← The Tara Palmeri Show
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Tara Palmeri
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Progressive Insurance Announcer
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Tara Palmeri
Welcome to the Tara Palmieri Show. Just like you, I've been reading excerpts of Virginia Giuffre's new book, nobody's Girl, and it's absolutely heartbreaking. But these aren't just stories on a page to me. They're the same ones she personally told me in 2020 when we traveled around the country trying to get people to tell the truth about her story. And if you followed my reporting over the past few months, the shows that I have laid out and told you all about what I know from my time I spent with Virginia Giuffre, you know, can find it here on the Tara Palmerie show and at my newsletter, tarapaumary.com I'll be writing about her book there as well. And we'll be writing about her life and how historic this is that Prince Andrew had to give up his title and how it's happening, though, after her death and how she fought so hard for these changes during her life. And it's just so brutal to me because it all had to happen like this. In the book, she writes about a miscarriage and I remember her telling me about this and how devastating it was and how terrified she was. I remember when we were driving past the Palm beach airport together and I watched her body physically recoil at the site of the Runway. That's where Epstein's Lolita Express plane was parked. And that was where some of the worst brutality happened up in the air. And as you can see from some of the excerpts, she talks about being so brutally assaulted that she was begging for her life. And these are the stories that she told me. She writes about the threats on her life when I traveled with her in Los Angeles, knocking on doors of witnesses who could corroborate her claims she had a break in at her house the time she really feared that the men who were around Jeffrey Epstein who abused her would come after her. And there was a reason that she moved to Australia to escape it all. I also saw that in the book she calls out her father for incest. And it just takes so much courage. I always sense there was something darker there in her relationship with her father. You know, they were estranged and I think it was such a taboo subject at the time and still is, that she wasn't ready to tell the full story. And she said that she was molested by a family friend. But I had a feeling that there was something more there. I am really relieved, though, that her brother sky, has come out and confirmed what I've been saying all along, that Virginia wasn't murdered, that she died by suicide. She was struggling. She was struggling with the demons of being trafficked and the isolation of being separated from her children, who were her only light. I heard that when I was on the phone with her in February, just months before she died in April. I actually said to her, virginia, you should go see your family. You should go to the US you should spend time with people. She just seemed defeated. There was a heaviness about her. She seemed sad, sadder. And, you know, she was a light for so many other people, but she needed that energy. She needed her family. Otherwise she would become dimmed. And, you know, she confided in me about her. Her marriage to. To her husband Robbie, and how he was abusive to her. And it sadly didn't surprise me at all because this is what happens. People who are abused throughout their life often f. Fall into the hands of another abuser. That's why it makes sense that, you know, Virginia started her life being sexually abused as a child, then went on to be homeless and trafficked and raped. And then, just as she was trying to turn her life around at 16, that's when Galen Maxwell spots her at Mar A Lago and. And convinces her that she's about to change her life. She's going to make her a traveling masseuse. She's going to introduce her to a wealthy man who has teach her some a skill, something that will keep her safe and secure, and it ends up being just another trap. That night, she ends up being sexually molested by Glenn Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein. You know, when I wrote, when I read that Virginia was really upset about being strung along by ABC News, my former employer, in deference to the crown, it really stung. She wrote that she believed that the network wanted an interview with William and Kate.
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Nicole Wallace
And.
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Tara Palmeri
And I thought to myself, that's just how access journalism functions. And it's brutal and it just re traumatizes the victims who risk everything to tell their story only to be sidelined for proximity to power. I remember that Virginia told me that she really believed that President Trump would one day release the Epstein files because that's what he campaigned on. And that was her nature, hopefully, sometimes maybe to a fault. She told me that Elon Musk told her over exit he would release the Epstein files. Now we see that he may have even gone to Epstein's depraved island, Little St. James. It was on the schedule, Epstein's schedule. We don't know if he went through with it. But the amazing thing about Virginia is that even when the world doubted her, she still believed justice would come. And that's why she was so inspiring to me, to so many other victims. She's a singular voice who never stayed quiet. She kept knocking on those doors. We did it together. I was so in awe of her and her grace. And I hope that you all go out and read her book, Nobody's Girl. Mine arrives on Tuesday and I will be reading it. I've got a number of pieces coming out. I hope you'll go to tarapalmary.com to see them. I want to honor her in this moment. And this is a conversation I had on Nicole Wallace's show on MSNBC about the latest in the Epstein case. Take a listen here. AI had the time of my life a I never felt this way before. From building timelines to assigning the right people and even spotting risks across dozens of projects, Monday Sidekick knows your business, thinks ahead and takes action. One click on the star and consider it done. And I owe it all to you. Try Monday's Sidekick AI you'll love to.
