the lowest of the low crime. And yeah, so he, he certainly was not safe in there. We know that his former modeling partner, Jean Luc Brunel, also mysteriously died by hanging in a prison in France. We know that Robert Maxwell, Galen Maxwell's father, mysteriously died off the side of his yacht, the Lady Galen, in the Canary Islands. You know, people like to say it was a suicide, but why would you go off on your yacht to kill yourself in the Canary Islands?

Jim Acosta (8:33)

Exactly.

Tara Palmeri (8:33)

It just doesn't add up.

Jim Acosta (8:35)

And, and this happened during the first Trump administration. I mean, you know, again, I don't want to be like Glenn Beck with the whiteboard and all the squiggly lines going in all these different directions, but, I mean, they're holding back documents. And Ronna was just saying a few moments ago, some of these documents are obviously very important to their investigation. And I just, to me, this is never going to be resolved if these, no, if these documents aren't released.

Tara Palmeri (8:58)

Also, just the way they handled it, like, they purposely made it difficult to investigate this story. But early on, I mean, CBS was doing 60 Minutes. They've been investigating this since 2019, how he could have possibly died in prison. I mean, he was a very, he was a very valuable prisoner in a lot of ways. You know what I mean? Like, this is where they put El Chapo. I mean, there are a lot of problems with this jail in downtown Manhattan, but still, the guards don't just go to sleep. The tape doesn't just cut out. They don't, you know, this is the he, the way he died. Three breaks in his neck. I mean, a lot of. Some say that's just not possible, you know, from, from hanging. So.

Jim Acosta (9:39)

And now bags of shredded documents. You know, what's that? It's just so insane when you think about it. Just doesn't add up. And so we're going to stay on top. I know you're, you're going to stay on top of it, too. But let's talk about your reporting because I, you know, anytime somebody brings up Pete Hexeth, I, I want to dive into this, right? You know, this is somebody, when you see him at these Pentagon briefings now, the way he goes after the press, it's absolutely Ridiculous. And, you know, recently, I guess they just had to revise their, their press restrictions because a judge told them, you can't do what you're doing. But I, I do want to get into, I mean, just what you're hearing up on Capitol Hill. This is what you wrote over the weekend. I spoke with Republican sources and the administration on Capitol Hill and on K Street about what they're saying behind closed doors about the war in Iran. What emerged was a picture of growing unease. No plan to end the conflict. And then you went on to talk about what people are saying about Pete Hegseth. One Senate source put it bluntly. There's zero confidence in Pete Hegseth. Everyone, everyone. This is my favorite quote. Everyone regrets that they had to vote for him. The source added, he's a bigger regret than RFK now. To be a bigger regret than rfk. That's, that's saying a lot because RFK was just in a creepy video with Kid Rock the other day. But, and we. Let's not play that again, because I can't get that image out of my mind. But you're reporting on Hegseth and, and what this has been like for a lot of these Republicans, who I'm sure are sweating behind the scenes.

Tara Palmeri (11:06)

Yeah, they are. And, I mean, one of another source said that they see the real chain of command actually laying out lying outside of Hegseth. And while he's out there fighting with the press and not really projecting a lot of confidence for the American people, I mean, he is literally a caricature of himself, like the one on SNL that's played by Colin Jo. But, like, you know, this one source said that it's really between the president and his generals, and Heath has been really cut out of strategy in a lot of ways. But, you know, you remember the confirmation hearings around Pete Hegseth. So much damaging information came out about him. Joni Ernst, who's a sexual assault survivor, really struggled and, and has military background. She struggled with, with confirming him. And they spent millions of dollars running ads against her in her backyard, an intimidation campaign to get her to vote for Hegset. Now you might say, well, she's not exactly a red badge of courage. Right. Voting for Hegseth. But, you know, a lot of these Republicans, they just did what Trump wanted. They put this man in power, and now we're in a war with no clear end in sight. And there's a lot of frustration with how Israel's handling it. There's worries about the widening, widening escalation you know, from the Gulf to Lebanon. And there was a lot of discomfort over the way the Pentagon is handling this wartime posture. It's, it's quite a different thing, you know, to be berating press in normal times, but you can't enforce one single narrative on people. It's, it's, you can't do that during a war. It's disturbing, and it's even to the same party, like, and, and then at the end of, at the same time, President Trump, he hasn't done a very good job selling this war. He never did. It was like, over the night, overnight, there was no, you know, consultation with even the Congress, let alone the American people. He hasn't held an Oval Office address, which is something that I was hearing from members that they want to hear before they sign up on a $200 billion supplemental package. I mean, this is the party that doged half the government. Not exactly half, but you know what I'm saying, that. That is willing to cut jobs, huge portions of it. Yeah, yeah, $100,000 jobs. But is now ready to write a blank check for $200 billion for a war where they don't know the exit plan yet.

