The Mysterious Death of Jeffrey Epstein, With Jena Friedman

Summary

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"Wait a Second..." – The Mysterious Death of Jeffrey Epstein (April 9, 2026)

Hosts: Jason Concepcion, Tyler Parker
Guest: Jena Friedman (Comedian, co-host of "The Epstein Files Book Club")
Main Theme:
A deep-dive into the mysterious death of Jeffrey Epstein, examining investigative gaps, institutional failures, conspiracy, and the enduring implications for public trust and accountability. Jena brings a mix of black humor and dogged research, reflecting on the chaos of “the files,” how the information dump disempowers as much as it reveals, and why so many questions persist.

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Episode Overview

The episode is an exploration of the unresolved, chilling questions surrounding Jeffrey Epstein’s 2019 death, contextualized with reference to global cases (like Alberto Nisman in Argentina) and drawn into the larger conversation about institutional rot, impunity for the powerful, and the collective psychological toll these stories take. The hosts and guest shine a light on investigative inconsistencies and examine the broader systemic failures beneath the headlines, weaving in gallows humor and personal anecdotes to process the darkness.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Stage: Deaths Shrouded in Mystery

• [00:07–02:33] The episode opens with a narrated parallel: Argentine prosecutor Alberto Nisman, investigating terrorist attacks and government corruption, is found dead under suspicious circumstances before he can testify. The clear suggestion: patterns of "suicide" covering up politically threatening truths recur globally — now, with Epstein.

2. Epstein’s Final Hours and Investigation Oddities

• Broken Procedures and Missing Evidence
  • [03:25–14:10]
    • Details around Epstein’s arrest, detention, and alleged suicide:
      • Former guard Tova Noel, under intense scrutiny, received unexplained cash deposits and performed internet searches for “latest on Epstein in jail” shortly before his death.
      • Routine checks on Epstein were neglected; guards lied in logs (Julie K. Brown reporting).
      • Cameras in his cell area were mysteriously nonfunctional.
      • Critical evidence mishandled: No clear photo of the cell’s state, and authorities could not locate or confirm the ligature used.
  • Memorable Quote:
    • Jason: “Of all the details, that's the one [missing noose] that. When I learned it, I was like, what?” (11:19)
    • Tyler: “You don’t even have the murder weapon.” (11:02)
    • Jenna: “It's like the worst game of Clue.” (10:59)

3. Skepticism and Conspiracy: Did Epstein Kill Himself?

• [05:00–14:41]
  • Jenna: “I do not believe…he was killed, murdered. ...I never knew until this week that no one had even seen him hanging.” (05:00)
  • There’s pushback against the “suicide” narrative, grounded in practical absurdities and absence of basic investigative competence.
  • Discussion of Epstein’s prior “suicide attempt” — which was instead described as an attack by cellmate (ex-cop and convicted murderer Nick Tartaglione).

4. Corruption, Power, and Unanswered Questions

• Follow the Money

  • [14:41–17:26]
    • Tova Noel’s finances under scrutiny (JP Morgan flagged 12 unexplained deposits). Guest raises questions of why such transactions weren’t investigated.
    • A general sense that every institution (banks, prisons, prosecutors) failed or colluded.
  • Quote:
    • Jenna: “...the larger issue is just like, why is nothing in the files been investigated thoroughly?” (17:21)

• Impunity for the Powerful

  • [17:26–21:35]
    • Why hasn’t anyone in Epstein’s orbit been charged?
    • The current President’s implication in the files, as well as multiple ex-Presidents and other elites from finance, business, and entertainment.
    • Jenna: “Let’s try to not vote for a rapist...” (19:04)
    • Jason: “There’s really nobody else. ...That to me is like, we–nobody, there’s no one else.” (38:16)

5. The Chaos and Impact of the File Dumps

• [24:44–28:36]
  • Government document releases are haphazard, fostering disorientation: “...When you get this amount of information, you either have two reactions. One is to completely tune out, and then the other is to go crazy. Like, you're like left-wing QAnon.” (27:17)
  • Among the harms: many victims’ names released without redaction—explicitly dangerous, deeply traumatic.

6. Lingering Revelations and Real-World Fallout

• Persistent Culture of Abuse

  • [28:44–30:15]
    • Scale and brazenness of offenses described: “It was at an industrial scale.” (29:25) Ephemeral accountability for women like Ghislaine, none for powerful men.
  • The shaping of culture and industry by pedophiles—modeling, beauty standards, etc.

• Patterns of Mysterious Deaths

  • [33:55–37:46]
    • Jean-Luc Brunel and other insider deaths; personal story of a friend Juwan Lee, whose passing was tangentially referenced in the files, illustrating the far-reaching peripheral harm.
  • Memorable Quote:
    • Jenna: “...the amount of people who just died mysteriously or died before their time connected to the people in the files is so chilling.” (33:55)

7. Crooked Justice Systems, National & Global

• [37:46–41:00]
  • Only women prosecuted; men protected or ignored. “Europe has been better with people at least falling from grace...” (38:40)
  • Global pattern: other countries see resignations, suicides; the U.S. fails to hold anyone truly to account.

8. Political System Dysfunction and the Public’s Alienation

• [44:00–49:44]
  • Pendulum swings, voter apathy, fractured media ecosystem.
  • Jason: “It's unfair to the rest of the world to have their economies torched...because 30% of the US is crazy...” (45:21)
  • Continuous institutionalism and caution (Comey, Garland, Mueller, etc.) in the face of crisis.

9. Psychological Toll and The Need for Collective Meaning

• [49:12–53:22]
  • Helplessness of ordinary people: “...all we deal with all day are consequences for our actions. And the most powerful people don't have to do that...” (48:19)
  • Layers of disinformation, AI threats, and internet-fueled insanity.
  • Jenna: “AI taking away jobs. You're taking away meaning. Humans need meaning. ...It just feels really bad.” (49:41)
  • Comedy as partial relief, but never negating the horror: “It's dark.” (49:44)

10. Ratings: The "Lucid Score"

• [54:07–59:01]
  • Hosts ask Jena to rate the Epstein story by categories:
    • Legs: “We're going to keep talking about it. ...I think we’ll be talking about this for the rest of our lives.” (56:51)
    • Unintentional Comedy: “It's tragedy plus time. Also not a tragedy. Epstein being dead is not a tragedy.” (54:27)
    • Sinisterness / Intrigue / Danger: All maxed—deepest institutional rot, intrigue, persistent threat.
  • Score: “Grand score of 18, which I think is a pretty high. It's legal in many states. Yikes.” (60:12)

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Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• Jena Friedman on Conspiracy Logic:
  “If you take a step back and you say, what if he didn't kill himself? What if someone had ordered it, then everything makes sense.” (14:10)

• Jason Concepcion on Public Trust:
  “They've never held anybody of power accountable in this country.” (47:36)

• Jena’s Black Humor:
  “It's like the worst game of Clue.” (10:59)

• Tyler on Public Perception:
  “I think it makes normal people feel crazy when all we deal with all day are consequences for our actions. And the most powerful people don't have to do that.” (48:19)

• Jena on Getting Lost in the Chaos:
  “...when you get this amount of information, you either have two reactions. One is to completely tune out, and then the other is to go crazy. ...You’re like left-wing QAnon.” (27:17)

• Jason on the Epstein Case’s Longevity:
  “I think we'll be talking about this for the rest of our lives.” (56:52)

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Significant Timestamps

• [00:07] — Cold open: Nisman/Argentina parallel
• [03:25] — Review of Epstein’s arrest, charges, and death
• [08:41] — Camera/video evidence discussion
• [15:35] — Tova Noel’s Google history and cash deposits
• [18:00] — The President’s implication in files; Jane Doe victim statements
• [24:53] — Information warfare and chaos of file dumps
• [33:55] — Deaths of other notable figures linked to Epstein
• [38:16] — Failure to prosecute those in Epstein’s network
• [44:30] — Current crisis of democracy, media, and mental health
• [54:07] — "Lucid Score" and absurdity of the case
• [56:51] — The expectation this story never goes away

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Tone & Style

• The conversation oscillates between gallows humor, horror, and disbelieving outrage — mirroring the emotional response the public has had to Epstein's story.
• Jena Friedman’s comedic perspective is used for relief but never trivializes the horrors: “It's tragedy plus time... Epstein being dead is not a tragedy.”
• Throughout, the mood is one of disillusionment tempered by a feeling of duty: keeping the story alive, refusing to let it fade as another “unanswerable” institutional failure.

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Concluding Sentiments

• Keeping the conversation alive is a moral imperative, not just for justice, but for societal sanity in the absence of meaningful accountability.
• The “Epstein case” is not only unsolved — it’s unending, emblematic of a rot that touches finance, politics, law enforcement, and culture itself.
• [69:32] Jason: “It is important to keep it in the public conversation. ...Because there are living victims, like, who need justice.”
• Jena: “This is the one issue that is bipartisan...Epstein didn't kill himself, and we need justice for the perpetrators...” (70:22)

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Useful For

• Anyone seeking a critical, skeptical rundown of the still unsolved questions around Epstein’s death.
• Listeners interested in systemic corruption, institutional accountability, and their intersection with conspiratorial thinking.
• Those looking for a blend of dark humor, pop culture reference, and grounded investigative commentary.
• Individuals needing validation that the official story simply does not add up — and that it’s not unreasonable to want better answers.