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Nicole Wallace
Use on Monday.com the burden placed on these women is something the co author of Epstein Survivor, Virginia Giuffre's memoir, calls out in the New York Times, writing this quote, why do we as a society ask those who have been weakened by abuse to do the heaviest lifting, not just calling out the predatory schemes of those who abuse them, but also testifying and being deposed under oath, as well as sitting for interviews and news conferences? And why is it that even when survivors do this, so many of us still don't give them the benefit of the doubt? Instead of requiring the wounded to endlessly recite their worst memories on repeat, why don't we bear down more forcefully on those who they accuse of wrongdoing? Joining me at the table, Tara Palmieri. She's here. She writes the red letter on Substack. She's hosted two acclaimed podcast series on this topic called Broken Jeffrey Epstein Empower the Maxwells. Also joining us, MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin. Tell me about the memoir.
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Tara Palmeri
Well, I haven't had my hands on it yet, but I've been told from people who have read it already that Virginia writes about a journey that we went on together over a number of weeks around the country trying to find people that worked for Jeffrey Epstein that would help cooperate her story, because for over a decade, you know, she had been called a teenage prostitute and a liar, and she just was desperate to find someone who could say, I see you. I know you. I remember you from that period of time. And so we spoke to people like. We tried to reach people like the chef, the pilot, the house manager, and he actually opened the door for us, and it was one of the few people that actually let us into their home. And. And it's in the Broken Jeffrey Epstein podcast. I also write an essay about it. It'll come out tomorrow. But it was heartbreaking to watch this, because this was a man who testified that he had to clean up dildos and make the massage bed well, after picking up girls from high school and then bringing them to Jeffrey Epstein's house. But yet he could really accept no wrongdoing in the situation. He just kept saying, I didn't know. I didn't know, over and over again. And it was incredib. Frustrating to me to be sitting on his couch and watching this man play mental gymnastics, walk some sort of moral tightrope. And for Virginia, she was just so happy to have someone see her and remember her and be there, and just like. Just almost like they had lived through this shared experience, and she needed someone to kind of make her feel like she wasn't alone in this experience. And so I remember when we got out of the house and we were in the car, I was like, how do you feel right now? And she said, I feel happy. I was like, how do you feel happy right now? I mean, he recalled seeing Prince Andrew in the house and Alan Dershowitz, but he said they were with women, never with children, you know, and she was like, well, he gave us 10%. And if that's all you get, you know, that's all you're gonna get. None of these people are gonna admit how much involved they were, and it was just really, really heartbreaking. In the book, she also writes about this profound disappointment that she had really hoped that the people who worked for Jeffrey Epstein for decades would actually come forward and do the right thing and say, I stand with you now, Virginia. But it just wasn't the case. And. And she took the breadcrumbs that she got, and he was a. He did end up being a crucial witness in the case against Glenn Maxwell. Actually, while we were there, the FBI called him and asked for an interview, which was crazy. It was. I mean, it's all on. You can hear the phone call. It was all recorded. But, yeah, he was. You know, he was a useful witness, but he also was unwilling to accept the depravity of it all and how he stood by for two decades working for Jeffrey Epstein.
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Nicole Wallace
On the outside, it's impossible to make sense of. And I imagine in the innermost ring, as a victim, it has to be sort of the final act of betrayal and gaslighting.
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Tara Palmeri
Oh, absolutely. I mean, she had so much hope, though, and strength, and she believed that President Trump would release the Epstein files. She told me that. She said that Elon Musk DMed her and told her on X that he would release the Epstein files. And she believed them. I mean, that is someone who's just so desperate to be acknowledged, to believe that there are better angels and that people will do the right thing. And I was inspired by her because I was jaded. I got to tell you, I was jaded, and I was furious. And doing that podcast made me see the worst of the world, not the best. And to see her feel like, oh, this is great. And I was like, what? This is great. And then it just reminded me of what she's lived through. I mean, in the book, she writes about being sexually abused as a child by her own father. You know, she writes about being trafficked, being homeless, trying to turn her life around. And that's when Ghislaine Maxwell comes through and finds her, just to bring her. And then it's just this life cycle of abuse she's lived through. And so many of these victims, they just. They can't even be heard. They've never been heard. And even now that the piece that Amy Wallace wrote was brilliant, because it's true, why do they have to keep telling their stories over and over and over again? Why does she get some justice after death? She lives with the trauma from it. And that is why she died. She killed herself. She. I mean, I spoke to her before she died, and she was not well. And all the conspiracy theories about her being killed, she killed herself. Because when you are. When you are a victim of this type of abuse, you live with that trauma for the rest of your life. Those demons, those nightmares, they play in your mind. And I just find it to be horrific that people use this whole thing to spread more conspiracy theories about a story that, frankly, doesn't need any more conspiracies. The truth is bad enough.
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Nicole Wallace
Alex Acosta's line that there were evidentiary issues and problems with the witnesses is sort of the final slander Right. Of these women, the witnesses are victims of sexual assault from some of the most powerful men the planet has ever known.
