If there’s nothing actually damaging to President Donald Trump in the Jeffrey Epstein information, he and his administration did an excellent job of making it look like there could be.
How else to elucidate their guarantees of full transparency, their sudden and inexplicable U-turn, and then their (finally unsuccessful) efforts to combat Congress’ push to get the information?
It appears the administration didn’t study its lesson from that episode.
Because it seems like historical past could possibly be repeating with the boat strikes video.
Trump and the administration sound as if they’ve instantly gotten chilly toes about releasing full video of the September strikes on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean that killed survivors. This regardless of Trump having mentioned plainly lower than every week in the past that the administration would launch it.
While the strikes have been already controversial and legally dubious, consultants say that the US army killing survivors could be a war crime.
Trump mentioned Wednesday that “whatever they have, we’d certainly release, no problem.”
But just about all the things since then suggests the administration needs he hadn’t made that pledge:
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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth supplied a much more qualified response on Saturday, emphasizing the want to guard key army info. “We’re reviewing the process, and we’ll see,” he mentioned.
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Trump on Monday falsely denied that he promised to launch the full video, rising indignant with a reporter who confronted him along with his personal phrases. He finally mentioned it could be as much as Hegseth about whether or not and what to launch.
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Asked Tuesday morning on Fox News about releasing the video, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt fully prevented the query.
It bears emphasizing that, regardless of Hegseth citing the want to guard delicate info, the administration has launched video of those strikes slightly rapidly in the previous. Trump truly posted video from the September 2 assault at problem — the preliminary a part of it, at the very least — mere hours later.
The query from there turns into: What can be so delicate about the portion that exhibits a second set of strikes that wasn’t delicate about the preliminary strikes? And why has it taken practically every week to assessment that launch, when it took simply hours to assessment the launch of the preliminary strikes?
Democratic Rep. Adam Smith supplied a concept this weekend: The administration is anxious the full video will undercut its protection of the strikes. (Some Republicans have argued the second strike was professional as a result of the survivors may have gotten assist or continued their mission, someway.)
“If they release the video, then everything that the Republicans are saying will clearly be portrayed to be completely false,” the rating Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee mentioned Sunday on ABC News’ “This Week.”
Indeed, even Trump seems to be treading gingerly round defending the second strike too arduous.
Before the White House confirmed it final week, the president mentioned he wouldn’t have needed the army to launch a second strike killing survivors. Similarly, when requested Monday in a Politico interview whether or not the second strike was mandatory, Trump prevented a direct reply and again distanced himself from the scenario.
“Uh, well, it looked like they were trying to turn back over the boat, but I don’t get involved in that,” he mentioned. Trump added in obvious reference to the army: “That’s up to them.”
The full video — which Trump informed Politico is “not pretty” — can be of curiosity no matter whether or not he initially vowed to launch it.
But if the administration tries to withhold the video, will probably be violating Trump’s promise in a really conspicuous method. And that would definitely be learn as protecting its personal bottom, similar to with Epstein.
But the parallels don’t cease there.
Indeed, we realized Monday that, as with the Epstein information, Congress seems to be doing one thing on this problem.
Tucked into a brand new huge protection coverage invoice is a provision that seeks to compel the Defense Department to show over the full, unedited movies of the strikes to the House and Senate armed providers committees. If it doesn’t, Congress would restrict Hegseth’s journey price range.
It feels lots like the House discharge petition that compelled a vote compelling the Justice Department to launch the Epstein information. (And the public strain finally compelled Trump to relent and conform to signal the invoice.) It’s extraordinarily uncommon for the Republican-controlled Congress to truly assert itself like this, however it’s — at the very least for now.
Even GOP Sen. Josh Hawley, who’s recurrently a Trump ally, on Tuesday joined the ranks urging the administration to discover a strategy to launch the video.
“I would just say to him, like, ‘Listen, if there’s a way to release the video’ — which I have not seen — but if there’s a way to release that, that does not compromise our intelligence-gathering, I would urge them to do it,” the Missouri Republican mentioned.
So why are lawmakers more and more calling for this transparency? It’s not clear, however there’s bipartisan interest on this problem and even some concern amongst high-ranking Republicans like Senate Armed Services Chairman Roger Wicker and former House Intelligence Chairman Mike Turner. Turner just lately urged the administration had hid details about the second strike.
“This is completely outside of anything that has been discussed with Congress,” the Ohio Republican informed CBS’ “Face the Nation” on November 30 after the second strike was initially reported.
GOP Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, a longtime critic of the strikes, has even accused Hegseth of lying about them. And earlier this fall, some outstanding Republicans criticized the administration’s lack of information-sharing about the strikes.
Much has but to play out, however the administration is again establishing a possible conflict with Congress over releasing one thing it beforehand promised it could launch.
And if the Epstein information are any indication, that can seemingly solely improve curiosity — and suspicions about what the administration is perhaps hiding.
“We’ve got to get the Epstein files released. We got to get any videos that do not in any way compromise mission integrity down there,” GOP Sen. Thom Tillis mentioned Tuesday. “Just get the stuff out there.”