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Transcript

[Narrator]

It's after midnight in Buenos Aires and you're still working. 13th floor, Puerto Madero. The lights of the port through the window. You are Alberto Niesman, special prosecutor. And tomorrow you are going to walk into Congress and end a presidency. You've been building this case for 11 years. It was 1994. A truck bomb driven into a Jewish community center in the middle of the city. 85 dead, 300 wounded. The deadliest terrorist attack in Argentine history. But the investigation went nowhere. There were rumors of COVID ups. A judge in charge of the case was removed for serious irregularities. The future Pope Francis signed a petition calling for justice in the case. Then you came along. You identified the bomber and traced the operation back to Tehran. You got Interpol to issue red notices. Then, quietly, the President cut a deal. Oil for grain may be arms. And in exchange, the case goes away.

[Jason Concepcion]

You have the evidence.

[Narrator]

Hours of wiretaps implicating the President. You wrote the complaint and tomorrow you present it.

[Jason Concepcion]

Your computer consultant comes by.

[Narrator]

He brings a gun with him. Later he'll say you asked him for it. It's somewhere in the apartment right now.

[Jason Concepcion]

Do you know about it?

[Narrator]

Well, there's a lot you don't know. For instance, you don't know that right now your security detail isn't at their posts. You don't know that yesterday a fire in the Presidential palace offices destroyed logs that corroborate your wiretaps. And you don't know that you won't be going to Congress. They will find you in the bathroom with a bullet in your head. The gu. That gun at your side. Your death is ruled a suicide. But the labs will find no gunpowder on your hands. Both doors are locked, but police will find a third entrance, a maintenance corridor for the air conditioner. And they will find a footprint there. The camera in the corridor doesn't work. Someone will delete records from your phone and computer. It will seem to everyone that a conspiracy is taking place. And it will take 10 years and a 56 page prosecution report to confirm what everyone. You were murdered body pose to look like a suicide. But even then, no one will stand accused in another hemisphere. Another man who knew too much. Another suicide ruling that took years to question and may never be fully answered.

[Jason Concepcion]

This is.

[Narrator]

Wait A Second.

[Jason Concepcion]

The death of Jeffrey Epstein. Welcome to Wait a Second. I'm Jason Concepcion. As always, that's Tyler Parker. And today we are joined by a comedian and co host with Elise Hu of the podcast the Epstein Files Book Club, Jenna Friedman. Jenna, thank you for joining us for this horrific topic. How are you?

[Jenna Friedman]

I'm. I mean, I'm fine. That's right.

[Jason Concepcion]

We should mention, I guess at the top that this morning the President threatened

[Tyler Parker]

to try to wake up for everybody

[Jason Concepcion]

to wipe out a civilization. So if. If people are a little tense on air, it might be related to that.

[Jenna Friedman]

Related to that. Yeah, Yeah, I know. I. Yeah, it's fine. I mean, it's not fine, but we're living in these times. We have to live.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's right. We have to live somehow. So today we're talking about the mysterious demise of Jeffrey Epstein. On the night of August 9, 2019, Jeffrey Epstein was in a cell at the Metropolitan Correctional center in lower Manhattan. He was awaiting trial for federal sex trafficking charges. He had been arrested at Teterboro Airport coming off a private jet from Paris. And on the morning of August 10, he was found dead. House Oversight Committee is trying to get one of the guards who was on duty that night, former Bureau of Prisons officer named Tova Noel, to sit for a deposition. It was Originally scheduled for March 26. It has since been rescheduled. No date has been set. We'll see if new date is ever set. Documents released under the Epstein Files Transparency act show that Noel was googling, among other things, quote, latest on Epstein in jail at 5:42 in the morning, roughly 40 minutes before the body was found. And additionally, there were up to a dozen unexplained cash payments to Noel's.

[Jenna Friedman]

Was it a dozen?

[Jason Concepcion]

There were around.

[Jenna Friedman]

There were quite a few. There was like a $5,000 payment. And then, like, in the 11 days before he was killed.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah, the 5,000 was a week after his first reported suicide, or alleged, I guess it should be, suicide attempt.

[Jenna Friedman]

I just said was killed. And maybe I'm wrong. I mean, that's like the one benefit of being a comedian.

[Jason Concepcion]

So let's talk about that first. I mean, we will go through the many details that just simply don't line up. But what do we think, Jenna? What do you think happened?

[Jenna Friedman]

I do not believe so. You know, I'm trying to not, like, feed the fires of conspiracy theories. I don't believe he's in Tel Aviv. I don't believe he's Palm Beach Pete. Yes, come on. I believe that, but he was killed, murdered. And as I remember, in 2019, I joked about it on Conan. Like, I had this set and I was talking about Ted Bundy in the set, and I forget what the joke is. Or like, oh, how Ted Bundy ghosted a woman. And, like, it's really hard to ghost someone from prison. Unless you're Jeff Epstein. Aw, I said Jeff, which I wish I'd said Jeff or anything, but it was so apparent then that he didn't kill himself. But then I didn't realize how like I never knew until this week that no one had even seen him hanging.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, so originally when this happened, I think maybe it was my own reaction to QAnon or and a kind of antipathy towards conspiracy theories. I thought it seemed fairly reasonable. You know, people do kill themselves when they're in particular when they're under horrendous charges like this. And it's not. You know, as a New York person, it did not seem crazy to me that cameras in a jail were not working or that the guards were bad.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, but it was a lot of things. And then the William Barr of it.

[Jason Concepcion]

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[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, but so here is so Julie K. Brown, Miami Herald investigative reporter whose work is probably more than anyone else responsible for bringing Epstein to public consciousness, has been very outspoken on various podcast appearances, most notably the New Yorker Radio Hour where she was asked, you know, do you think he killed himself? And here's just some of the things she talked about, which, you know, we can. I have then researched. And she's right. So first the guards lied on their reports and never reported that they reported they made checks on him and they didn't. Yeah, absolutely true. They never checked on him the night

[Tyler Parker]

that he died at 3am and 5am where they're supposed to be doing those checks. They did not happen.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right. The cameras, of course, very famously didn't work. The one that's, like, right across from the cell didn't work. There's one in the kind of, like, main area of the floor that has a sort of fleeting angle towards the hallway.

[Jenna Friedman]

But then there was a camera in the files that they found that there was a kind of a shadowy figure that they saw.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's right. From across where they're putting up, like, a barrier post death. Right. We think.

[Jenna Friedman]

I thought that they saw like, an orange figure moving in the. Like there was some video. This is again, why I need to have this, like, source in front of me. I feel a little.

[Jason Concepcion]

No, I think I know what you're talking about. I believe that is the angle. From the angle that's out there from the main lobby, there does appear to be like a. Like the cutoff of somebody's an orange shirt going that way. And then later, there emerged a video post mortem of them putting up like, a screen in front of his cell to do stuff inside the cell.

[Jenna Friedman]

And then the shredding of the documents, which I know you'll get to.

[Jason Concepcion]

We will get to that. Next, Julie brings up the fact that they didn't take pictures of the scene, which is crazy to me. Didn't treat it as a crime scene. He's dead in there. Very famous sex predator.

[Tyler Parker]

The most famous.

[Jason Concepcion]

The most famous even at that time. Very famous, very sensitive person to have in custody.

[Tyler Parker]

Yes.

[Jason Concepcion]

And they don't take a picture of any of the way his body was laying of any of the stuff. They have no idea how that looks. This one is the. This is the craziest one to me. And the one that's like, jesus, they don't have the noose.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, that's wild.

[Jason Concepcion]

They don't have it.

[Jenna Friedman]

Didn't they say that it was sheets, but they don't have sheets fashioned in

[Jason Concepcion]

the form of a noose. Well, they said that there were, quote, multiple scraps of cloth found in the cell, ripped and tied like a noose. But the actual one they didn't find. Unclear. Now, there's a picture of the cell where there's like, an orange piece of fabric that's hanging from the. One of the legs of his bunk. But again, it is stated in the DOJ inspector general's report from 2023, quote, that that piece of fabric is, quote, not the ligature Epstein used to kill himself. The noose that investigators collected at the scene was later determined not to be the actual ligature. Guard Thomas told investigators he did not know whether the noose was made from clothing or bedding. They don't have it. Unbelievable that you'd think that someone would put that in a bag right away.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's like the worst game of Clue.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's truly.

[Jenna Friedman]

You don't even have the murder weapon.

[Tyler Parker]

How is it not like. All right, nobody move. No touch anything. We gotta keep that like that. Just seems like if you know nothing, you know enough to know that's gonna be an important thing. Let's make sure we keep tabs on that.

[Jason Concepcion]

Of all the details, that's the one that. When I learned it, I was like, what?

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Really?

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah. I mean, the guards falling asleep, the camera's not being on, the fact that he. So there was. I did think maybe he killed himself because I had read that he had attempted to kill himself prior. But then when you look into that,

[Jason Concepcion]

he never said that. He never said that.

[Jenna Friedman]

And the guy that was in his. When you're talking about him, our friend Nick.

[Jason Concepcion]

So, yeah, okay, so he was previously put with a gentleman named Nick Tartaglione, who is an ex cop and quadruple murderer who tried. Who Epstein said attacked him and tried to kill him.

