FLOTUS Gets SLAPPED - A Conversation With Michael Wolff

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This is Michael Cohen and you're listening to the one and only mayor called the podcast.

Available everywhere that you get your podcasts. Now know this. There's a familiar rhythm to how

power protects itself in America. I've seen it up close. I've lived inside it and at one point

I helped perpetuate it. You see it begins with access morphs into influence and it ultimately

calcifies into a system where truth becomes negotiable and accountability is treated like a nuisance.

And when that system is threatened when someone dares to pull at a loose thread, the response

is swift, it's aggressive, and it's almost always legal. That's where this latest saga involving

Michael Wolfe, Melania Trump, and the lingering shadow of Jeffrey Epstein becomes more than just

another headline. It becomes a case study in how power reacts when it feels exposed.

My friends, let's not get ourselves litigation, especially at this level. It's rarely just about

the letter of the law. It's also about leverage. It's about intimidation. It's about sending a

message not just to the person being targeted, but to anyone else watching from the sidelines

who might be tempted to speak. You see, I know this playbook because I helped execute it.

Season to cis letters weren't just legal tools. They were weapons. And the goal? The goal wasn't always

to win in court. It was to make the fight so painful, so expensive, so drawn out that the other

side simply gave up. So when Michael Wolfe preemptively files under New York's anti-slap statute,

he's not just defending himself, he's flipping the script. Anti-slap laws for those unfamiliar

are designed to protect individuals from frivolous lawsuits that are meant to to silence free speech.

It's actually known as a strategic lawsuit against public participation, which is a

marvelous lawsuit that is filed by individuals or corporations to silence critics, activists,

or journalists by intimidating them with high legal costs and time consuming litigation.

These suits target free speech on public issues with common claims including defamation,

libel, or slander. In other words, they exist precisely for moments like this, but invoking them

against a former first lady? I mean, that's not just a legal maneuver. That is a declaration

of war against the machinery of intimidation. And here's where it gets uncomfortable for a lot of

people. The intersection of journalism access to truth, Wolfe spent extensive time with Epstein,

arguably more than most anybody ever. I mean, that proximity is both his strength and his vulnerability,

because in a world where proximity to power often comes at the cost of independence,

the question becomes, what do you do with what you know? You see, Epstein, by all accounts,

was a master manipulator, someone who trafficked not just in exploitation, but in information.

He understood that knowledge, especially about powerful people, was currency.

And if there's one thing that I learned during my years with Trump,

it's that proximity to people like Epstein was never accidental. It was transactional. And that,

that's why the idea of depositions in this case is so significant. Because deposition

strip away at the theater. I mean, there are no press secretaries, no carefully crafted statements,

no strategic leaks. Just questions, answers, and the uncomfortable weight of an oath.

And if Wolfe succeeds in compelling testimony from both Melania and Donald, it won't just be a

legal victory. It will be a rare moment where narrative collides with accountability. But let

me be crystal clear about something. It may now work in the favor that you're thinking.

It may not demonstrate that Trump had any information or any to think to do with any of these young

children. But something also that we must address, and that of course is the elephant in the room.

It's all about motive. You see, critics have also suggested that this by Michael Wolfe is all

a ploy. It's a mechanism to generate attention, maybe even some fundraising dollars.

And while skepticism is healthy, necessary even, we shouldn't lose sight of the broader issue,

because even if there are secondary motivations at play, that doesn't negate the central question.

And that is our powerful individuals using the legal system to suppress scrutiny. Again,

we don't know because the documents are not released. Now, the media ecosystem

it only complicates better further. Figures like Tara Paul Mary, who insert themselves into the

narrative is the so-called Epstein whispers. They muddy the waters. They don't just money. They

make it filthy. Because in today's attention economy, proximity to scandal can be just as valuable

as proximity to truth. The result is a fragmented narrative with fact speculation and self-promotion

coexist in a kind of chaotic equilibrium. And that chaos, that chaos, it serves one group particularly

well. The powerful. Because the more confused the public becomes, the easier it is to dismiss

everything else's noise. But what makes this moment right now different? What makes it worth

paying attention to? It's the convergence of forces. A journalist willing to litigate

a legal framework designed to protect speech, a public increasingly skeptical of institutions,

and looming over it all. The unresolved legacy of Jeffrey Epstein, a man whose influence extended far

beyond what we've been allowed to fully understand. You see, this isn't just about one lawsuit.

No, it's about whether the systems designed to protect speech and expose truth that can actually

function when tested by those who have spent decades mastering the art of evasion.

Because if there's one thing I know for certain, it's this. The truth doesn't just come out on

its own. Oh no, it has to be dragged into the light, kicking, screaming, and usually at great

personal cost to the person doing the dragging. I know, I know because Tara Palmerry and others

did it to me. Which brings me of course to my guest today. I'm talking about Michael Wolfe,

who is no stranger to controversy or proximity to power. Mike's a best-selling author and a journalist.

