This Trump fixer is not the man to reveal the Epstein truth

Donald Trump is not messing around with this Jeffrey Epstein thing.

Cornered like a rat between needing to appease his base by doing something about those smirking photos of him with the sex-offender — but not at all comfortable with something spiraling out of control — Trump has summoned his mob muscle memory to split the difference.

Just send a nice man to pay a little visit to Ghislaine Maxwell in prison. You know, just to chat her up about her plans to discuss what she may or may not know about her late boyfriend Epstein’s illicit activities that may or not have involved facilitating those illicit activities with famous people.

No one in particular. Just an emphasis, perhaps, on what Maxwell may not know. But with no any specific famous person in mind.

Sounds innocent enough to me.

The visitor apparently will be Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, certainly an appropriate representative of the Department of Justice. And Blanche’s independence should hardly be questioned just because of Trump’s long-established history of insisting that the DOJ serve as his personal law firm.

It is true that “Blanche represented Trump in both the 2020 election interference case in Washington and the Florida case accusing the former president of hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate,” as the Associated Press reported, adding: "In both cases, the defense team successfully mounted a legal strategy focused heavily on delaying the cases until after the election.”

And, of course, Blanche was part of Trump’s team in that annoying New York prosecution for which the former president was found guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in an effort to influence the 2016 by disguising hush-money payments to porn-star Stormy Daniels as legal fees. That now-moot verdict is under appeal.

So, Blanche is clearly an honest broker here, just as he was in representing Trump ally Paul Manafort against some Russia hoax thing. And if you’re looking for a common denominator here, it is this: Mr. Blanche is one very competent lawyer known for his formidable and aggressive cross-examination style.

And ultimately good outcomes for his clients.

Against that backdrop, came this tweet today from Blanche, which only cynics might view as a just a little bit wide of the strike zone in the candor department.

“Justice demands courage. For the first time, the Department of Justice is reaching out to Ghislaine Maxwell to ask: what do you know?”

Well, of course justice demands that. And what better unbiased source than Trump’s lawyer to assure the world, “No one is above the law — and no lead is off-limits.”

Even by Trump’s standards, that does seem just a bit audacious on its face. But what do I know? It’s not like I’ve ever had first-hand dealings with Blanche.

Perhaps it might be better if someone more authoritative weighed in. Maybe like Lev Parnas.

In a piece published on Tuesday on his Substack, Lev Remembers, Parnas writes:

“But almost none of these pundits know Todd Blanche like I do. I want to take you back and remind you: Todd Blanche was originally Paul Manafort’s attorney. Later, he was supposed to be on my legal team. But when I made the decision to stop protecting Trump’s criminal operation and started telling the truth, Blanche quickly became my adversary. He stayed on to represent my co-defendant, Igor Fruman, and worked against me at every turn.”

We don’t know exactly what Trump’s fixer plans to say to Ghislaine Maxwell. But we do know she’s serving a 20-year sentence for sex trafficking and conspiracy. We do know she shared a criminal enterprise — and a silence pact — with Epstein that conveniently kept many powerful names off the record.

And we do know she’s at least an acquaintance of Donald Trump, who was apparently at least an acquaintance of Jeffery Epstein. Although, Trump’s defenders can point out that, four years after Epstein’s death in prison, Trump retroactively banned him from Mar-a-Lago, maybe.

So what should we expect to come from Mr. Blanche’s nice visit to Ms. Maxwell?

Give me a break.