[Jenna Friedman]

Said he attacked him. And then he walked it back and said, I had just tried. Like, he walked it back because he knew that he was in danger.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's right.

[Jenna Friedman]

Allegedly. Allegedly. Allegedly.

[Jason Concepcion]

And to your point, it was said that he had. He was put on suicide watch because he had said he was suicidal. He never says that. Nowhere in any of the reports did he ever say, I want to kill myself. He never said that. He just said that he was in danger potentially, and that he was being extorted by his ex cellmate, the quadruple murderer, Mr. Tartaglion. And one must also, you know, like, we will get into Epstein's various connections with very rich and powerful people with intelligence, contacts, etc. You'd think that guy would get his own cell, right? Why would you?

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, well, they. They moved Epstein to that hall because he was afraid of getting killed, because he's a pedophile.

[Jason Concepcion]

He was in gen pop, so to speak, for like a day.

[Jenna Friedman]

And then they moved him, which you

[Jason Concepcion]

kind of feel like now in retrospect, that was attempt one. Let's put him in gen three.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah. Well, and his cellmate is released the day before Epstein allegedly commit suicide.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right. They got him out of there, I guess, because it just seemed to. There was, you know, Once he had been attacked and on. And they had it on record. Maybe it's. There's just too much heat on it now. Okay, here's the other part of this, as he, apparently, they say, hung himself from his bunk, tied the one end of the ligature, which we don't have, to his bunk, and then pulled forward enough to break three vertebrae in his neck, which is a tremendous amount of force. But pictures of his cell show that the bunk is. First of all, the bunks can be moved around. They're not anchored to the floor. Really? Yeah.

[Tyler Parker]

That's crazy.

[Jason Concepcion]

That feels risky. All of the. Like, his lotion or whatever it is that he had on the top bunk, none of it fell over or anything.

[Jenna Friedman]

Right.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's just all still undisturbed, despite the fact that this guy is yanking forward.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah. I mean, we're all acting as if what we were told was the truth. But then if you're. If you take a step back and you say, what if he didn't kill himself? What if it was. Someone had ordered it, then everything makes sense. Everything makes sense. Tova Noel, who wasn't qualified to serve in that unit, being placed there just before he died. The money that was sent to her, her Google, literally. We were talking about her Google history.

[Tyler Parker]

The Google history for Tovah is absolutely bonkers.

[Jenna Friedman]

So just before he dies, she has her searches, and the one that everyone is talking about is the one where she searched, like, Jeffrey Epstein.

[Tyler Parker]

The latest on Epstein.

[Jenna Friedman]

Latest on Epstein. But before that, she searched UNEM insurance, which I thought meant unemployment. She just was looking for unemployment insurance. UNEM insurance, unhuman insurance, I don't know. But then after that, she goes USA jobs. And then there's an ad for Ashley's furniture.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah, there's a couple different. There's furniture Bronx ny, then Ashley's furniture.

[Jenna Friedman]

What if Ashley's is in on it? What if Ashley's is like, you're gonna be in the files in a big way, and we want our brand out there. No press is bad, you guys. All right, fine, I'll stop. You know what else is also interesting? After she searched. Latest on Epstein and jail, she said latest on Omar. Do you know who he is? No.

[Tyler Parker]

He's another prisoner in the.

[Jenna Friedman]

He was a prisoner or he. Yeah, in the jail. And he's like a finance guy.

[Tyler Parker]

Same thing with Kenyatta taste. Right. Who's another, like, sort of bracketing. The latest on Epstein in jail are two searches. One of this Kenyatta taste, then one of the name you just mentioned. And they're both inmates at that facility. Right.

[Jenna Friedman]

So is she doing it to throw off the scent or is she just. I mean, that one's a little Tricky one, all sorts of sketchy stuff. And then when they subpoenaed her, when they asked her initially, you want to. You get into it because you're.

[Jason Concepcion]

We can just talk about. First of all, the various cash deposits made to her account that have never been explained or really investigated. JP Morgan filed a suspicious activity report, flagged 12 cash deposits made between April 2018 and July 2019. The largest single deposit was for $5,000. One day after Epstein was removed from suicide watch. Seven deposits made between December 2018 and the filing totaled about 11 grand. She was also leasing a $62,000 Range Rover at the time.

[Jenna Friedman]

So my question with the JP Morgan flagging as suspicious, I mean, if. What. How would they have. It doesn't seem. I mean, if the amounts were less than 5,000.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right.

[Jenna Friedman]

How would that be suspicious? How would. Where would they have seen the. Do you know what I'm saying?

[Jason Concepcion]

I. I do understand what you're saying. It's unclear because we've never investigated.

[Jenna Friedman]

Investigated anything because with Epstein, there were like so many suspicious transactions that all the banks, Deutsche bank, like the bank of America, just had to settle with the victims. Everybody, apparently, Deutsche Bank. And yeah, the suspicious transactions don't. Doesn't. I guess they're never investigated or it'd be nice to know if they were. I don't know. I think. I think the larger issue is just like, why is nothing in the file. Why is nothing in the files been investigated thoroughly?

[Jason Concepcion]

I think I know the answer.

[Tyler Parker]

You got a hunch?

[Jason Concepcion]

I got a hunch. I think. Let me just say this and I will immediately come back at myself with the criticism that you hear. I think it's one, because the current president is heavily implicated in the files, right? To two pretty serious degrees. Going beyond just like the FBI tip line type evidentiary stuff. There is a pretty harrowing and truly horrific interview with a victim was 13 at the time with an FBI. With an FBI agent.

[Jenna Friedman]

So not four interviews. Four interviews that they found Jane Doe number four is what they called her.

[Jason Concepcion]

They found her credible, right?

[Jenna Friedman]

Oh, I know.

[Jason Concepcion]

So there's like a lot of stuff and a lot of reason for the current president, United States.

[Jenna Friedman]

And there's also everything he said out loud leading up to the 2016 election that I don't know why everybody's shocked about everything, including what's going on with Iran. Like, yeah, the dude is a convicted. I would say, I don't know if the term is convicted.

[Jason Concepcion]

I think you can say adjudicated. He's an adjudicated rapist.

[Jenna Friedman]

Rapist yes.

[Tyler Parker]

That was the Eugene Carroll.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes, yes.

[Jenna Friedman]

And adjudicated rapist in a civil court.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's correct.

[Jenna Friedman]

So not civilly convicted because you can't be civilly convicted.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right.

[Jenna Friedman]

He's an adjudicated rapist.

[Jason Concepcion]

He's an adjudicated rapist if we want to be legally correct. And then you can like go, go online and watch his deposition where he talks about it. It's like there's no. He leaves you with no shadow of doubt.

[Jenna Friedman]

But also everything he said, he's literally said, you know, with the grab him by the pussy tapes and everything. I mean, I think we just have such a short term memory where we just should try to not. Let's, let's try to not vote for

[Jason Concepcion]

a rapist that's pleased they do that.

[Tyler Parker]

And I think that's a good rule of thumb in general. I think.

[Jason Concepcion]

And then I think the fact that like Epstein was killed like during his first term, you know, or I love.

[Jenna Friedman]

Now we're all just saying Epstein died.

[Jason Concepcion]

Epstein died during his first term in

[Jenna Friedman]

circumstances remain with William Barr as the acting Attorney General.

[Jason Concepcion]

William Barr as the acting Attorney General under circumstances that I think it's fair to say have not begun fully investigated.

[Jenna Friedman]

Have not been really investigated much at all.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's right. Now people will say, okay, well why didn't Sleepy Joe do something? And I would say two things. This is just me personally, not a legal expert. I would say first of all, if it is in fact proven, and I think we should investigate it, that any of the recent presidents suppressed evidence or allowed pressure to keep a case against Jeffrey Epstein from going forward, then fine, let's look convict him to. I don't have any personal.

[Jenna Friedman]

No one cares.

[Tyler Parker]

By all means.

[Jenna Friedman]

Bill Clinton's implicated. No one Democrat is good. Like none of us.

[Jason Concepcion]

I don't care.

[Tyler Parker]

Lock him up.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, lock him up.

[Jenna Friedman]

But her emails, if her emails have evidence of child porn, I don't care too.

[Jason Concepcion]

But secondarily there was once, and this feels like a bit billion, million years ago, there was this idea. Very naive now.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

I know that there was like this judicial independence and that because there was an open investigation into this guy.

[Jenna Friedman]

Right. Separation.

[Jason Concepcion]

You would not. The president would not put their finger on the scale in any way that could be seen as pressure or anything like that.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yes.

[Jason Concepcion]

And Joe was just one of those guys who believed in that kind of stuff.

[Tyler Parker]

I mean, Trump was discolored hand and slammed it on the scale.

[Jenna Friedman]

I would say James Comey and Robert Mueller, may he rest in peace. Like these guys were all institutionalists.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes. Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

And in a moment, when I don't think that's what was called for. But yeah, I mean, the two reasons. Because people, you know, that's the thing people say, why didn't Biden do this? Well, obviously, the idea that the DOJ was separate, but also that they were. That they had Glenn and behind bars and it was an active criminal investigation. But it is crazy. It's also crazy that, you know, under President Obama, they had all this. They had so much of this information, too.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah. Yes.

[Jenna Friedman]

About Trump. They had to. I mean, I don't know how you felt about the Steele dossier.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, I think it's been. I think it's been mostly debunked. That said, the Russia collusion case found.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

You know, there's a lot of there there that William Barr then reframed as there being no there there when he basically put it to bed.

