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- [00:02]
A
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- [00:32]
B
Welcome back to the Tara Palmieri Show. Okay. Something historic happened in Congress today, subject of an investigation, you could say Leon Black. He stormed out of a hearing room with the House Oversight Committee because they pressed him on the non disclosure agreements that he has signed with women and girls. And obviously the non disclosure agreements could be the heart of the story since he has been accused by multiple women in connection to Jeffrey Epstein of sexual abuse. So he refused to answer the questions. They said that he was arrogant, he was indignant and he stormed out. Now here's the problem that would never have happened if he was under oath, right? He also couldn't have made blanket claims like he, he did nothing wrong and he knew nothing about Jeffrey Epstein and what he was up to if he wasn't under oath. This was an interview and it was behind closed doors. But you know what, the Republicans that are leading the committee, James Comer, he did something shocking as well. He decided that he is going to call Leon Black back, subpoena him and have him sit under oath and tell the story with fear of perjury. So that's about to happen. Now I wasn't in the room because it's a closed door hearing which obviously frustrates me. But we do have a member of Congress, her name is Melanie Stansberry and she's actually from New Mexico where Epstein's horrendous Zorro ranch was located, where he wanted to actually breed human beings. I mean, he wanted to create a breeding ground there and some of these like horrific scientific things that he was up to. It all went on and a lot of abuse. But she is coming in to the show to tell us what we didn't get to see. And this is really quite something. So take a listen to the interview and as always, you can support this show by going to the QR code, signing up for the red letter. It's a great way to get my independent exclusive journalism straight to your inbox. You get access to the entire archive and it's a way to support independent journalism. So take a listen here, leave Your comments. Always love hearing from you. And we will do this again soon. Congresswoman Stansbury, we're so happy to have you. We've been waiting to hear what it was like in the room. I can only imagine.
- [03:03]
C
Yeah, I mean, it was a very bizarre morning and unprecedented morning for our Epstein investigation and the Oversight Committee. This morning we had a recorded interview with Leon Black, and there had been months, I believe, of negotiations with him about coming in, what the nature of his testimony would be. And basically, he got through his opening statement, and when the majority attorney started asking him difficult questions about his relationships with women, about potential abuse, about NDAs, he. He basically referred to his attorneys and said, we're not answering questions about NDAs or about my private life. And our attorneys for the committee continued to ask the difficult questions. They recessed out of the committee room for a few minutes, and then he came back and said, okay, I'll answer a question about this one relationship. And then they start asking questions about the NDA again. And basically they left the room, and then they stormed out of the. Of the investigation and completely stopped answering questions. And his six attorneys and communication person gave a statement to the press and basically accused us of. Of some sort of premeditated political move, which is completely false. And then he left the building. But that's never happened before. He was served with a subpoena and a deposition to come back and testify under oath because he was refusing to answer questions.
- [04:41]
B
Wow. Okay. I. I've never heard of this before. I don't know if in the history of Congress we've ever had something like this happen. Think of the entitlement, though. A man, he's a billionaire, accused by multiple women right now of sexual. I mean, I was pulling up these files from the indicting document from back in 2019. It was a memo for investigation from the U.S. attorney, Jeffrey Berman at the time. And he's mentioned multiple times by women who went under oath. And I just find it. I find it incredible that he was able to say to the House Oversight Committee, Right. In an interview, not under oath, that he knew nothing, that nothing happened. I mean, there's no penalty of perjury. What's it going to be like now when he's subpoenaed? Will he be under oath?
- [05:26]
C
Yeah. So he has officially been served a deposition, which is a legally binding deposition, which means that he must appear in front of the committee under oath. And if he refuses to testify, then he can be held in contempt of Congress, which comes with potential criminal and civil referrals. To the courts, and he can be sent to jail for doing that. We also subpoenaed the NDAs themselves because at the heart of this is, you know, I know folks are wondering kind of what was the vibe? My read is it was giving Harvey Weinstein vibe is what it was giving of, like, he admitted in the. The testimony this morning that he had a, quote, unquote, extramarital affair. But what we know from the records that we have, including the thousands of times he's named in the DOJ Epstein files, as well as civil cases and women who've come forward and, and spoken their truth, is that a number of women have accused him of rape, of sexual assault, and violent sexual assault. And we know that he signed at least one NDA, which is public because he spoke about it himself with the media.