Jim Acosta (13:24)

Exactly. Well, and I mean, Adam Kinzinger was pointing this out the other day, that's more money than the US has provided to Ukraine to go up against the Russians. I mean, so it's a, it's a huge amount of money, and it is going down a rat hole to some extent because, I mean, the US Is not really in charge of events right now. I mean, you know, Pete Hexeth and General Kane can get out in front of the press and talk about all of these military objectives that have been met and so on. But at the same time, you still have the Iranians firing missiles at Israel and at Iraq. They're now trying to draw the Iraqis in, into all of this. And now the rest of the Gulf states, there's some reporting in the Wall Street Journal today that the rest of the Gulf states are now trying to figure out whether or not they want to join the US And Israel because they're getting bombarded. And so, you know, I don't see, you know, Trump tries to cool things off and says, well, I'm going to hold off on bombing these Iranian power plants so the markets can cool down. But that's only, you know, a sliver of what's taking place. And I'm just wondering at what point, I mean, based on your reporting, do you get any sense that Republicans in the Senate may start to squawk about this because, I mean, they've been marching in lockstep with Donald Trump. They will not really defy him on much of anything.

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Tara Palmeri (15:05)

No, I think it's a really good question, Jim, because while, you know, the, the White House, they pointed to this poll. Sorry about that. My dog had a moment. You know, the White House pointed to this political poll that came out over the weekend that showed 43% of Americans approve of the strikes, while 33% disapprove. And so that's their way of me, you know, saying that they have public support. And the truth is that Republicans are generally with President Trump on this war. He does still have the maga, the really, you know, the libertarian wing of the MAGA party. They're having, they're struggling with it. And you're seeing it through Tucker Carlson, Megyn Kelly and others. And I think it's only going to get louder. Right. But for now, they seem to think that they have the support of the people. But the thing is that these senators, these members, mostly senators who have been around for a long time, they've been around, they know what this is like. They know what it's like to take a vote like this, you know, and, and how that can really backfire against them. And so while they see the public support is there three weeks in, you know, four weeks into a war, they know that doesn't last forever. Right? Because people want this thing cleaned up quickly. And the longer it lasts, the more public backlash there is. On top of that, they're paranoid, and rightly so, about gas prices. I mean, that's the one thing that they just keep coming back to and they say we are, you know, that was the first word that came out of most of their mouths is gas prices. I mean, and I, I got it because this, this is the affordability election, as was the last one, as was the one before that.

Jim Acosta (16:39)

I mean, and, and it's something that everybody can understand. Everybody can understand gas prices. I keep going back to this amazing video that Jonathan Allen on NBC got last week where he went to the gas station in Pennsylvania and he asked this Trump supporter, this lady who's a Trump supporter, what she had to say to Donald Trump. And she Said something like, you're a worthless pile of shit. And she said, and I voted for Trump three times. I must be an idiot. When you talk gas prices, what you pay at the pump, the economy, the way it hits people in the wallet, I mean, it's not just gas stations. If the price of diesel goes up, that goes, that goes to trucking costs. And trucking costs go up, that means grocery prices go up, that means restaurant prices go up. Just about, you know, Amazon prices may go up, delivery prices may go up. And so everybody can understand this stuff. And I saw a CBS poll over the weekend that said 92% of the American people want this to be over as quickly as possible. I mean, Tara, this goes right to what you were saying a few moments ago. Donald Trump did not sell this war to the American people. He didn't say there's this imminent. I mean, he's been trying to say there's an imminent threat, but his own counterterrorism official, Joe Kent, says there's no imminent threat.