[Jenna Friedman]

I remember in 2015, and I will never get over this, when RT was pushing to be like this media, right company.

[Jason Concepcion]

Russia. Russia Today. Russia Today.

[Jenna Friedman]

I was working at the Daily Show. My colleagues had just gone over to Russia and interviewed Snowden. They came back with all these Russian agent.

[Jason Concepcion]

Mr. Snowden.

[Jenna Friedman]

Well, he was there. They came back with all these crazy stories about what it was like in Russia. And I got a phone call from a friend of mine who was like, do you want to work on this show called Redacted Tonight? It's like, left of the Daily Show. You can talk about whatever you want. And I was Googling it because I liked my job, but they were like, you could be a correspondent and do all this other stuff. And I was like, okay. And then I'm like, oh, Russia Today.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

Funded by the Kremlin.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

And I asked my friend, like, can you. Can you joke about Putin? Well, you can talk about any. You can really criticize anything other than can you talk about Trump? I mean, anything else. And I was so livid. And it was like. And I was publicly commenting about my disdain for RT and ending up on their blog, and no one knew who I was, and still no one does. They did. They did. I was on their blog. I was on their radar, and I got so frustrated that, like, there was a show with comedian Lee Camp that was supposed to be like, an edgy version of the Daily show, but it was fully funded by Russia. Nobody was talking about it. And I actually, like, tipped off a reporter friend, and I was like, look, like we're in an era of Trump. And you're like, you know, can comedians still be funny under Trump? Blah, blah, blah. Like, how hard is it? You know, everyone? That's the angle. I'm like, the angle is like, look at these guys. They're not talking about Trump and find out why. And you should. And he did write about it. He did write about it in the New York Times, but it was just like. And then when RT had to register as a foreign agent, I believe they went away. And maybe now they're just online. But it was infuriating to just watch that happening and no one challenging it. And no one, really. Everyone kind of thought Russia was like, I don't know, Yaakov Smirnov, everyone. Miss.

[Tyler Parker]

Great comedian, great comedian.

[Jenna Friedman]

But underestimated that. The Cold War hadn't, in my belief, ended. And people who are watching this are going to be like, well, you like Russia.

[Jason Concepcion]

We've got a lot of problems here.

[Jenna Friedman]

You think this country is like, what about other countries? What about Israel? What about blah, blah, blah? And it's like, yeah, maybe Epstein was working with them, too. But let's not ignore the fact that, like, there are so many connections. Also, the way that the Kremlin operates in terms of honey pot, like traps and stuff, it's just not. I don't know, it's outside of my expertise. But. But if you are just somebody who kind of like, thinks, looks and connects dots, you're like, yeah, this sucks.

[Jason Concepcion]

It super sucks. I wonder if you had any thoughts. You know, the files have been dumped in this extremely chaotic way.

[Jenna Friedman]

Half of them.

[Jason Concepcion]

Half of them. There's still 3 million ish documents that

[Tyler Parker]

we will probably officially half.

[Jenna Friedman]

I don't know.

[Jason Concepcion]

We don't know. And now that Todd Blanche is the acting Attorney General, it's pretty clear that he has no intention of.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, but neither did Pam Bondi. It doesn't matter. I really believe that you, like, to the extent that we can. And really it's going to come down to the midterms.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

The amount of power that we have, if we don't flip the House and the Senate in the midterms, we got

[Jason Concepcion]

to make it there.

[Jenna Friedman]

Let's make it mean.

[Jason Concepcion]

Let's make it there, folks.

[Jenna Friedman]

So forget your politics. This is like, if you want to live in, like, some semblance of a work in progress democracy, which I don't know if we are even that anymore, but I mean, the fact that we're not yet arrested, no one is busted

[Jason Concepcion]

in the door right now, although surely by now we're in some Palantir database with, like, the hashtag what's up, Big Carp? What's up, Alex Karp?

[Jenna Friedman]

That's what's so scary. I was coming back from jfk and ICE is in the airports because, like, they really don't have anything else to do with them. They're not paying tsa, so ICE is, like, just doing the jobs of TSA while TSA is still standing there next to them. And an ICE agent asked my toddler, who's three and a half, like, what's your birthday? And I'm sure, like, TSA people do that too, but with the ICE agent. And my toddler actually did know, but it took him a minute, and we were just kind of like, okay. But the feeling of that was so. It was so creepy. And then the Palantir on top of it. It's like you have, like, things that feel like they're out of, like, pre Nazi Germany. And then you have the fact that they could just, like, see your face and know what you've posted in the past 20 years. It's terrifying.

[Jason Concepcion]

So listen, there are these.

[Jenna Friedman]

On that note, follow me on all social media. I'm Jenna Friedman. Jenna1n.

[Jason Concepcion]

So there's. We have some amount of files in various states of redaction. Some of those redactions were highly imperfect. Some of the file naming conventions were wrong, perhaps on purpose. It's unclear whether they dumped these files in an incompetent way out of pure, sincere incompetency, or whether part of the idea was, like, let's make people crazy with this conspiracy.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, I mean, there had to have been. And they also release names of many of the victims, which is crazy. Which they're getting sued rightfully right now. But yes. I mean, it's a form of information warfare, I believe, again, as a comedian, not a journalist. And other people have said similar. It's like when you get this amount of information, you either have two reactions. One is to completely tune out, and then the other is to go crazy. Like, you're like, left wing QAnon. Yes. And part of why Elise Hu and I started the Epstein Files Book club is I was going through the files and I felt insane. And then I would go onto threads. I kind of. I got off of Twitter. I was also kicked off. It's a whole other story. But my account was, like, deleted. I made one Elon joke, and then my account was, like, fully deleted, and I couldn't get it back.

[Jason Concepcion]

Multiple pictures of himself with Ghislaine.

[Jenna Friedman]

Right. So we were just. I was like, I need smart people and friends to Synthesize this with. Without going crazy. And I don't. And I know a lot of people are out there who feel the same way. You don't want to go into the files yourself. You don't want to tune everything out. Like, what's the not happy medium? Because none of this shit is happy. But, like, where. How do we proceed in this moment? And then Elise had said to me, she said, do you think that doing a podcast just about the Epstein files is too limiting? And I'm like, no, I believe that this is Watergate times a thousand. And it's going to be in the news for forever.

[Tyler Parker]

Yes, forever.

[Jenna Friedman]

For as long as we have a free and fair press.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, it will be.

[Jenna Friedman]

And which is not. Might not be that long, but it will be in the news. And this is a prism with which we're viewing all news in this moment.

[Jason Concepcion]

What has been the most. I mean, is there, like, a revelation from the files that has leapt out at you? I think for me, it was like, why isn't Lex Wexner in jail? Yeah, that's one. To me, that, like, just not even from the files, but from, like, reporting that is out there, that existed. But is there something like that to you that has popped up where you're just like, why? Why do you know about this? And why isn't this person real?

[Jenna Friedman]

Probably so much just how brazen and how, like, how compulsive Epstein was and how long he was able to get away with, like, if you can be a predator and a pedophile, but just like this. It was at an industrial scale.

[Jason Concepcion]

It was a crazy scale.

[Jenna Friedman]

Like, 200 girls in Florida.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

And that he was never held accountable.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

It just. It's crazy. And then also, he was, like, so brazen to send flowers to some of the girls high schools.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes.

[Tyler Parker]

That's crazy.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Tyler Parker]

It's like, I feel like that is has not even been harped on enough

[Jenna Friedman]

that just the level. And then the other thing is, just as a woman who grew up in the 90s, like, you know, I remember when my friend's little sister came home from, like, the mall, and she had a thong from Limited, too. And I remember then being like, ew. And it's all these pedophiles are shaping how women see themselves and what we wear and how we look, and it's like somebody was tearing up Botox. I'm like, I don't want to inject toxins into my face to, like, appeal to a beauty standard set by pedophiles. Come on, guys.

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[Jason Concepcion]

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[Jason Concepcion]

It's been impossible to, like, think of, you know, like, I love the strokes during the late 90s, early 2000s.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah. Who they are.

[Jason Concepcion]

And you know, the lead singer's dad.

[Jenna Friedman]

Oh, God. Nobody talks about Casablancas.

[Jason Concepcion]

The lead singer's dad, Julian Casablancas, lead singer. His dad. Father was a big time modeling agent who was entangled to a degree that is notable.

[Jenna Friedman]

John Casablancas. John Casablancas was who Trump aspired to be.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes, There are reasons to believe, including that it appears that the modeling industry certainly at that time was like on some level, a trafficking.