He's perhaps best known for his deep reporting on the Trump White House, including his explosive

book called Fire and Fury. But long before that, Wolfe embedded himself into the worlds of media,

politics, and influence, spaces where accesses everything and truth, it's often negotiable.

Most notably, Mike spent extensive time with Jeffrey Epstein while working on a biography that

was never completed, giving him a rare insight into one of the most secretive and disturbing figures

of our time. And now, Mike finds himself at the center of a legal battle with former First Lady.

And now, Mike finds himself at the center of a legal battle with the First Lady,

Melania Trump, invoking empty slap protections in a case that could have far-reaching

implications for journalism, for free speech, and for the limits of power. So let's go now to

that conversation. Michael, well, great to see you as always interesting bumping into you on the

street, which is what brought this together. Good to have you back here on May, a culpa, my friend.

Lots to talk about. Yes, in our old neighborhood, the old, uh,

yes. Our old stomping ground is right. So Mike, let's start at the beginning.

You spent years documenting the Trump orbit and hundreds, maybe thousands of hours

with Jeffrey Epstein himself. And now, right now, you're in litigation against the First Lady,

Melania Trump. Jason, you make it really sound like I'm in the soup here. Yeah, there you go.

So how did this unusual path from chronicler to litigant land you here? And what does it reveal

about power, secrecy, and accountability in this Trump universe? Well, these are, these are big

questions. And I don't exactly know the answer. I would say I wandered into this. I mean, this,

this started by pure happenstance when Trump was running for president in 2016.

You know, I happen to have done an interview with him on the campaign trail. And he liked the

interview, actually, to be honest, I don't think he read the interview, but he liked the cover,

his picture on the cover of the magazine. So we got a no great cover. So did he read it or not?

I don't know, but he was under the impression that he liked this, the piece that I had written

about him. And then I had had a little relationship with Steve Bannon. And suddenly, this sort of

all kind of rolled forward. And Trump was elected president. And I actually wrote a little note

to Bannon. And he said, you know, go stop by Trump's tower at any time. So I said, okay. And I

went up to see Steve. And we got to talking. And I have always liked Steve for all that Steve is

and let me acknowledge. I am perfectly clear-eyed about Steve, but I find Steve smart duplicitous,

yes, but funny, certainly interesting, insightful, interesting. And at the same time, I mean,

of course, Steve Bannon is singularly, perhaps even more than Donald Trump, the biggest opportunist

I have ever met. But having said all that, I still, we get along. And I like spending time

with him. And so I was up at Trump Tower and we were talking. And then I said to him, this was

basically off the cuff. I said, why don't I come into the White House in the first six months and

write about it? And he said, well, you have to ask the boss. So let's go up and ask him. And we went

up in Trump Tower to Trump's office. And I kind of made a brief pitch. And then Trump said,

I mean, he, Trump's in confused. And he thought, because I said, let me come in as an observer.

And then it seemed likely that he thought I was asking for a job, deputy assistant observer.

I don't, I don't know. But I said, no, you know, I want to write a book. And he was like, you

could just see the interest go out of his eyes. And he said, sure, sure. And then we, Steve and I

left the office and Steve said, well, that's not a no. And from there, literally, I think on the

21st of January, so the day after they arrived at the White House, there was, I was there at their

doorstep and basically spent a good part of the next seven months, kind of wandering around with

a certain kind of carte blanche. And then I wrote this book, Fire and Fury, which was this

first book about the administration and got a lot of attention. And then there were three

subsequent books after that. And during, during a time period, really, in which I was able to

maintain a lot of relationships in the Trump circle. And that seems odd because these were,

I guess, one would say pretty negative books. But I think also many people in the Trump circle

have have a very ambivalent view of Donald Trump. And I mean, or let me say a clear-eyed view

of Donald Trump. And, and, and I think that they found that my portrait of that often

comported with their own. And then during this time of, you know, in Trump, when my first book

came out, Trump threatened to sue me and the publishers ignored him. And then, and then after

the second book came out, or maybe slightly before, he, he invited me to have dinner with him

in Melania and Mar-a-Lago. Who knew? You couldn't tell if you were Trump's friend or his, or his

enemy. So this went on and then this rolled into the second administration. And once more,

there was, and, and there is the, so, so simultaneously with writing about Trump, I'm also, I've,

I've also done a considerable amount of writing about Jeffrey Epstein. And, and early, I guess in the,

in the fall that collided with remarks that I had made about Melania Trump's relationship to

Donald Trump and to Jeffrey Epstein, that got a threat. Well, before we get there, before we get

there, because I, I want you to actually walk us through that spark, right? Was it as you were going

to say now, a cease and desist letter on the lawsuit? It actually was not a cease and desist letter.