Tara Palmeri (17:46)

Tulsi Gabbard said, too, the same thing. She's like 10 years maybe.

Jim Acosta (17:50)

That's right. She, she was unwilling to, you know, she was being pressed on it, was unwilling to agree with what her boss, the President, said. And so this is a fiasco for them. And you add to that the long lines at the airport, which I know are unrelated, but I mean, in a way, not if Department of Homeland Security is not being fully funded in the middle of a war. That ain't good.

Tara Palmeri (18:11)

No, you're totally right. I mean, especially when Iran is now saying they're going to attack holiday destinations around the world. It's just like, what have we done? I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's really something else. You know, I, I like to de dive, like, deep into, like, the Washington conversation, too, and what's going around. And, and someone on K Street pointed this out to me that Qatar has spent so much money, by the way, in the US on influence campaigns. Like, oh, yeah, $260 million is according to the Kinsey Institute. And that's like, just what we know. But, you know, they have bought real estate in Georgetown, the city center in D.C. this glitzy city center. They had Attorney General Pam Bondi on retainer before she joined the administration. You know, they're paying for America's 2, 250th birthday party. They're one of the sponsors. They're having a big party at the White House Correspondents Dinner at the Four Seasons. So, like this is a country that has paid so much money and influence to try to have a foothold in America and to have some influence on our foreign policy. And they have lost 17% of their LNG G gas and natural fuel. So it's like it just, it doesn't matter at all. And I think a lot of our allies are looking at that and they realize that it's not really worth it to play with the US we're not exactly stable partners. And that's not to say that I think that these, you know, influence campaigns are, are, are a great thing by any means. Right. I mean, a lot of it, a lot of the most difficult countries are, are the ones who have to spend this money to have that kind of influence in the U.S. but for the, for the Washington set, they're looking at, you know, how years of buying access, relationships and goodwill have basically been thrown away in the middle of a war and, and what that means and how much the entire region is being destabilized.

Jim Acosta (20:02)

Right. And, and I'm going to talk with Arwid Damon, the longtime war correspondent for cnn, in just a little bit. But I mean, this was predicted by so many experts. Terry, you and I have been around Washington long enough to know that the Lindsey Grahams of the world, they've been talking about hitting Iran for years. And it's always been, it's always been warned that if you hit Iran, you could just unleash a quagmire in the Middle east, you could cause a global energy crisis, that the Strait of Horbus would be used as a weapon. All of those things are coming to pass. I mean, you know, for as much as we knock K Street, I think K Street even was warning this. Everybody in D.C. was warning all of this. The think tanks were warning this on both sides of the aisle that if you go after Iran, that why do. I mean, has anybody asked the question, Mr. President, you know, why is that? No other president tried to do this in the last 47 years? I think maybe he liked the idea that it's been 47 years and he's the 47th president, so he just thought, oh, yeah, naturally, I must be the one to do. I mean, that's, you know, that's how he thinks about some of these things.

Tara Palmeri (21:08)

Yeah.

Jim Acosta (21:09)

You know, he gives it about five seconds of thought. And now this country is going to be paying for this for a very long time. And it may not even happen during his term where he's the one who pays the political price. This could be something that blows up in another president's face years from now.

Tara Palmeri (21:24)

It's, it's a good point, Jim. And yeah, Trump is in greatness mode. Right. He wants to prove that he can do all the things that other presidents could not do. And, and I think he really felt a little high on himself after the Maduro, you know, I guess you'd call it raid.

Jim Acosta (21:42)

That's what everybody keeps coming back to. Exactly.