[Jenna Friedman]

It was a system. And Melania,

[Jason Concepcion]

that this gentleman was involved in trafficking. And it's like, that's one of those things where it's like there's so many things I can't even look at the same. I'm like, that is going on how

[Jenna Friedman]

he died in prison. That's the other thing. So the one, the one thing that's

[Jason Concepcion]

so Talk about that one. Yeah. Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

Well, I mean, the thing I'll talk about as we're doing this and then I want to talk about this one is actually personal to me. And it's like so sad. But as we're doing our little research, it's like the amount of people who just died mysteriously or died before their time connected to the people in the files is so chilling. Jean Luc Brunel died in prison. He was. He committed suicide. He was Epstein, whatever you want to call it. And he allegedly was going to talk. So a friend of mine, Juwan Lee, was a comedian in New York. Super smart, super funny, gorgeous comedian, went to dental school at Columbia. And we all lost touch with her. A bunch of us saw her right before she died. She came to a comedy show that I was on. We all hung out that night. And it was a couple years after she stopped doing comedy. And they just like. I remember that night. There was just something off with her and I didn't know what it was. It was like the light had just kind of gone from her eyes. There was just something weird. Anyway, a couple months later, we hear she's missing. And then maybe three or four weeks later, her body is found in the Hudson River. And everyone said, Juwan, you know, it's tragic. She was struggling with Mental health issues, and she committed suicide. My friend had a Facebook page that was a memorial site to her. The week after the files, the second batch dropped, he sent me a screenshot. Someone sent him one of the things from the files. That was Karina Schuliak to Jeffrey Epstein. One with a link about Juan's disappearance.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's chilling.

[Jenna Friedman]

Jesus and Juwon, nothing. No other context. When he sent me the. He's like, do you know what this is about? And I got chills because Karina was in dental school with Juwan. Juwan also wasn't just in dental school. She was a president of the student dental association for the entire country. So she had access to power and whatever. And, like, I'm like, maybe Karina just knew her from school and she was missing. Karina also donated. A couple weeks later, right before Juwan's body was showed up, Karina donated, I think, $1,000 to her, to Juwan's brother's, like, missing person, like, to try to find a detective. So I reported this to the nypd, and I said, just so you know, somebody who was missing, like, I'm not a detective. I don't have any access to anything. But, like, if her. Her family also. I didn't realize two other things. I didn't realize that her family always suspected that her death was suspicious. And I also didn't realize that right before her phone turned off, which was, I think, around Washington Heights, she had a phone call to a number in California for 30 minutes, and that number disconnected shortly after.

[Jason Concepcion]

And no, like, the number is gone.

[Jenna Friedman]

The phone number disconnected, and none of her friends and family recognized that number. So that's all we know. Best case scenario. And I hate to even use that phrase, Karina knew of Juwan.

[Jason Concepcion]

Sure.

[Jenna Friedman]

And just told Epstein, there's a girl in my school who went missing, and then she just donated three weeks later. That's the best case scenario. I can't speculate.

[Jason Concepcion]

For those who. Who aren't aware who Karina is, do you want to. She was sure. She's like.

[Jenna Friedman]

So Karina Schuliac was Epstein's, like, Glenn number two.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right.

[Jenna Friedman]

She came from Belarus. She was a dental student. Is. She's not a dental student anymore. She practices dentistry.

[Jason Concepcion]

He put her through school.

[Jenna Friedman]

He put her. He paid.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

There's a whole scandal at Columbia University dental school because a lot of the. Or a couple people, professors in the department. I think the head of the school had to step down because they were bribed. Epstein got her into dental school, and then she's who he gave all of his money to. She's his last phone call from prison and she has never been subpoenaed.

[Jason Concepcion]

And so this is the other thing. To me it's like, okay, he's. Ghislaine's in jail. Okay, Epstein is dead. But like, who flew the plane? Who fixed the plane? Who cleaned the houses? Who drove him to and fro? Who brought the women and the girls to his.

[Jenna Friedman]

All the dentists, all the doctors, the

[Jason Concepcion]

doctors that went to his house to look at people.

[Jenna Friedman]

Eva Dubin, Glenn Dubin's wife, who dated Epstein.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's insane that there is no. There's really nobody else. Like that to me is like, we nobody. There's no one else.

[Jenna Friedman]

And then the only people that have been held accountable so far are women. Ghislaine. Which I'm fine with if they deserve it.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right, Right.

[Jenna Friedman]

Glenn Pambandi, Kristi Noem.

[Jason Concepcion]

And also not really, not really held

[Jenna Friedman]

accountable in Trump's administration. It's just been Christina and Pam Bondi who have had to.

[Jason Concepcion]

Europe has been better with people at least falling from grace in a way that you feel like, yes, while they're not going to prison, their career is probably done, like for good.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Although other people have gone to prison in other European countries. There's been a suicide of a, I believe the ex Finnish prime minister or something.

[Jenna Friedman]

Why do you just tell us what you know before you kill yourself?

[Jason Concepcion]

That's where I am. Like, hey, can we get a note?

[Jenna Friedman]

What A really long note.

[Jason Concepcion]

What happened to. What happened to everything, you know, what happened to suicide?

[Tyler Parker]

You're going to look bad regardless.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Tyler Parker]

No, just give us a heads up

[Jason Concepcion]

or like a straight to phone video and then just be like, guys, post it.

[Jenna Friedman]

Trump did it. We all know he was a ring leader. Allegedly. Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

I mean, I don't think, you know, I don't know Trump the ringleader. I think that he was. I think he's just so deeply enmeshed that he is like a cornered rat who is just anything to delay the day of reckoning for five more minutes. And I don't think he's strategic or smart enough to.

[Jenna Friedman]

But he has to be something because he's in power again. I mean, I also think that this second round is just everything that is happening now. I feared in 2016, like, I remember being. I remember election night. Cause I was on live tv. I was on Colbert on election night. And I remember feeling like it was the beginning of the end. It felt like 9 11. It felt like 911 on like another level, New York felt like just. It felt like our democracy was done.

[Jason Concepcion]

And as a New Jersey person, as a Long Island New Yorker, I'm a New Jersey girl. It was always crazy to me. Like, I remember when he went bankrupt, and I'm like, good, okay, we don't have to deal with this guy anymore. And then he came back with the. With the Apprentice and all this stuff. But then to see his rise to national prominence, it was literally like. It was almost like the Giuliani thing, too, where I was like, no, you guys don't understand, because you're not in the area. This guy's terrible. Like, how can this be happening?

[Jenna Friedman]

So I remember I met him. I met him. I was on the campaign trail with these two comedians who are hilarious, Jason and Devram of the Good Liars. And they were doing this movie on the campaign trail where one was, like, the most, like, parody of, like, a Bernie Bro, and the other was, like a parody of, like, a Trumper and then. Or like, a parody of actually, like, Rick Santorum. And then they both became. And then they both became Trumpers. It was like the Horseshoe, but it was like this, like, prank live action comedy where we're literally on the campaign trail. And they had this bit where they had Trump armbands, and they're like, we need to. We're doing a bit where we're giving people armbands to see if they'll wear them. Everybody, of course, wore them, but for the joke to work in the movie, we needed to get footage of people wearing them in a Trump town hall. And they were like, we're already too recognizable. We can't go to the Trump town hall. This is New Hampshire primary. Right when he won the New Hampshire primary. And that was really when he became, like, a viable candidate. And I was like, okay, I guess I used to be a producer at the Daily Show. I can see if we can get in. And I show up. I'm like, hi, we're women. For Trump. It was me and camera operator who was a woman, and they were like, okay. And they let us in, and I got, like, a front row seat. I can show it to you. I'm, like, on cnn, like, next to Trump, and Charlotte is filming me, and I'm like, not a prank comedian. I was like, what the. What the fuck do I do? I should have pretended to fall asleep, but instead, I got up on my phone and had this, like, conversation behind him. But there was this one moment where he. I was the only person in the front row under 70 so he went right for me. And I also. He's a rapist. So he went on.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

And he went to shake.

[Jason Concepcion]

Adjudicated rapist.

[Jenna Friedman]

Right, right, right. And I went. And he went to shake my hand, and I couldn't touch his hand. I wouldn't touch his hand. I have to show you the photo, too. It's wild. But I wouldn't touch his hand. And then the rest of the time, he stood right behind me between. It's like game recognized game, you know, he stood right behind me between me and the cameras because he was like, I don't trust her. But after, they were like. They were like, People were asking questions, and I was scared shitless, and I'm like, what do I ask him? How do I. Like, I just. And I. I couldn't sleep for two days. This doesn't have to be on the podcast, but I couldn't sleep for, like, two days because I was like, I should have. I should have asked him about Russia. I should have asked him. It was. But it was like, you felt. It felt like he was gonna win, and he won New Hampshire, and then he won the election. But the reason I bring him up after the election, I was thinking, I'm like, how did. I've never. I, I, I went to, like, the Atlanta airport, and they're all these white women, and I've never had this out of my life, but I'm like, which one of you white voted for Trump?

[Tyler Parker]

Right.

[Jason Concepcion]

Probably. Well, by all, all of you. I mean, by percentage, it's like 70% of them thought that, yeah, I hate

[Jenna Friedman]

the word bitch, and I would never. But I was just like, what the fuck? And I was at some, like, random bar in, like, Joshua Tree with all these white women who voted for Trump, and they were drinking beers, and I had a beer with them. And the one through line is that they were all really damaged and broken and sad. Yeah. And I do think not to. You know, I mean, there are also. It's like, you know, a lot of racism and a lot of, like, all sorts of things enmesh into it. But, like, the past 30 years of just, like, the middle class eroding, people losing jobs and people wanting a scapegoat and wanting a savior. I mean, it's like, it's history, you know, it's like people are voting for Trump because they would rather just torch the system because it's not working for them.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, I think that that is, certainly.

[Jenna Friedman]

And we haven't fixed it, really. You know what I mean? I Mean, we're like, here's the good news.