It was the under, under the Florida law that they were, that they were talking about. It was

commencing the action. In other words, if I didn't do what they wanted to do within X number of

days, which the law demands that you give the, give the, the defendant that much, that much time,

then the lawsuit would be started. So it wasn't cease and desist. It was literally under, and I,

I don't have the, the, the technical law at my fingertips as my lawyers do. But, but it was the

commencement of a litigation. So, and the threat was for a billion dollars, and this was the

itemized issues that, that they objected to. And in, in all, in, in all respects, they were doing

what the law demanded in order to start this litigation. So got it. At that point, I got this,

and I thought, okay, what are we going to do about, about, about this? And I have, I have very good

first amendment lawyers who I've worked with for, you know, 25 years. And I, I called them and said,

hey guys, and they're good, I mean, really good lawyers. And, and one of my lawyers, David Korseneck

said, I said, well, you know, this is, we can turn around and sue them. There are laws in the

state of New York against using the law as a way to intimidate perfectly legal and reasonable

speech. And so that's what those are the laws that we sued under anti-slap laws.

Right. So let me bring that to my listeners as well. It's the under the New York anti-slap

statute. Slap is an acronym for a strategic lawsuit against public policy. And what it does

is it is an action brought by the person, meaning the defendant or the potential defendant for

the sole purpose of inhibiting, it's a merit list lawsuit that is designed, right?

Exactly. To prevent merit list lawsuits and against, again, public policy, which is the

violation of the first amendment freedom of speech. The question that I actually want to ask you

was there's something deeper going on? Was this, in your opinion, a pattern of intimidation

that you had recognized before? Have you ever received this type of a, of a letter or a lawsuit

in intimidation lawsuit? Yeah. Well, I have only in terms of the of the threats that I've gotten

from the Trumps. So in a long, long, too long career, I have never gotten such a threat from anyone

else, from the hundreds, probably thousands of people I have written about, never, never once.

Certainly, after my first book came out, a letter came from the from the president's lawyers.

And my publishers at the time said, you know, fuck off, basically. And we never heard from them again.

So that was literally just an effort to intimidate, which they didn't follow up on.

Then since then, they have gone after, and especially in the second term,

of media organizations, after media organizations and reporter after reporter,

getting these, these letters. And they actually all come from, from a firm in Florida.

Just the other day, a fairly well-known podcaster got a similar letter from this guy,

this person got in touch with me. This person has asked not to be public about this yet,

because the person has not decided on the legal strategy. But this, you know, almost a verbatim

letter to the one that I got. So this is what the administration is doing, which has never,

ever in the history of the American presidency happened, that the office of the presidency

is used as a leverage to threaten the press. So the suit that I've brought is the antidote to

this, you know, in a way. I mean, this is what this is about. I don't make any money off of this,

this lawsuit. That's never been the point. The point, the point is to say, hey, you can't do this,

stop. And the threat now to them is because I am suing them, I get, I have subpoena power.

I can get, at some point, they, Melania Trump and Donald Trump will be forced to sit for a

deposition. And that's the moment in which everything about their relationship with Jeffrey

Epstein becomes fair game. Yeah. So clearly in that letter, the intent of the lawyer Melania's team

was to demand an apology, I suspect, and retractions over your statements that link her.

Exactly. To Jeffrey Epstein. Right. So Michael, from your perspective,

and just let me, let me add that, that the things that I have said, I said about her were actually

kind of mild. I mean, the things that I said were where she was connected to Jeffrey Epstein's

social circle. Well, we've all seen pictures of them in the social circle. This is not, this is

like a no-brainer. This obviously happened. And then there is, I had quoted Jeffrey Epstein as saying

that Melania Trump and Donald Trump first had sex on Jeffrey Epstein's plane. Well, first thing,

it's not liable is to say that someone had sex, especially two unmarried people.

For one thing, for another thing, this is a direct quote from Jeffrey Epstein.

It brings me to the point I was trying to make. From your perspective, what would you say is

legitimately defamation versus what is rigorous journalistic reporting that the public has a right

or an interest to know? Well, defamation is an issue of very specific law. It's not really an

issue of what my opinion of defamation is. I mean, people are often writing negative things about

me, and I'm always saying, oh my god, I've been defamed, but that's not true. And I certainly

haven't sued them. And we're in the United States of America, and we as journalists, we as

writers, we as citizens have the right to basically malign almost anybody we want to malign. And

that is the nature of a free press. And it's quite bothersome, I would say, to the people being maligned.

But it seldom comes to the point of defamation, which is a very, very specific, is defined very

specifically under the law in a whole series of court cases. It's also much more difficult if

you're a public person. You know, it's interesting because the defamation laws are not equal

from public versus private individuals. Public individual, you have to show a much higher standard

of how that they have been damaged. It's so unfair. But, you know, I could understand where

Melania would be upset about a statement like that. You know, basically criticizing her or questioning

her chastity. So to say that she was part of a my club or something like that, which is predicated

or from a dead guy. Well, yeah, I mean, number one, I mean, anything that is true is not

defamatory. Amen to that. So, you know, is that, is that, so there's a, there's a whole set of

complicated questions, questions there. Is it, and saying someone has had sex with someone else

is not defamatory? It's just not a great agree. You know, the way that you defeat a defamation claim

is through veracity, right? It's through truth, which sort of brings me to this whole thing,

because when you and I were sitting and talking on the street, I was asking you about, for example,

Tarapal Mary, Lev Parnas, this guy, Zev Shlev, Dean Blondell, L Leonard, and the whole group

of other far left wing activists in their own minds. They call themselves by influencers,

whether it's on whatever platform that they're on. They went and they make all of these statements.

