Deep inside the story describing the letter hinting about sexual secrets that Trump wrote Jeffrey Epstein in 2003 — 26 paragraphs in — WSJ includes a seeming no comment from Ghislaine Maxwell.

Maxwell, a British socialite, was convicted in 2021 of helping Epstein’s sex-trafficking and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Maxwell didn’t respond to a letter requesting an interview sent to her in prison. Arthur Aidala, an attorney who represented Maxwell, said, “At this point, she is focused on her case before the Supreme Court of the United States.”

The reporters either had time to write Maxwell a posted letter or they are among the contacts Maxwell has listed to contact her via the prison email system (in any case, Trump would have no compunctions about tracking her communications in prison). Whichever means they used to contact her, they got got no response.

They also asked Arthur Aidala, who represented Maxwell — past tense — for comment. His response wasn’t so much a no comment, but was, instead, a claim that Maxwell is focused on her Supreme Court appeal — the appeal which she delayed until Trump was inaugurated, the appeal response to which John Sauer twice delayed, first from May until June, then from June until July, before finally submitting the response last Monday, July 14, just one day before WSJ interviewed Trump about the story. Aidala is not the attorney on that appeal; David Markus and Sara Kropf are the listed attorneys on her SCOTUS appeal. In fact, after Sauer submitted the response — indicating Trump’s DOJ would defend the prosecution after twice leaving open the possibility it might not — Markus told ABC that Trump probably didn’t know that Sauer — Trump’s one-time defense attorney — had done that, because Trump is the ultimate dealmaker.

In a statement Monday, an attorney for Maxwell hinted at the swirling controversy surrounding the Trump administration’s decision not to release any further records related to investigations of Epstein.

“I’d be surprised if President Trump knew his lawyers were asking the Supreme Court to let the government break a deal. He’s the ultimate dealmaker—and I’m sure he’d agree that when the United States gives its word, it should keep it. With all the talk about who’s being prosecuted and who isn’t, it’s especially unfair that Ghislaine Maxwell remains in prison based on a promise the government made and broke,” wrote David Oscar Markus.

The ultimate dealmaker wouldn’t break a promise, Markus said on Monday.

And then on Tuesday, the WSJ interviewed Trump for a story revealing that Trump had sent Epstein a letter boasting that “A pal is a wonderful thing” and referencing daily secrets and enigmas.

Aidala represented Maxwell in her Second Circuit Appeal but not her criminal case, which means that, like Markus, he’s not covered by the protective order in the case which, by the way, permits witnesses to use discovery for purposes other than their testimony, but not Maxwell’s own attorneys, and of course only covers Government attorneys (or former Government attorneys) if discovery is actually turned over to the defendants.

With all that in mind, let’s look closer at what WSJ — which doesn’t say whether it spoke with Markus or any of Maxwell’s attorneys from the criminal case — says about that letter and in the process, their sources for the story.

The first reference to the album — a bound book — describes documents that show Maxwell collected letters.

Maxwell collected letters from Trump and dozens of Epstein’s other associates for a 2003 birthday album, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

This is important: If Maxwell “collected” those letters, she might have not just the letters, but letters about the letters — the kind of thing that would provide further authentication for the chain of custody. Just as one example, during the Russian investigation, we learned some of what the Agalarovs and other well-connected Russians sent to Trump not from the Agalarovs themselves, but via the communications to Trump’s then Executive Assistant, Rhona Graff, passing them on.

There’s even an example of Rob Goldstone asking Graff to get Trump to contribute a note for a birthday book, precisely the same ask Maxwell would have made in 2003.

If Maxwell solicited a letter from Trump, she would have asked Trump’s assistant to get one for her, and Trump would have passed on the letter via the same assistant.

WSJ seems to have seen letters about letters. Which might explain why they’re not clear “how the letter with Trump’s signature was prepared,” but are sure that it came from him.

It isn’t clear how the letter with Trump’s signature was prepared.

Mind you, they’ve also seen the letters themselves — not just the Trump one, but letters from other famous people from whom WSJ solicited comment: Leslie Wexner and Alan Dershowitz.

The album had poems, photos and greetings from businesspeople, academics, Epstein’s former girlfriends and childhood pals, according to the documents reviewed by the Journal and people familiar with them. Among those who submitted letters were billionaire Leslie Wexner and attorney Alan Dershowitz.

