Latest Epstein revelations are fracturing Maga's base

What do the latest releases from the Epstein files tell us about Donald Trump?

- SEAN O'GRADY

The text of one email, as released, sent in April 2011 by Jeffrey Epstein to Ghislaine Maxwell, alleges: “I want you to realize that that dog that hasn’t barked is Trump. [Name [redacted] spent hours at my house with him". The name, according to the White House, is Virginia Giuffre Roberts, who of course can no longer speak for herself.

In another, Epstein alleges that “of course [Trump] knew about the girls”, perhaps meaning those procured by Epstein and/or Maxwell for sexual purposes — but with no great sense of direct and detailed knowledge.

The White House says: “These emails prove absolutely nothing other than the fact that President Trump did nothing wrong.” On a narrow reading, in that the texts as presented aren’t a “smoking gun”, that’s probably correct. They don’t, however, “prove” Trump did nothing wrong at all, ever, because we don’t know what the rest of the relevant evidence, if any, looks like.

But that’s the problem for the president of the United States. These are just three more emails (ie relating to Trump) and we know that there are thousands more files - emails, images, documents of all kinds - that are not yet in the public domain and which might well implicate all sorts of people in all sorts of ways. Including Donald J Trump.