Michael Cohen claims he knows nothing about Donald Trump's relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.

We now have the official government documents that prove he was lying to everyone. In fact,

they go ahead and they post the following, which is Cohen also tried to separate the Katie Johnson

rape allegation into two different cases on PDB. That's the Patrick Bitt David podcast.

Claiming he only handled the Jane Doe complaint, but his own timeline collapsed. He described

sending private investigators to the accuser's address calling it a vacant parking lot.

Shlev pulled up the actual location. It's a house. The lawyer Cohen contacted turned out to be

the same lawyer connected to Katie Johnson. His own words confirmed what investigators have been saying.

It was the same case all along, but here's the interesting part. The lawyer himself in a document

in a text message to me claims, I never dealt with an attorney named Michael Cohen, and then he

says, you are conflating to entirely different Jane Doe cases, meaning they're completely wrong,

and this has caused me, and I know that Tarapal Mary and Levin others have caused you a similar

sort of angst. Yes, they really haven't. I mean, I'm aware of these people. I'm

hardly aware of them, but there is, I don't know what they seem to me. They're conspiracy buffs.

The world is filled with crime buffs, conspiracy buffs. I don't know what they get out of this,

and I don't know why they get subscribers and money.

Well, I suppose. They're trying to claw out a living in this desperately difficult business.

So I think that's, and this probably, and there is a coterie, I think, of people who are interested

in these kinds of conspiracies, and everything piled onto everything, and everything conflated.

It's a somewhat of a fantasy world, and I think that they live in that, but that doesn't affect

me very much. You get comments, but the nice thing about Substack is it's an easy block.

I don't know, and that's also one of the things about defamation and libel from a writer's point

of view is that, and I've said this to many people who have been annoyed about what I've written

about them. I say, don't read it. So I can't take these people, conspiracy buffs who have always been

around. It's always been a subculture. It's more than that, Mike. I hate to say it's more than that.

So would you agree, if I said that as a writer, a chronicler, as a biographer, that you probably

spent more one-on-one time with Jeffrey Epstein than anybody else out there?

Oh, without question. Okay, so that's a true, that's a true statement, correct?

Absolutely, yes. Okay, how is it then possible that someone, like a tarot Paul Mary,

manages to figure out how to claw her way into a scenario where she becomes the Epstein whisper?

I mean, I see this. I see her on MS now. I see her on podcasts. I see her all over the place,

as if she has any specific information regarding Jeffrey Epstein and anyone other than what is

readily available, either through the document dumps or her own conspiratorial belief.

Well, I think, yeah, I mean, the whole media world is in a state of existential confusion

because the audiences are collapsing. Nobody trusts it. I mean, you know, and that she and not

just her, but a whole range of people would be examples of this. Anybody can go on television.

Anybody who is fits whatever, whatever category and whatever view MSNBC, which is not

called MSNBC anymore, it's called something else. I hardly am aware that it exists,

nor is most people aware that it exists anymore. They'll take anybody. It doesn't make any difference.

And I don't know. You could say the world is upside down, which surely is, but this is the nature of

the nature of the media at this moment in time, the nature of the discussion. One of the things

about the Jeffrey Epstein discussion is that it's a discussion carried on only by people

who don't know the story. So anyone who has had firsthand contact with the story doesn't want

to talk about it because that gets them in trouble. So we're left with a story that is being

narrated by people who don't know it. So that's just the, I mean, I think over time that will change

and eventually people, you know, we're in a moment of hysteria about this story and a moment

of enormous opportunism. And anybody who kind of can latch onto this story or claims that they

have some purchase on this story becomes an expert. Everybody's a self-declared expert. And

there's so much conflicting information, so much information, which has not been generally

digested so much. And since there is no other expert on this, everybody can

and everybody can move forward without fear of contradiction and get on MSNBC or whatever it's

called now. So Michael, you're seeking debt positions from both Malania as well as Donald.

Yes, we have not yet, they have not yet been subpoenaed. You know, one of the things as I'm sure,

I'm sure you know, I mean, it's extraordinary. You know, I went through, by the way, you know,

I went through this. I was $400 million. You got this is important design.