- [06:35]
A
But.
- [06:36]
C
But we believe there are multiple NDAs. And the fact that he wouldn't even answer questions about the existence of them. I mean, listen, like, I. I don't have any NDAs. I don't know anybody else who has NDAs. Like, if you don't have them, you tell the people you don't have them. But he wouldn't even. He wouldn't even discuss whether or not they exist. And why would you need to have NDAs with women who you had consensual extramarital affairs with? Come on.
- [07:06]
B
Yeah, I mean, I'm with you. It's. It's absurd. It's. The only. It seems to me that the only person who would be in favor of keeping those NDAs private is his, is himself. Right. I've always found it so fascinating that the Justice Department has done nothing about this. I mean, you know that Jay Clayton. I know that he's now been moved into a new role in the administration, but he was in charge of future investigations allegations right into the Epstein case. And Jay Clayton was appointed by Leon Black to replace him at Apollo Management. The billing, the. The private equity firm that he founded. And so to me, when I look at the files, and, you know, I've gone through them a lot, I think I keep seeing. I see leon Black repeated 8,000 times, women under oath telling their story about what happened with Leon Black when Jeffrey Epstein sent them to give him a massage. And yet I wonder why has Leon Black never suffered, I mean, or even been invest. Litigated for this? And I have to think to myself, like, this is the Epstein class. This is a. This is an official appointed by the administration who has not gone after someone who he made millions of dollars off of. Because when he, when he replaced Leon Black, you know, even in his public disclosure, it showed he made millions of dollars being a chair at Apollo Management. The found the firm that Leon Black founded and the firm that Leon Black continues to make money from, like, so he just got kicked upstairs when he lost his job for his association with Epstein. I mean, concern you that, that we are in this situation where Leon Black isn't going to face any, you know, justice because he's just so deeply connected in the justice system.
- [08:47]
C
Yeah. Well, let me. I want to come back to the Clayton piece because I think that's a really important thread that you have brought into this, and it's something that I'm deeply concerned about now as both Todd Blanch are facing confirmation for, you know, being the ag and Clayton is being looked at to, you know, serve in the DNI role for the federal government. So a couple of things. One of the things that's really important to understand about this Leon Black case is that not only has he been accused by multiple women of rape and sexual assault, we know that he transferred in direct wire transfers over five years, over $150 million. That is a massive sum of money, and it's pretty much inexplicable. He, he says today in his testimony that he was Jeffrey Epstein for financial services, that volume of money to be transferred in wire transfers. And he also claims that he thought he was going to get a tax deduction for that amount of money. Come on. I mean, you're not a businessman, CEO of a major hedge fund and you don't understand how tax refunds work? That's just ridiculous. And so part of what we're investigating is whether or not there was potential money laundering with. Was he paying Jeffrey Epstein to be his fixer? We also know that Jeffrey Epstein was communicating with members of the Russian government to try to have the visa revoked for the very woman that he signed an NDA with.
- [10:20]
B
Wow.
- [10:20]
C
Leon Black, the. The affair that he admitted to today on the record. The one affair. The one affair with Gazelle. We know from the DOJ files that Jeffrey Epstein was working with the Russian government to try to have Leon Black's ex girlfriend basically deported from the United States. Now, doesn't that sound remarkably familiar? Paolo Zampoli. We know from a testimony we had in Palm beach this was a pattern. This is what Epstein and his friends did. You know, they had women brought to the United States under the auspices of being models, and they got, you know, sent around to their friends. They were sexually exploited. They were made promises that were never manifest and then basically lorded power over them and used their powerful connections through international connections to elites and to governments to basically have control over their lives and whether or not they could even live in the places where they had put down roots. So I think that the other aspect of this Leon Black investigation is also the financial aspect of it. His relationship with Epstein and the reality that, that really there are two people who Epstein had such intertwined relationships with that spanned sexual assault, money laundering, vast amounts of capital that funded Jeffrey Epstein's lifestyle. And Leon Black was number one next to.
- [11:53]
B
But there are others too. But it was really the two of them. Yeah, yeah, there are others too. The founder of Victoria's Secret. I know you.
- [12:01]
C
Oh, sorry.
- [12:02]
B
I'm sorry. What were you going to say?