[Jason Concepcion]

There's never been a true reformist redistributive movement without disaster. So, like, here's hoping that after this, there will.

[Jenna Friedman]

The pendulum is gonna swing.

[Jason Concepcion]

The pendulum will swing, like, heavily back. It'll be like, woke to here we come. And like, let's.

[Jenna Friedman]

And then it's gonna be the apocalypse. But here's the thing. It's like, with our media ecosystem the way it is, it's, like, so fragmented. It's like we're not. We're speaking in our own silos. We're not speaking across the aisle, and we're not speaking to each other. And I just like going back and forth from extremes.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's not.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's not good.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, that's the. I mean, the thing that, in my view, nobody's really talking. It's like, yes, we got to win midterms. Of course, you got to win the presidency and have someone who's more normal in there. But you also have to, like. Like, it's fourth quarter, we're down by five touchdowns. Like, you. We got to get in there, put the key in, and kind of break it off. Like, it's unfair to the rest of the world to have their economies torched. No gas, nuclear war, maybe. Question mark. And it's like, because 30% of the

[Jenna Friedman]

US is crazy, and it's not even 30%. And also with voter suppression and all this shit, you don't even know what. What the Starling stuff, I don't even know about that. Or the voting machines. Like, who knows? But that's what I thought with, like, that's the thing that I'm also most upset about. Like, the whole Merrick Garland of it all. Like, what the fuck was that about?

[Jason Concepcion]

I think that is. It's just like, wrong person for the wrong time. Like, it's an example of an institutionalist. I mean, I can't believe he convicted Biden's son and didn't get Trump on multiple trips.

[Tyler Parker]

Unbelievable.

[Jason Concepcion]

Like, anyway, but it's not just him.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's him. It's James Comey.

[Jason Concepcion]

Comey, whose big move was getting Martha Stewart. Like, that's his big conviction.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's. It's Mueller. You know, I mean, like, Mueller tried. But then to your point about William Barr mischaracterizing the findings, I mean, it's just. It's really. I think it's like, it keeps happening. And then just even not having a primary the way that they ran. Kamala, like, after not having a primary, when they should have. You know what I mean?

[Tyler Parker]

It's just.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, you know, I'm glad you brought this up because, like to. In case people think we're being too hard on pedophiles, too hard on pedophiles and adjudicated rapists, I'll say this like, here's. Well, first of all, Joe was clearly too old and it was not gonna make it. But if Joe was gonna drop out at the late hour that he did, he should have turned to Harris and said, listen, whatever you need to do, whatever you need to say, like, go at me, you disagreed with me on Gaza, you disagreed me on this, that and the other. Whatever you need to do, do it because it's for the country. If he's not gonna say that, then Harris needs to go. If your rhetoric matches your actions and this is a threat to democracy and we've got to make sure this doesn't happen and this, that and the other, then you've got to be like, you know what? I've got to hurt Joe's feelings. But then instead we decided not to hurt Joe's feelings. And we are here.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's really hard to be optimistic about the future with everything that we're staring down. And then when you take into account the fact that like the Epstein files have spanned decades and all of these 30 years of stuff now, no investigations, no one's held accountable. Yeah, you know, it's like the public distrust is even higher in the system.

[Jason Concepcion]

I do think, like, if, if, let's say the pendulum swings right. I do think stuff has to happen like pretty quickly and people have to be comfortable with a type of accountability that we have never kind of seen in the country. It's like Ford pardoned Nixon, Jefferson Davis was allowed to return to normal life. They've never held anybody of power accountable in this country. So it is gonna feel like, why are we going after people? But they're gonna have to do it. They're gonna have to actually go after people this time. And it's gonna have to be in a way that's not like, oh, this'll take two years as we spin up the invent. No, it's gotta hit the ground running this time.

[Tyler Parker]

I think it makes normal people feel crazy when all we deal with all day are consequences for our actions. And the most powerful people don't have to do that. I think that that's when we get into this mind numbing headspace that a lot of us are in now, where you're hearing all these terrible things that it seems like for sure these very powerful people did. And we haven't seen a single perp walk. And everything in your head tells you, like, oh, they fucked up right? Royally. There should be some fucking action after this that addresses that. And when there is none. Yeah. I think you just start to think, like, well, then what is. Is that. Are we not in that world? Like, are there multiple worlds here and we're not. But it's like. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

So that level of distrust in the system and then not to go so dark, but then AI on top of it.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, right.

[Jenna Friedman]

And the. Not only the Palantir, so the surveillance state, but also the fact that, like, AI is coming for so many jobs. Not my job, because my job is not profitable enough. AI is not like, oh, I'm going to go on podcasts and talk about Trump. But AI taking away jobs. You're taking away meaning. Humans need meaning.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's bad.

[Jenna Friedman]

It just feels really bad.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's dark.

[Jenna Friedman]

It feels really bad.

[Jason Concepcion]

This is why people love Luigi. You know what I mean?

[Jenna Friedman]

I'm talking about Luigi, you know, but, like, you're gonna create a lot.

[Jason Concepcion]

This is what people who don't, you

[Jenna Friedman]

know, who don't have jobs, who don't have. And I'm not. I'm not, like, trying to, like, run on, like.

[Jason Concepcion]

No.

[Jenna Friedman]

No comedian.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah. Nobody is calling for an actual armed revolution. But I will.

[Jenna Friedman]

Showing up somewhere feeling like you can work towards something big or small, even like, you know, just to not have that is going to be really scary for a whole generation of kids who are already, like, mentally ill, literally, because of social media.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah,

[Jason Concepcion]

sorry. You know what?

[Jenna Friedman]

The Epstein files are dark enough. Let's have a comedian on. We'll lighten things. Look, I thought we started off at a good spot, talking about how my son's last name is Epstein.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah, that was a good start.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, that was funny. I hope that, like, the teaser into this. Harrowing.

[Jason Concepcion]

It is truly harrowing. I mean, I keep coming away with, like, so the QAnon people were right. Kind of. They've disappeared since, by the way, which tells you that it was some sort of a psyop.

[Jenna Friedman]

Well, wait a minute. So we had on the podcast last week, we did a whole episode about the Rothschilds, which I didn't want to do, but they were mentioned.

[Jason Concepcion]

I think it's important to be like, hey, guys, let's be careful with.

[Jenna Friedman]

Well, they were. I mean, like, Epstein's former accountant mentioned them. As mentioned, the Edmond de Rothschild group which is run by Ariane de Rothschild, who's not even Jewish, but as one of the financiers of Epstein. So I was like, I gotta talk about this. So we talked about it. And so this guy who's a journalist, he's written two books, one on QAnon and one on, like, the Rothschilds. And his last name, unfortunately, sorry, conspiracy theorist, it is Rothschild. His name is Mike Rothschild.

[Jason Concepcion]

Oh, so the Rothschild guy is writing the book on the Rothschild.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's so bad. But I asked him that question about QAnon, and I said, Mike, what happened to QAnon? And he said, it became the government.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, I mean, that's.

[Jenna Friedman]

So it hasn't receded. It's the government.

[Jason Concepcion]

I mean, sure, it's.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's. It's Department of Health and Human Services. It's. It's now mainstream. So it's no longer in the shadows. It's no longer a conspiracy.

[Jason Concepcion]

I mean, I will say one of the threads that remains unpolled is Epstein's intersection with this entire ecosystem of right wing Steve Bannon nationalistic, you know, disinformation networks, particularly 4chan, who he had, I mean, he had to meet some kind of exchange meeting with Moot, who is the programmer behind 4chan, in order to recreate, reinstate the poll politics. Subreddit. Not subreddit, 4chan, whatever they call the 4chan sub channels. That was a big nexus of disinformation, QAnon stuff, you know, Comet pizza type stuff. And why was he in, like, why was he in contact with that guy? There's just.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's too much.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's too much. It's literally too much. You just start going like, yeah, and

[Jenna Friedman]

that's also, that's also another thing. Like, I really feel for people who are struggling with mental health issues.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

It makes crazy. It makes you.

[Jason Concepcion]

It makes you crazy.

[Jenna Friedman]

It makes you crazy. And that's not to be like, another reason why we are talking about it on our podcast, at least because when you were going, I'm on threads and I'm looking at. There's like blatant misinformation. There's like, there's stuff on threads now talking about, like, you know, like Trump. Like, there's so much misinformation on threads that. And like, and like, you know, AI videos and stuff that you're just like, I'm gonna go crazy if I don't find a way to.

[Tyler Parker]

Well, there's. Yeah, there was some picture going around of the WSO who supposedly was rescued or, you know, all that bullshit. But the picture that was going around on Twitter, I guess, yesterday. Picture of the guy, of the person among other troops, whatever, smiling and stuff, and just so clearly.

[Jenna Friedman]

AI.

[Tyler Parker]

But that doesn't stop people from buying it.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, let's go to our. We have a thing called a lucid score. Legs. Does this story have legs? Are we going to continue to talk about this story? Each category, from one to four, it can be a zero as well. For instance, unintentional comedy. Gonna be a zero. Sinisterness, intrigue, and danger. I'm gonna have you rank these. This story. I guess we can keep it to this story.

[Jenna Friedman]

You mean Epstein files.

[Jason Concepcion]

We can keep it to Epstein's murder or. And. Or death.

[Jenna Friedman]

Death. Epstein's death.