I have done through this personally, and you're also a lawyer. So you've seen this, but the way that

this, the slowness of how this, this, this moves. And just to give a thing, because a lot of people,

you know, a lot of people keep asking, I keep saying, but people don't hear all of this. This

lawsuit now is the, the first lady has moved this into federal court in New York, as is her

right. And she has asked the, the federal court to do two things either or to dismiss the lawsuit

or to have it move to Florida, which would be an easier venue for her. In turn, we have

obviously defended the lawsuit, but also asked for it to be remanded to state court. And our

position is that Melania Trump lives in New York City. She doesn't live in Florida. Therefore,

therefore, it should not be in federal court, because it is two, two residents of the state of

New York, who are in this, in this dispute. And we've offered the court all kinds of evidence to

show that she is, in fact, a citizen of New York. She may vote in Florida, but that doesn't make her

a citizen of, of Florida, all of her activities, her relationships, her family, and the time she

spends is in New York. So that's where the lawsuit is right now. We are waiting for the decision

from the federal judge, which happens to be a Trump appointed judge. So we're kind of waiting to

see what the effect of this thing. What do you actually hope to uncover under oath? Something that

you're, let's say you're reporting could not reveal. Well, I think you're looking to uncover.

Well, I don't, on a very specific basis, we on a specific, we are only looking to show that the

things that we have said are true and not defamatory. So, but beyond that, we will be in a position

to explore the entirety of the relationship of Donald, Melania, and Trump, and Jeffrey Epstein,

which will, of course, be of enormous interest to, well, the world, I suppose.

Well, I imagine, you know, the goal would be to elicit something salacious, right?

In regard to the relationship. Well, you know, I'm an I have always, yes, salacious. I have always,

always felt that the, that what is at issue here is the close relationship. These two men had for

a period of time beginning in the late 80s and probably going to 2004. You know, they were,

they shared girlfriends, at least, at least one woman that I know of, which was actually shared.

They certainly pursued women together. They had various business dealings together.

They were, I have often said, and I think it's true, they were very, very much the same person.

They had the same interests. And I asked you a quick question. The woman that you're saying that

they shared when they dated this woman without releasing anybody's name was not a child,

was an adult. No, no, it wasn't an adult. Yes. Okay. Yeah, I'm just. And the reason why I bring that up

is as a result of tarot palm airy and the rest of them, you know, I have been labeled by so many

whether it's on sub-stack and elsewhere as a pedo protector. I know there's this kind of whole

new language that has developed in the social media street. Yes. You're complicit. You think,

what is, what does that possibly even mean? Anyway, this is, you know, again, a subset of people

who have developed this little world in which they occupy and in which people are interested,

you know, I guess enough people are interested in joining them to produce enough revenue,

although I doubt if it's all that much, to keep them going. Yeah. So again, like, I know that when

Trump sued me for the $500 million. And I did not the same as you. I didn't file because it was

filed in the Southern District of Miami, Florida. I filed an immediate demand for depositions in

lieu of an answer. And Trump, of course, did not want to sit across from me at a table asking

questions. But I know the questions that I would have put forth. Is there any one specific question

that you would hone in on with your lawyers? If in fact, you're successful? I suppose. I mean,

we really haven't gotten to that to that point to outlining what what the deposition strategy

would be. But I'm sure if it gets to that point, we will obviously have a have a strategy.

But judging by the way, this is the slow pace of this is that we have a lot of time to develop

such a strategy. But according to our previous conversations, because this is not your first time,

thank God on me, a cope. And I hope it's not going to be your last. You would tell me that Jeffrey

Epstein during your many, many, many hours of conversation with him spoke quite a bit about

Trump and Melania. Yeah, I mean, Epstein was obsessed with Trump hated Trump feared Trump.

I suppose probably was envious of Trump. You know, they had been best friends for a very long time

and then they stopped being best friends. And that's that's that that always for everyone leaves

to say the least a residue of bad feelings and and Epstein felt that Trump had a very specific

hand in in all of the all of his all of his legal problems that began to happen after 2004. So

so I mean, I mean, clearly a fraught relationship and interesting relationship,

I think what you're very revealing relationship. Right. But I think what you're basically revealing

there is that Jeffrey believed that Trump was the one who turned Jeffrey into the authorities.

He did after after they had some major disagreement over a real estate deal if I'm not mistaken.

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Precisely. Yeah. So that is obviously, obviously, a, a, you know, a key

question, you know, did Trump know what was going on at Jeffrey Epstein's house? How long and for

how long had he known it? Well, additionally, were you an informant to the FBI in regard to Jeffrey

Epstein and his and his pedophilia ring? Yes. I mean, I mean, these are types of questions that I

could certainly imagine asking at a deposition. But you know, the part that again,

anything to sort of knock you down because I mean, I'm living, I'm living proof of all of this by

this group. And I know there are plenty that come at you as well. There are critics that are claiming

that your entire lawsuit is actually nothing but a fundraising ploy as well as a ploy within which

to elevate yourself as a journalist, as a chronicler, as pointing, right? And what they do is then

they point to this GoFundMe campaign where there was a significant amount of money that has been

raised. How, how do you respond to the suggestion that this is financially motivated rather than a

fight to preserve truth and transparency? Well, I don't get anything from this money. The money

doesn't actually go to me. It goes directly to the law firm. I have never seen a cent of this

money. We'll never see a cent of this of this of this money. It goes specifically to the law firm

who draws down what from a, you know, from a billing cycle to a billing cycle draws down the money.