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Progressive Insurance Announcer
Nicole, reading that transcript was like living in two different times, because you had Alex Costa on one hand, who was sort of representative of the old guard and the way people used to see sexual assault. And yet he was facing an onslaught of questions from women who came to Congress having had very different life experiences and representative of a new generation. So hearing him being interrogated by Jasmine Crockett, for example, who really wanted to drill down on, I'm sorry, what exactly were the credibility problems with these women? Why did you not find them credible? Why did you think you couldn't rehabilitate them in front of a jury? He sort of sputtered. And he also insisted at one point during the transcript that it wasn't a sweetheart deal after all. His reasoning for saying that is because on his recommendation, the original non prosecution agreement would have had Jeffrey Epstein do two years in jail, which he said was the sentence Jeffrey Epstein would have received had the state not been so crooked. But of course, that's ignoring the fact that a prosecutor, under his own supervision, had written something like an 80 page memorandum recommending that they bring 50 to 60 counts against Jeffrey Epstein, as opposed to a single state count, to which he pledged as a result of sort of a framework that Alex Acosta himself developed. So I found the whole thing sort of galling as well as it was both galling and useless, because as you and I have discussed before, Alex Acosta was interviewed by the Department of Justice as part of an investigation they did into the professional misconduct of lawyers associated with the Epstein case. He relied on that throughout his interview. He hugged it to him like a child has a stuffed animal, and he just kept going back to it. I don't have an independent recollection of this, but here's. Here's what the report says and like quoting it chapter and verse as if it were his defense manual, as opposed to sort of having organic recollections of what had transpired. The whole thing to me, was both disappointing, upsetting, and yet, not surprisingly, so.
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Nicole Wallace
So her book, her memoir comes out obviously, after her death. What will we learn from the book that might have a corollary if and when the files are ever released.
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Tara Palmeri
I mean, the book is incredibly graphic. If the files are released and they are truly released and they are unredacted, then you will see the names that are associated with those descriptions. And they're very powerful people. I mean, she was trafficked to incredibly powerful People as many as three dozen men. And I think it would be jaw dropping for both political parties. And, you know, you can read and you can figure out who these people are. And it's incredible that in her death she's seeing some justice, but she has to be dead to see this. I mean, it's just so. It's heartbreaking.
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Nicole Wallace
What's amazing is that her story will be about being trafficked and about the trauma, but the story about the men, these broken men who may. Some of them may be fathers, some of them may have daughters, will be about broken men as well. And then I think the question in our politics turns to, why are they protecting broken men? I mean, what will the answer be to that?
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Progressive Insurance Announcer
I have no idea. And to your point about the memoir, there is a portion of the memoir that I believe addresses a person to whom she was trafficked. And she was told to go over to a hotel room that this gentleman was staying in with his then pregnant wife. And she was told to give a proper massage to the pregnant wife, who then retired to the bedroom and went to sleep. And then as she was preparing to give what she thought or hoped would be an appropriate massage to the husband, learned that he expected exactly what she had been giving to Jeffrey Epstein. So to your point, these are not only powerful, powerful men, these are people with children. And I think for Virginia, one of the biggest, big breaking points is when Ghislaine and Jeffrey ask her whether she will bear their child, and she wonders, am I being asked to bear their child solely so that they can raise someone that they will then themselves sexually exploit? That was sort of the point in time where she decided, I need to get off this island. And I mean metaphorically. But that was the point at which she began to think about, how do I escape this? And that's when she took up the offer to go to Thailand and get massage training.
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Nicole Wallace
When does the book come out?
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Tara Palmeri
Book comes out tomorrow. It's already a number of excerpts have been released, and I wondered what kind of impact this book would have. But I think what you now see is the violence that was involved in the assault. So many people do not understand how violent the assaults that she endured. I remember we were driving past the Palm beach airport where the Lolita Express plane, Epstein's private jet, was parked. This was in February of 2010. And I saw her body physically recoil at the sight of the plane. And she closed her eyes and she remembered being assaulted in the air and how it was a brutal assault. And I think you're going to see those details in the book.
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Nicole Wallace
Would she want the book consumed and shared with as many people as possible?
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Tara Palmeri
Absolutely. She created a nonprofit, Victims refused Silence. She believed that she beat the drum forever, even when people said she was a liar. And she never stopped. And I hope this lives on forever in perpetuity so it never happens again.
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Nicole Wallace
So when it comes out, we'll, we'll share as much of it as, as we can with our viewers. You guys will come back. We'll do that together. Thank you.
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Tara Palmeri
Thank you.
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Nicole Wallace
Thank you so much.
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Tara Palmeri
Thank you for tuning into the Tara Palmeri Show. You keep this all possible, so please come back. Please tell your friends about it. Please rate, subscribe Leave comments I want to hear what you want to know more about. To support my independent journalism, please go to tarapaulmieri.com and sign up for my newsletter, the Red Letter. That's how you can keep this going. I want to thank my producer, Eric Abenate. I want to thank Abby Baker who does research, and Adam Stewart, who does graphics. I'll be back again tomorrow. And Doug, here we have the Limu Imu in its natural habitat, helping people customize their car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. Fascinating. It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug. Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us. Cut the camera. They see us. Only pay for what you need at libertymutual. Com Savings. Very underwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company Affiliates.
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Nicole Wallace
Excludes Massachusetts.