[Jason Concepcion]

Sorry, I keep saying murder, but Epstein's suspicious death, his mysterious death. Does this story ever happen?

[Jenna Friedman]

Wait, wait, wait. Wait a minute. Unintended comedy. We can. We can think of.

[Jason Concepcion]

Okay, well, you're the professional, so I'll let you take it.

[Jenna Friedman]

It's tragedy plus time. Also not a tragedy. Epstein being dead is not a tragedy.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's kind of good, right?

[Jenna Friedman]

You know?

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, let's start with legs. There's a story of Legs, the death

[Jenna Friedman]

of financier Jeffrey, because you find out if. If Tova Noel decides to, like, say, yeah, I was given an order by this guy. Right. If you find out who gave her the order or who put her there, then you can implicate people, and then you can prosecute people, potentially.

[Jason Concepcion]

And I do think that the guards are going to be a weak link. It's not like that's. You go.

[Tyler Parker]

You go.

[Jenna Friedman]

Sorry, I'm so.

[Tyler Parker]

No, you're the guest.

[Jenna Friedman]

I don't. Everyone. No one's saying anything. I watched Wexner's deposition. He just didn't. No one's saying anything. Like, they're so. The Clinton. I was shocked to learn that he's only ever sent two emails. That was shocking to me. But all of these people are being deposed for hours and hours and hours.

[Jason Concepcion]

Wexner did take the Fifth, I believe, multiple times.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah. But he. He just. He's like, no, no, no. And he was kind of like, who knows?

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

And it's just crazy to watch these people just like. No one's giving you an inch. No one's. All you want is, like, one person to be like.

[Jason Concepcion]

But I do feel like Noel and the guards, potentially, they're gonna get killed

[Jenna Friedman]

if they say anything.

[Jason Concepcion]

I kind of. I don't disagree with you. And surely they are thinking that, but I feel like we're kind of at a tipping point. Like, how many times can you go back to the well, and especially with the spotlight that, like, it's one thing

[Jenna Friedman]

I can't imagine Tova Noel has anything to gain by. There's nothing.

[Jason Concepcion]

She's.

[Jenna Friedman]

She's in a position where they don't have proof that she did anything. It's all, like, circumspect. So she's not gonna get. She's not gonna go to prison. So she just shuts the fuck up.

[Jason Concepcion]

She needs to do the Thomas Massey. Hey, I'm in great health. I eat very healthily. I have no emotional problems. I don't own a gun. Like, I intend on living a long, long, long life. Let me just put that out there.

[Jenna Friedman]

I mean, she's also the Julie K. Brown reporting on her is so interesting. And then you just kind of.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, okay, so legs.

[Jenna Friedman]

Legs, Yeah. I mean, until we get. Until there's justice for the victims and survivors and all of us living in

[Jason Concepcion]

this country, we're going to keep talking about.

[Jenna Friedman]

We're going to keep talking about it.

[Jason Concepcion]

I think we'll be talking about this for the rest of our lives.

[Jenna Friedman]

Well, don't say that, because we could get.

[Jason Concepcion]

Okay, okay.

[Jenna Friedman]

The rest of our short lives are right outside, waiting.

[Jason Concepcion]

Unintentional comedy.

[Narrator]

Anything.

[Jason Concepcion]

Can you come up with anything?

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, I mean, in the files, I've seen some pretty dumb jokes. There's this guy, Harry Fish, who was a friend of Epstein, who had this pilot he wrote called Baby Maker, written with two Letterman writers. I worked for Letterman. I'm trying. I think I have an. I think I know who those guys are, and I don't want to blow up their spot, but I need. I'm trying to get a hold of that pilot.

[Jason Concepcion]

I mean, Steve Bannon, a producer on Seinfeld, is one of the creators.

[Jenna Friedman]

Steve Bannon. Okay, so there's more comedy about Epstein. Oh, I mean, I did that joke

[Jason Concepcion]

on Conan in 2019 from 0 to 4. Where would you rate it in terms of funny intention, Unintentional comedy, aspects of the mysterious death of Jeffrey Epson?

[Jenna Friedman]

Look, I think anything can be funny. I think there's a way to make anything funny. So, you know, if you're funny, you can make it funny.

[Jason Concepcion]

You want to give it a two.

[Jenna Friedman]

I know you guys don't know. It's like you're.

[Jason Concepcion]

Again, you are the professional sinisterness. Is it a sinister story?

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah, of course. I mean, it's got everything.

[Jason Concepcion]

It does have everything. Tover release that statement. Jeffrey Epstein in prison. The. Noose we don't know where it is. Okay. Intrigue.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah. Four.

[Jason Concepcion]

Four. Okay. Danger.

[Jenna Friedman]

Well, it depends.

[Jason Concepcion]

Are you Toby Noel?

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah. Are you Tova Noel? Or that other guy, Michael something.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

Or Nick. Nick. The guy who was. Who?

[Jason Concepcion]

Oh, Nicholas Tartaglion.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah. Tartaglione or Tartaglione?

[Jason Concepcion]

Tartaglione. Well, I don't want to get it wrong. Nick.

[Jenna Friedman]

Well, you are. We don't want to get your name wrong.

[Jason Concepcion]

I don't want to get it wrong. Well, I would argue that it's unclear how much of this situation, the Epstein situation in general, is driving current chaos in the world.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

So I think it's pretty dangerous.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Even if you're not one of these people who intersects with this story.

[Jenna Friedman]

Right. So also, after the second batch of files dropped, I was like, why isn't anyone talking? Why isn't anyone talking? Then I realized someone did talk. Virginia Giuffre.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes.

[Jenna Friedman]

And I read her book, and it was interesting because it actually made me less conspiracy. Less conspiracy oriented. Because there was nothing about, like, jerky and eating babies and whatever in the book, but it just talked about, like, the way that they were trafficked to powerful men. And it wasn't, like, financial. Like, it wasn't as overtly financial. It was more just kind of like, this guy's here.

[Jason Concepcion]

He's here.

[Jenna Friedman]

You're here right now.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

Give him a massage the way that Epstein likes it. So it's, like, helpful for me to kind of understand. And then, you know, she. She left. She escaped, I think, around, like, 2001 ish. And then he, you know, there's been so much more. And all the Zorro ranch stuff is so sketchy, but which they never searched. Oh, this is also sketchy. I'm sorry. We could talk about this forever, but Don Huffine's wife.

[Jason Concepcion]

Oh, God.

[Jenna Friedman]

Which I didn't even realize. The people that bought Zora Ranch, his wife has, like, ties to Russia. Yeah. So that's confirmed.

[Jason Concepcion]

They're looking into that. But yes.

[Jenna Friedman]

Like, I read it from a journalist on Sub Sec, so I don't know.

[Jason Concepcion]

Danger.

[Jenna Friedman]

Journalist. Yeah, danger. I mean, two.

[Jason Concepcion]

Okay, two. So that gives us.

[Jenna Friedman]

That gives you off, like, 20 million times.

[Tyler Parker]

You're the guest, and you should. It's all good.

[Jason Concepcion]

That gives us a grand score of 18, which I think is a pretty high. It's legal in many states. Yikes.

[Jenna Friedman]

I'm glad I make. I got one laugh out of people over there.

[Jason Concepcion]

We're gonna go to the Doom scroll now, so.

[Tyler Parker]

Welcome to the Doom scroll. This is A thing where we take a look at some stories that have been in the news recently that have kind made us just raise our eyebrows a little bit. Stuff that we wanted to kind of keep tabs on. First things first. I'm not sure if you saw that Iran has a Pete Hegseth diss track or not.

[Jason Concepcion]

Have you seen that Iran made a AI generated diss track about. They've made several, but they didn't.

[Jenna Friedman]

Whoever's doing around social media is really on.

[Jason Concepcion]

No, no, no. They're winning. I mean, they're winning the war, I think, in general, but they're winning the information wars.

[Jenna Friedman]

The little Legos, trailers.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, let's.

[Jenna Friedman]

Tight. Oh, my God. Oh, my God, you're right there. Who's doing this? It feels like the Kremlin is, like, helping them. It feels like very, very technical people. Not to. Not to say that the Persians aren't technical, but I just feel like. I feel like the people do not like the. Like, I feel like the people do not like their. I mean, this has to be. This feels like it's from people who actually like their administration. I don't know, but.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, I think that there are probably, you know, very smart people within the. I mean, my question is, like, what AI platform is it. Is it Chinese? Is it deep seat? Did they use sora? Did they use some sort of deep Seek into SORA input? It's very questionable, but, yeah, I mean, it's well done.

[Tyler Parker]

The things that are covered in the song, the sexual assault allegations, the fact that Hegseth was removed from Bryden's 2021 inauguration when he was an Army National Guard member.

[Jenna Friedman]

Original song, do you think? Or is it like ChatGPT?

[Jason Concepcion]

No, no, no, it's ChatGPT. It's ChatGPT.

[Jenna Friedman]

Okay.

[Tyler Parker]

But yeah, makes fun of him for being racist, adulterous, alcoholic, bad tattoos, the whole shit.

[Jenna Friedman]

He has a comedian, and I'm just like, they're repl. Our jobs. That's all I'm thinking.

[Tyler Parker]

No, I'm with you.

[Jason Concepcion]

Other than. Other than the fact that he's purging the military of all women and black generals, why would you think that he's racist?