[snip]

The longtime leader of Victoria’s Secret wrote a short message that said: “I wanted to get you what you want… so here it is….” After the text was a line drawing of what appeared to be a woman’s breasts. Wexner declined to comment through a spokesman. Wexner’s spokesman previously told the Journal that the retail mogul “severed all ties with Epstein in 2007 and never spoke with him again.”

Dershowitz’s letter included a mock-up of a “Vanity Unfair” magazine cover with mock headlines such as “Who was Jack the Ripper? Was it Jeffrey Epstein?” He joked that he had convinced the magazine to change the focus of an article from Epstein to Bill Clinton. Dershowitz, who represented Epstein after his first arrest, said, “It’s been a long time and I don’t recall the content of what I may have written.”

Wexner doesn’t want to talk about what documents might have once been in Epstein’s possession or might still be in Maxwell’s possession showing him joking about women with a sexual predator. Dershowitz, however, didn’t deny he sent a letter to Epstein laughing about framing Bill Clinton for something Epstein did, several years before Dershowitz would denigrate Epstein’s victims in a successful bid for a get out of jail free card for the abuser. He just claims not to remember that he was thinking of doing so before he actually had to help Epstein out of a terrible criminal jam.

I’ve read the WSJ article a bunch of times, and while they claim to have seen the letters (and possibly letters about letters), they don’t appear to claim they’ve seen the leather bound album itself. They are reporting on the existence of the album and the contents of the letters.

The existence of the album and the contents of the birthday letters haven’t previously been reported.

They know it was bound because several people involved in the process of getting it bound (this could be people both on Maxwell’s side and on Herbert Weitz’s team — he’s dead but his team might not be) told them who bound it.

The book was put together by a New York City bookbinder, Herbert Weitz, according to people who were involved in the process.

There’s one more thing about the album, something absolutely critical for understanding what is going on. Pages from the album were examined by DOJ officials back in 2019 and 2020, but WSJ has no idea whether they were part of the review Pam Bondi just did.

Pages from the leather-bound album—assembled before Epstein was first arrested in 2006—are among the documents examined by Justice Department officials who investigated Epstein and Maxwell years ago, according to people who have reviewed the pages. It’s unclear if any of the pages are part of the Trump administration’s recent review.

WSJ is certain they were in DOJ custody during the first Trump term. WSJ is not certain that those documents were among the ones Pam Bondi had 1,000 people review in 24-hour shifts before John Sauer kept delaying the decision about what to do about Maxwell’s appeal.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that WSJ has DOJ sources — or rather, former DOJ sources. It could be that witnesses were asked about the letters, which is how WSJ discovered they were in DOJ custody. But it’s worth noting that one of the prosecutors on both the Epstein and Maxwell prosecutions, Andrew Rohrbach, was among the people Emil Bove got fired for refusing to take part in Trump’s quid pro quo. Rohrbach isn’t the only one who’d be covered by that asymmetric protective order. Obviously, Maurene Comey, whom Trump fired the day after the interview with WSJ, would be too. But Rohrbach is one person who would know what prosecutors did in 2019, but probably not the review done in March. But then, so would a bunch of other people at SDNY if the Maxwell prosecution was one of the reasons Trump fired Geoffrey Berman.

With all that in mind, let me lay out something else.

This binder does not obviously show up in the inventory of things obtained in searches of Epstein’s various properties. Most of the binders included in the inventory contain CDs or photos, though item 1819 describes 10 binders, some of which may contain other things, and item 18140 is a bankers box with miscellaneous things. Nothing in the WSJ story says that DOJ had the binder itself.

It’s possible that DOJ obtained “pages from the leather-bound album” via email warrants targeting either Epstein or Maxwell, letters about letters.

But if those pages were obtained with a search warrant, they would not be covered by grand jury secrecy.

Moreover, nothing in either Epstein’s or Maxwell’s indictments would reflect testimony about the album. They rely on victim testimony, travel records, and phone records. And while Epstein’s indictment spans the same period — 2002 to 2005 — as the binder (which explains why DOJ would have obtained it), Maxwell’s indictment focuses on 1994 to 1997. If she got copies of the binder in discovery (and it’s not clear she would have), it would not have been central to her case.