And that's it. It allows, it's only purpose is to allow this lawsuit to go forward. And, you know,

and it has been, this money has been raised by, you know, a tens of thousands in individual donors

who have found reason to believe that this is, that this is a pretty good or at least a

cogent act of resistance to these terrible people. So I, I don't know what these other people

are talking about. I mean, again, they live in a, they seem to live in a fantasy world. I'm a writer,

you know, I'm, I do what I do what I have to do to be able to get access to the subjects and to

the information that I write about. And, um, and the idea that this is about, about bringing

attention to myself, I mean, this is like one of those circular things. Yeah, I write books and

they bring attention to me, I suppose. Um, and I guess that's good because that allows me to

write other books. Um, but the, um, but the central act here is writing the books. So, so, uh, read

them if they're, if they're, uh, helpful to you, if they explain things to you, if they're

illuminating, great. I've accomplished something. If they haven't, we'll put the book down and, and,

um, like, like, like we all do. I mean, that's, that's, that's, that's it. You know, these people,

I mean, this group that you're talking to, yeah, I mean, they seem, I mean, they kind of have this,

this malice thing, any deviation, and then you're, they want to send you to hell. Um,

um, again, they, they don't really affect, affect me. Um, um, you know, if they've had an effect on,

I knew that's true. That's what they have. I mean, they ruin my relationship with Midas,

they ruin my relationship with other people. Um, you know, they, you know, it's a, yeah, no,

that's a, that's a bad thing. And, you know, and, you know, them, I know the Midas people a little

bit and, um, you know, they want, they've variously solicited me. I found them incredibly disorganized to

deal with, um, but they seem like nice guys, but they also, they also seem like they are in,

their politicians, they want to be in politics. Um, um, I don't want to be in politics. I don't have

in agenda. These other, these conspiracy buffs, they too seem to have an agenda and want to be

something. They want to be in the Epstein business. They want to be Epstein prosecutors,

I suppose. They want to be, they also want to be an in, in politics. It's all a political,

it all is to political advantage, which is fine. I mean, others, uh, that is fine, but let's

recognize the difference between that and what actual journalists do or what writers do.

Yeah. So Michael, let me then ask you this, because hypothetically, something's going to happen,

right? So eventually, let's say you're successful in getting whether it's Malania and or Donald

to the deposition table. Yeah. And when you ask a specific question, you ask me to add something

there, because I think it's important for people to, uh, to understand that the Trumps have

gotten themselves into quite a pickle here, because it's not like those, the other lawsuits,

which, which if they stop going well, or if it looks like they're going to be have to, have to

testify, they just drop or walk away from, they can't walk away from my lawsuit, because I'm

the one suing them. So, so they're, um, you know, I, as somebody in the White House, you know,

I'm, I still actually speak to a number of people in the White House. And when this happened,

this person said, well, nobody here saw that coming. So they're in, they're in a bind here that,

yeah, if it's lawsuit progresses, they will have to testify. Sure. So now you have them one or both

at the deposition table. And you ask a specific question. And the response, let's say hypothetically,

did you ever engage in sexual activities and talking to Malanya with Donald or anyone on

Jeffrey Epstein's aircraft known as the Lolita Express? And she says no. She says no.

No. Do you have information that would contradict that statement, because that goes directly to the

question I was asking you before, you know, what do you hope to uncover?

No, no. I mean, of course, and obviously as I say, I have, I have Epstein on tape talking

about that. But I think it's you, you would, you would triangulate that with flight logs, dates,

who was, who was where, who was, who else was on that flight. You know, to subpoena, it's not just

to subpoena them. It was, we have the power. This lawsuit extends the power to subpoena anyone who

has relevant information. So the, the, and anyone who, who would have been on that flight,

anyone who would have known Malanya at that time, you know, I think that you have a very good chance

given that power to triangulate this in such a way as to actually kind of come up with something

pretty close to the truth. So let me ask you then. So let's talk Epstein for a second, because

as you said, you have tons of recordings and interviews with him. What did you find credible

about his self-described relationship with the Trumps? And what do you believe was clearly rumor?

And how do you separate fact from, I guess, performance?

Well, I found him. Remember, I've spoken to a lot of people about, about the Trumps. I mean,

I have spent a lot of time thinking about who Donald Trump is, how he operates what's in his head.

And just let me say that I have a, do a three times a week podcast called Inside Trump's Head.

And Epstein, I would say to me, the two people who have been consistently the most insightful

and clear-eyed and knowledgeable about Donald Trump and Donald Trump's way of thinking and Donald

Trump's behavior and actually even then being able to predict what Donald Trump would do before

he did it, were Jeffrey Epstein and Steve Bannon. And in fact, Jeffrey Epstein and Steve Bannon

got together and they first met in the fall of 2017 and they instantly became fast friends

bonding over their mutual knowledge of and insight into and experience with Donald Trump.

It's interesting because Steve Bannon didn't really enter into the orbit until

it's either late August 2016. Yeah, August 2016.

Yeah, he takes over the campaign in August 2016.

And absolutely. Because prior to that, he did not know Donald at all.