Tara Palmeri (21:44)

And, and so I think he was trying to prove I can do the things that others can't do. He's thinking about his legacy. He can't run again. And, and he's more interested in that Nobel Peace Prize in geopolitical politics, foreign affairs, but he's really letting his, this country fall to the wayside in a lot of ways. And his party. And it's really.

Jim Acosta (22:05)

No, it's so true.

Tara Palmeri (22:06)

Setting up JD Vance very well if he wants to run again, because certainly true. I know will carry this with him. And he's the one who's a non interventionist and he's a young guy, so.

Jim Acosta (22:20)

And JD Vance, he's not out there as quite as much as he had been in previous months. Marco Rubio not out there quite as much as we've seen in the past. And I mean, all of a sudden we're talking about Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff being dispatched, that they're the ones who are going to go and solve this problem.

Tara Palmeri (22:39)

Two unelected officials, by the way. Yeah.

Jim Acosta (22:42)

And guys who have no expertise. They're real estate guys. I don't mean, I mean, Kushner's just a nepo baby. I mean, that's, I know that's his, that's his career background. He's a nepo baby. And, but he's of the Trump Royal Court. And so these are the, these are the guys who are going to get us out of this. And I get the sense that Marco Rubio and J.D. vance, that they maybe don't want anything to do with this. I think Rubio has his eyes on reshaping Latin America. But I, you know, I wonder if you sat Marco Rubio down in a room for 30 minutes and asked him about this, if this is what he want. I mean, I, I don't know, maybe he was pushing for this, but some of the reporting lately was that, that it was others who were really pushing Trump to do this.

Tara Palmeri (23:19)

Yeah. I mean, it's funny that you talk about Witkoff and, and Jared Kushner, who haven't just been deployed to the Middle east, but also Ukraine and, yeah, Wyckoff, the Qataris, they bought a hotel from Wyckoff in the. I think it's called the park palace in Manhattan for $135 million from him. I mean, there's so many conflicts of interest going on, especially since these two are real estate, you know, tycoons. There's so much Trump property in the Middle East. There are so many reasons for this war that are not what they seem. Right.

Jim Acosta (23:53)

Yeah. And Kushner is making money in the Middle east as he's being used to negotiate or being asked to negotiate all of this. And I don't even get the sense that they know who exactly to negotiate with. Trump was out in front of the cameras yesterday saying that they're not even sure that the. The current Ayatollah is alive. And so they're talking to members of the Iranian Parliament. And it seems to me that the real, you know, the. The guys who are really in charge of this, driving the train on this are in that Iranian Republican Guard. And so I, you know, this just seems to be a real fiasco, Tara, and I. I'm not surprised you're hearing from sources up on Capitol Hill who are a little cool on Pete Heth right now.

Tara Palmeri (24:34)

Yeah, I mean, there's. Yeah, he is really something else, this guy. But in a time of war, they are supposed to protect. Protect calm, you know, confidence. And he is just so combative, and it's. He's a. He's in a defensive state, and that's not very reassuring.

Jim Acosta (24:52)

So never a good place to be. Well, Tara, great, great reporting as always, and always great to talk to you on Epstein. Let's do this again really soon.

Tara Palmeri (25:02)

Thanks so much, Jim, for having me.

Jim Acosta (25:04)

You bet. Thanks. Terrible Mary of the Red Letter. Great stuff in the Terrible Mary Show. Really appreciate it. Thanks again, Tara.

Tara Palmeri (25:10)

That was another episode of the Tara Palmeri Show. Thank you so much for tuning in. Please, like, subscribe rate. Follow share this with all of your friends. Head to tarapaul. Mary.com read my exclusive reporting. I really get into the nitty gritty details. I spent my weekend calling around trying to find out what's really happening in Washington, and I want to deliver it to you. But you can help support me and my mission by going to Tara Palmeri.com signing up for the Red Letter newsletter. It's a way to support my independent journalism. I want to thank my producer, Dan Schiffmacher, Abby Baker, who does my booking production. She does social media. She's everywhere. And Adam Stewart, who handles my thumbnails and Dan Rosen, my manager. Thanks again for tuning in.

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