[Tyler Parker]

You're right. I should. Allegedly.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right, right. Okay.

[Tyler Parker]

That's a great point. Thank you for sticking up for him, Jay. Have you seen these Scientology speed runs? You know what this is? Kids nowadays, they've started this new trend on TikTok where they walk into a Scientology building and then just take off running and try to see how far they can get into the Building before they get stopped.

[Jason Concepcion]

Shall we? Here we go.

[Jenna Friedman]

Oh, that's clever. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Okay. It's, like, funny until it's.

[Tyler Parker]

Yes.

[Jenna Friedman]

Until it's like, weapon. You know what I mean? It's like.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's true.

[Jenna Friedman]

No, Sorry. Now I'm a mom, but I'm like, it's funny, but it's just like, what world are we living in?

[Jason Concepcion]

Okay. What else do you think?

[Tyler Parker]

The. The Mount Everest poison scam.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, the poison scam.

[Tyler Parker]

Okay, so the headline from the New York Post, hemi liars, Mount Everest guys allegedly poisoned, quote, climbers as part of a sinister $20 million scam. Allegedly, these guides up on Everest secretly laced tourists food to trigger costly helicopter rescues as part of a $20 million insurance scam.

[Jenna Friedman]

Oh.

[Tyler Parker]

Police in Nepal have charged 32 people, including Tour guides, helicopter operators, and hospital executives. Guys with the trucking agencies allegedly poisoned tourists by putting baking soda in their food to trigger pain that mimicked altitude sickness or food poisoning. And then they're obviously a lot more agreeable to be hellied out of there whenever they're feeling like something terrible is going wrong.

[Jason Concepcion]

Now, that is where I will say the earlier. It does seem in the.

[Jenna Friedman]

That just sounds like mother nature healing.

[Jason Concepcion]

I completely agree. But I will say that in the complaint, the first part of. Before the baking soda.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

It seems that what they were doing was encouraging anyone who is experiencing, because of the thin air, lightheadedness or, you know, symptoms congruent with altitude sickness to be like, well, you got to get helicopter off the mountain right now.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Which I think. Aren't they just being responsible? I don't know. These folks need a little money. Can we, like, up their pay also? Like, they're risking their lives. They're risking their lives.

[Jenna Friedman]

They're also, like, destroying Everest with all the foot traffic. It's crazy.

[Tyler Parker]

No. Anytime I see one of these guides, I do think, like, shouldn't these guys be bigger heroes?

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes, I think they should.

[Tyler Parker]

It's like the cameramen. Whenever these, like, you know, adventure shows are happening, it's like, these are the people that bring your own stuff in the big time.

[Jason Concepcion]

Carry your own stuff up there.

[Tyler Parker]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Like what?

[Jenna Friedman]

Go up there without people? Like, explorers didn't always have, like, porters with them. Like, carry your own stuff. Make your own food. This is part of. This is just called the tax that you have to pay.

[Tyler Parker]

I agree.

[Jenna Friedman]

You're gonna.

[Jason Concepcion]

You know, I. I support the Sherpas Anything else?

[Jenna Friedman]

I support the Sherpas working Sherpas. I do too.

[Tyler Parker]

Of Nepal sales. Do you want me to do the Waffle House update?

[Jason Concepcion]

Oh, wows. Update. That's right.

[Tyler Parker]

All right. Couple weeks, a couple weeks ago, I think maybe last week. Everything bleeds together and my mind is melting. But a couple weeks ago in the doom scroll, we covered Greg Phillips, which is this FEMA official who has now famously claimed that he once teleported to a Waffle House right in Rome, Georgia. The New York Times looked into the claims. The headline quote, no one at Waffle House remembers FEMA official who says he teleported in. So none of the two dozen employees or regulars they interviewed last week, no one even has a photo of him the the lead, which is great. Shastoni Burge has worked for a decade as a Waffle House server in Rome, Georgia, much of it on the night shift. She said she was once punched in the face by a customer. She saw someone overdose in the bathroom one night. A man took all the steak knives and threatened the staff with them. But she has never seen anyone teleport to the place.

[Jason Concepcion]

I will say, what if he teleported

[Jenna Friedman]

in the parking lot?

[Tyler Parker]

Really good call. Really good call.

[Jason Concepcion]

The headline was somewhat controversial online. Here's the headline.

[Jenna Friedman]

Oh, this is in the New York Times.

[Tyler Parker]

This was in the Times.

[Jenna Friedman]

Here's the story. This is in the New York Times.

[Jason Concepcion]

Here's the headline. No one at Waffle House remembers FEMA official who says he teleported in. And then the body of the story mentions that the reporter spoke to Sidney Perkowitz, emeritus professor of Physics at Emory University, just to I guess corroborate. Corroborate whether or not. Corroborate whether or not it's possible that a human being could teleport to anywhere, including a Waffle House and the professor just say no. So they've checked that claim and we

[Jenna Friedman]

should honestly just double check. Yeah, yeah. Well, that's what I do with everybody now. I just like if I go on a meeting, I just like, I'm like,

[Jason Concepcion]

I want to ask you this. What is your files research platform of choice?

[Jenna Friedman]

I mean, that's also probably why I'm flagged because I just go into the files directly. I've also I Also from the DOJ portal, JMail is a lot better. But I. Because I was so paranoid that I was going to misquote something or get something wrong, at least on my show. I don't know your show. I have no idea why I think

[Jason Concepcion]

it is important to Be accurate about it.

[Jenna Friedman]

There's a lot on my show, this show, I don't know what I said.

[Jason Concepcion]

You guys are much more.

[Jenna Friedman]

You have notes. I don't. I'm just talking.

[Jason Concepcion]

At least as a reporter. You guys are much more. You have like breaking news on your, on your episode.

[Jenna Friedman]

There was a friend of mine who was in the files and he was not in the File. Like, he just. It sucked for him. He did nothing wrong, but he just knew somebody and ended up in the files. And I wanted to get him to talk about. On the show and he was like, I want to talk about it.

[Jason Concepcion]

He should talk about it.

[Jenna Friedman]

My PR team will not let me even touch with a 10 foot pole.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's just one of those things if, if you're in the final.

[Jenna Friedman]

He's like, if it comes out more publicly, I'll talk about it. But until it does, I can't, like, bring it up.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, I think you gotta. It's a. I don't think I get it for the folks in there who were just mentioned tangentially, but you gotta take your lunch.

[Jenna Friedman]

I mean, people are like. People want accountability and justice and so, you know, it' what happens. Like, you know, people are thirsty for it, so.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, Jenna, come back sometime, please.

[Jenna Friedman]

Oh, anytime.

[Jason Concepcion]

We'll get dark again.

[Jenna Friedman]

Did we get dark? I thought that was pretty.

[Tyler Parker]

I think we kept it, you know,

[Jason Concepcion]

we kept it pretty light.

[Jenna Friedman]

I think it'd be pretty lightly cloudy. I think partly as long as, and I say this, but like, you know, who knows what's gonna happen? But as long as we are able to talk about this stuff, I do feel like there's something, you know, worth saving our democracy. Like the fact that we can actually. Or maybe we're all just like beards for fascism. Like, maybe like no one listens to them anyway. We're just gonna let them like, blah,

[Jason Concepcion]

blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, to your point, I do think it is important to keep it in the public conversation.

[Jenna Friedman]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Because there are living victims, like, who need justice.

[Jenna Friedman]

There are living victims and survivors who need justice. And I also, I mean, that was like, I hate to. Okay, so this is gonna maybe beat me, be me trying to end on a positive note. I did feel energized with the second batch of files being released because I'm like, now we have something to go off of.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right?

[Jenna Friedman]

Pam Bondi said that they were done and now she's out of a job. You know what I mean? We're. We're. It's. You just have to keep. This is the one issue that is bipartisan, that Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Libertarians.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, two of them. Yeah. Massey and Wonderful. Reaching across the aisle. Everybody else is kind of.

[Jenna Friedman]

But I. But I'm not talking about politicians. I'm talking about people. I mean, Americans.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes, you're right.

[Jenna Friedman]

I thought it would be ice, like, but it was. It's not ice. I don't know how. It's not ice. It's not like children in detention centers. I thought it would be that. I can't believe. It's not that, but it's this. This is the one thing that, like, all Americans can agree on. Epstein didn't kill himself, and we need justice for the perpetrator, allegedly the perpetrators. So it felt like energizing that there was so much information that was so indicting, even though maybe not prosecutable, but we're figuring it out. But, I mean, you're seeing. I do believe that it's like, you know, it has receded, but I don't think the war with Iran has, like, fully stopped people from talking and thinking about this. I think hopefully, if we can get the House and Senate back in the midterms, we can start.

[Jason Concepcion]

They're on vacation right now.

[Jenna Friedman]

I know, right? I know.

[Jason Concepcion]

Nothing going on, so they just need a. I need some rest. Yeah.

[Jenna Friedman]

It did make me feel less fatalistic, just being like, now we have a thing that we can talk to our crazy uncles about.

[Sponsor Voice]

Right.

[Jenna Friedman]

Or try to, you know, like, we all want people who abuse and victimize people to be held accountable.

[Jason Concepcion]

Jenna, thanks for coming on.

[Jenna Friedman]

Thanks for having me. Do you like how I mugged to that.

[Tyler Parker]

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[Jason Concepcion]

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