No, well actually, I can go further than that. Prior to that,

almost, there was hardly anybody in the White House who knew Donald Trump at all.

It was for, on the part of almost everybody, a complete day one blank page learning experience.

But Steve, nevertheless, as I say, I've always found Steve to be smart and insightful.

And I think that he got to know Donald Trump very, very quickly. It was certainly an intense experience.

And again, and this is against other people, the legions of other people I have spoken to

about Trump that I would go back. And I would say, yep, if you want to understand,

Trump, Steve Bannon is certainly a good person to go to. I mean, there were others,

for in the early days of the White House, I remember everybody referred to Sam Nunberg.

You remember him as the Trump whisperer. And Sam, for a period, was certainly a very astute

about Donald Trump. So I was, to be fair, Sam was never really part of the White House team.

He was absolutely. And he was forced out early on. But there are certain people, you know,

it's, it's, there are certain people who are good at understanding other people. There are

certain people who are good at understanding other people and then are able to express that

understanding. And, and among those people, I would say about Donald Trump, we're Steve Bannon,

Jeffrey Epstein, and for a time, very, very much Sam Nunberg. I mean, I, I suspect, I suspect you

are in that position too. And, um, more so than I, yeah, and I regret, and what time would Trump

than anyone? I regret not speaking to you for the first, for the first book. And I can't say

why I, I didn't accept, you know, in the vagaries of journalism, it's always, always after you have

written it, you say, why didn't I speak to? So you probably didn't think that I would speak to you.

It's probably the reason why you walked away from it, you know, just thinking. Yeah, no,

I mean, there were a bunch of, well, let me not say who I, who I spoke to or tried to speak to,

but in that coterie of lawyers around Trump before he came into the, into the White House. I mean,

I had some success, but that was a, that was a difficult nut to crack. Yeah. So you know,

they always say that there's an emotional side to every lawsuit. When I was sued for the 500 million

dollars, it wasn't just the fear of losing and having a 500 million dollar judgment set against

you, which of course, you know, they would never be able to collect upon not in 50 lifetimes,

but it's more, there's always an emotional side to these lawsuits. How much does the stress

of being targeted by one of the most powerful women in the world weigh on you,

and does it influence how you approach the lawsuit or your narrative?

You know, I think it probably did in the moment, you know, there's that moment when you get a lawyer's

letter and you think, Oh, geez. But, you know, I have good lawyers. I, I am, you know, I know,

I know the strength of my position, the ability to raise all this money from GoFundMe has been

certainly a buffer against panic. And, and I think that the strategy, and it's my lawyer's

strategy that they that they came up with has been, I mean, as well, first thing has relieved a

lot of anxiety to be the pursuer instead of the one pursued. And so, so that kind of emotion,

that kind of anxiety, that kind of fear has been kind of removed from this. And this is now just a,

you know, let's, let's bring it on. They wanted this. Let's pursue it.

So finally, Michael, because it's, you know, unfortunately, the hour goes by way too quickly,

and I certainly look forward to joining you on your podcast and you back here, because this story

is not going away. In a country where the wealthy often evade accountability, do you see this lawsuit

as potentially setting a precedent, whether it's legally or culturally, for how journalists,

authors, and critics can push back against intimidation and manipulation by those in power?

Oh, absolutely. I mean, I mean, completely. And specifically with reference to the Trumps,

as I say, this has never happened to me before. No president has, has, has launched these kinds

of lawsuits and threats before. This is, I believe in absolutely unique time and the unique moment.

And, um, but, but, and all the more reason why we have to push back against it.

Well, yeah, I mean, because at the end of the day, I believe that your lawyers, based upon the

questions that they will definitively ask at the deposition of either one or both,

could actually fundamentally change the public's understanding of the Epstein Trump relationship.

And here's the funny thing too. Those people who want to turn around and make the statement,

oh yeah, it's going to reveal all of the bad things about Trump and Epstein and the relationship

and this, um, this ring of pedophilia created by Epstein. To the contrary, it could also actually

dispel that, depending upon the answers that come out. Unless again, of course, that there's

information which would demonstrate that the response is untruthful. Yeah, no, come entirely.

And, um, you know, to, I mean, to me, it, this is just, you know, both of these guys look for

this period that they knew each other lived, you know, just lived and, you know, in openly

sleazeball life. And, um, and I, I don't think, I think many American voters have never quite

come to terms with that. That Donald Trump led a life, which if they understood the details of

that life, um, if they had a clear picture of that life, um, they, they would, they would say,

this is, this guy is the president of the United States. Something has gone powerfully wrong here.

Yeah, except, let me just sort of push back on just one, one aspect of that. You know, uh, it's

funny. If you're single, right? And I see this as a Manhattan night my entire life. I've seen this

a million times guy who's 80 years old with a 25 year old. I mean, we see celebrities all the time.