- [12:04]
C
Oh, no, well, I was just going to say, I mean, the DOJ aspect of all of this is. I mean, it's very obvious that these rich and powerful men had wide impacts on the justice system and are continuing to today. And the connections to Jay Clayton, the connections to Todd Blanche, to the law firms that represent them to, you know, currently the President themselves, I mean, these are all people who are in the same circles. They're friends, they go back decades. Are they shielding each other because it's a good old boys club? Are they shielding each other because they have dirt on each other? Are they shielding each other because somebody got paid through offshore bank accounts? We don't know the answers to all those questions yet, but that is part of what we're investigating is why have they been shielded from justice?
- [12:53]
B
I feel like they're all just bound by a single string, essentially this entire web of people. It's really. I know you have to run, but I just want to make one more. I have one more question. I. You know, there's a chance that Democrats win back the House, right? Will you repeat these, these interviews? Will you actually do them under oath? I mean, it seems to me like this has been a complete waste of time in so many ways. So many men, so many people that were close to Epstein as enablers, just able to go on record and say using Congress essentially as platform to clear themselves. And it's really like it's upsetting to the victims.
- [13:31]
C
Yes.
- [13:31]
B
It's upsetting to people who genuinely care about this that they've actually used the platform of Congress to make statements, to clear their names. They people don't understand that they're not under oath. And I think another thing is that like after so many decades of a cover up, why can we can we get some sort of promise that this will happen in front of closed door, like on camera, so that we at home can watch this? I mean, it just feels like it's. It's just. It feels like a charade.
- [13:59]
C
Yeah. Yeah. Well, the ranking member, Robert Garcia, has committed to doing that. And I can say that when we take back the majority, that's why this election is so important, because the only way you control committees is if you're in the majority, is that we will make this an actual investigation. But I will give Comer his due today. It was he and his attorneys that served that deposition and subpoena, and they were prepared for it. In fact, Comer told me himself that he had signed it prior to walking in the room because they were concerned that he was not going to tell the truth. So. So I. You know, I. It's a mixed bag in terms of how the investigation's gone thus far, but I don't want to. I. I don't think that it's not been worthwhile because I can say that, for example, some of the interviews we've had with some of the assistants, including, like, Sarah Kellen, have been, I think, very eye opening and helping us understand how this network operated, who the players were. And so, even though it hasn't resulted in concrete convictions and justice, it's helped us understand the backstory so that when we come back and have them under oath, we can actually hold them accountable.
- [15:13]
B
Yeah, I mean, Sarah Kellen is another one that could be very beneficial to have her come back. And Leslie.
- [15:20]
C
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, they need to be under oath. All of them need to be under oath.
- [15:26]
B
Absolutely. Thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate it. And we know you're in New Mexico, so hopefully we can do this again.
- [15:34]
C
In fact, you guys are in the committee room with me right now.
- [15:37]
B
Oh, that's so exciting. See, guys, this is why. This is another reason to tune in. Thank you so much. And keep us, us posted, too, on what you're doing in New Mexico, where Epstein's ranch was located, the center of so much depravity. I mean, I'm I'm just.
- [15:51]
C
Yeah, well, our Truth Commission has just issued another set of subpoenas, and so it is full charge ahead on the New Mexico's investigation.
- [16:02]
B
Okay. Wow. Okay. Well, we're excited for that. And this is. This is. Would love to talk to you in the future about that. Thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate it. And I'd love to have you on again for sure.
- [16:14]
C
Bye.
- [16:15]
B
Bye. That was another episode of the Tara Palmieri Show. Thank you so much for tuning in. I want to thank my producer, Abby Baker, who was tracking everyone down on the hill trying to make this all come together. She set up the interview as well. I want to thank Joshua Friday, new part of the team who ran the Lives. He also edited. I want to thank Adam Stewart, who does the graphics, Dan Rosen and Nicole Staple, my managers. See you again soon. And as always, go to Taro Palmeri.com go to that little QR code and sign up for the red letter. It's a great way to support what I'm doing. Transparent, radically transparent journalism where you are a part of the conversation and I tell you the story behind the story. Working for you and you alone. Thanks so much. This is a Monday.com ad. The same Monday.com helping people worldwide, getting work done faster and better. The same Monday.com designed for every team and every industry. The same Monday.com with built in AI scaling your work from day one. The samemonday.com that your team will actually love using the samemonday.com with an easy and intuitive setup. Go to Monday.com and try it for free. Yes, the same Monday.com.