I mean, there's, uh, a thing that constantly pops up on my Instagram and TikTok on celebrities

who are like 50 years older than their, um, you know, than their girlfriend slash spouses. If that's

the issue, I'm not certain that that would constitute sleazeball because what Epstein really stands for

is the largest pedophile world in the history of this country. What, what we, what we know is that

Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump had a mutual and central obsession and that obsession was models.

They were in the model business. They were in the model agency business. They were surrounded by

models. They got their status and their currency from being surrounded by models. Models are, are, um,

how, how they regarded women in the hierarchy of women. There were models and then there were

everyone else. And in within that model hierarchy, there were super models and runway models and

catalog models. And then the whole population of girls who just wanted to be models. I mean,

that is what we are talking about. That is the, the stage that is set here. And Donald Trump was

very much as crucially a part of that, of that, of that stage of that script as Jeffrey Epstein.

And I think that's what people don't quite understand and recognize. And if you say, well,

if you want to make this in an issue of age, then yes, how old are models? And models, especially

at this time, this is really the 1990s, you know, models were anywhere from, you know, I don't know,

14, 15 to 20. And, um, and that's the day of the game for Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein.

Mike Wolf, thank you for joining me again on Mayacolpa so much, so much to say.

And let me just say that I have, which might be of, of, of interest, I am doing now on

sub-stack every Monday, a new chapter of, of, of my view of Jeffrey Epstein really starting from,

I put the, the first chapter went up on last Monday, every Monday from here on in until the story

is, is, is done. And I'm very, I want to make that do this in a very clear way, which is to say,

this is only, this is from the view of what, um, of what I saw and I heard. So it's not this

information comes from here and here and, and this is first, this is, this is information.

Yes. So, um, um, but I think, I think people might find that interesting.

So make sure to follow him on sub-stack. I certainly do. Mike Wolf, thank you for joining me,

my friend. Good to see you. I'll see you soon. You got it. And now for today's Mayacolpa,

you know, there's a fundamental difference between secrecy that protects and silence that

corrodes. What we're seeing now is not discipline restraint. It's an information vacuum, one that's

being filled predictably and dangerously with misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation.

And that my friends doesn't happen by accident. When the people who actually know the facts

inside government, inside investigations, inside intelligence channels decide to ration information

or release it in carefully curated fragments, they create the very chaos that they later claim to

be fighting. It is a self-inflicted wound and the public, of course, is the one left bleeding

out clarity. Take, for example, the Epstein files. I mean, what should be a straight-forward

exercise in transparency has turned into a rolling drip of half-revelations and procedural breadcrumbs?

I mean, literally just enough to keep attention. Never enough, of course, to provide resolution,

and that kind of selective disclosure does not come speculation. It fuels it. It invites people to

connect dots that may or may not exist to fill in blanks with assumption, suspicion, and eventually

outright fiction. And once that process starts, it doesn't stop. The same pattern holds when the

stakes move from scandal to global conflict. So take with Iran, the public is fed fragments,

strategic hints, unnamed sources, conflicting signals without the connective tissue that would allow

anyone outside the room to fully understand what is actually happening. The question, like,

is escalation imminent? Is there a path to de-escalation? You see the answer shift, depending on which

sliver of information surfaces on any given day? And that, my friends, is not strategy. That's

instability, masquerading as control. Because here's the truth that no one wants to say out loud.

When information is incomplete, people don't wait patiently for the rest. No, they build their

own version of it. And in today's environment, those versions spread faster, louder, and often more

convincingly than the truth ever could. And that's where malinformation becomes the most dangerous

player in the room. It's not entirely false. It's just built on pieces of reality, on real documents,

real events, real names, but arranged in a way that distorts rather than clarifies.

And when the official narrative is either absent or inconsistent, that distortion starts to look

like credibility. You see, this isn't just a media problem. Oh hell no, it is a structural failure.

Because all of this, every investigation, every prosecution, every intelligence operation,

every step toward or away from conflict, is funded by the American people. And that, my friends,

is not a talking point. That is a fact. Public money creates a public stake. And a public stake

demands a level of transparency that goes beyond carefully managed ambiguity.

You see, no one is asking for reckless disclosure. Oh hell no, some things by necessity,

yeah, they remain classified. But what's happening now goes far beyond protecting sensitive

details. It is the normalization of partial truth. And partial truth, it's just another form of

manipulation. And the cost of that manipulation is trust. And once the trusted roads, everything

built on top of it, it starts to crack the institutions reporting even the basic ability to agree

on what is real and what is not. This, this is how confusion becomes the default setting.

And not because the truth doesn't exist, but because it's being withheld, diluted, or strategically

delayed. And in that vacuum, the loudest voice is sadly win. Not the most accurate ones.

And as always, thanks for listening.

Don't lie for me. If I tell you my star, I don't cry for me. I didn't have time to ask for my

message. My dreams are gone. If you dance with the devil, it's gonna go down. Don't truth.

It's now or never. Oh baby, don't you lie to me. Oh baby, don't you lie to me.

This is my, this is my miracle. It's coming on down. And you know where I'm going to bring it on down.

Bring it on down. Bring it on down.