The only other way this album would be covered by grand jury secrecy would be if it were subpoenaed. But wherever the album itself ended up by the time SDNY was investigating in 2018, it is extremely unlikely it was obtained via subpoena.

All of which is to say that it is virtually certain that Donald Trump instructed his defense attorney turned Deputy Attorney General, Todd Blanche (because Blanche has not updated his NY bar membership, he shows up in the docket under his firm identity, as if he’s a defense attorney who happens to represent the government in this issue), to go look for this letter in one place he’s pretty sure it never appeared, the grand jury.

When JD Vance tried to dispute the WSJ story by crying that WSJ hadn’t shown “us” the letter, there’s a decent chance he said that knowing that the signed copy of the letter remains safely in DOJ custody — precisely where Trump knows his attorneys won’t look for it.

Update: Added screencap of Rob Goldstone email.

Yesterday, I wrote about how utterly fucking ridiculous Tulsi Gabbard’s influence operation claiming a Deep State plot against Donald Trump because Barrack Obama knows the difference between a voting machine and the DNC server (which Tulsi claims not to know in her little project).

Her propaganda project is not without benefit. I mean, not only have I called on all the right wing members of Congress who’ve been duped by Tulsi to demand that Pam Bondi fire Kash Patel for covering this all up when he reviewed the same files in 2020. But Tulsi declassified a somewhat classified version of the 2017 ICA (there were two classified versions, a super classified version for President Obama, Trump, and the Gang of Eight, and a less-classified version for other members of Congress — this is the latter). So not only can we see what secrets about Russia’s 2016 interference Director Tulsi wants to keep from us, but we can compare the classified version with the publicly-released version to see what was sensitive in 2017 but no longer is.

There are a number of things that either did not exist in the public version or remain significantly redacted. For example:

• The classified version includes more discussion of the confidence levels. “We have high confidence in this assessment [that both SVR and GRU hacked political targets], the assessment described, “because it is based on a body of [redacted] intelligence reporting that reinforces and elaborates on publicly available commercial cyber analyses.” Elsewhere such language explains why some agencies were less certain.
• Speaking of Russian spooks targeting political targets, the classified ICA provided more details on the RNC hacks, which had been reported but never explained in detail. GRU hacked GOP targets in early July 2016, but (it appears) that server hadn’t been used for over six years. But that paragraph immediately precedes one of the only entirely redacted paragraphs in the assessment. A paragraph in a later section describing that “we saw Russian collection on some Republican-affiliated targets,” also includes three redacted lines.
• There’s a bit more detail on senior Russian officials, such as details about what hacked information was shared as intelligence, rather than used as an information operation.
• There’s an entire section on Russia’s targeting of state election infrastructure, including details on an Illinois hack that, I had been told by sources, was far more serious than publicly acknowledged. There’s one short paragraph addressing one of the several hacks revealed by Reality Winner. In general, the report was overly optimistic about Russian targeting of voting infrastructure, and simply didn’t imagine that Russia might steal registration data so it could conduct an attack like Cambridge Analytica.
• There’s a section explaining the ways that the attack could have been worse (though that claim is based, in part, on an assessment that “We did not detect extensive [redacted] influence operations as part of the Kremlin’s campaign.” Perhaps that part of the assessment would change as Robert Mueller investigated.
• There’s more detail on Russia’s past election interference (this section is worth comparing side by side), along with a map of operations spanning 2000 to 2016 (though the details remain classified). The ICA also predicted (in two still partly redacted paragraphs) that Germany’s fall 2017 election would be the next one targeted; it ended up being France’s May 2017 election.

Those are just interesting details, nothing really that (no matter how much Tulsi misrepresents all this) disrupts years of questions about the attributions.

There are just two passages I’m far more interested in.

In the section on the trolls, in the paragraph before one that addresses Yevgeniy Prigozhin’s role in funding it, there’s both a subheading and the first few lines of that section redacted.

I’m interested in that because, as I’ve gotten further from 2016, I’ve seen more reason to believe that the Russian effort to use trolls to make stuff go viral closely overlapped with the far right effort to do the same.

And finally — unsurprisingly — I’m interested in details about the Guccifer 2.0 attribution that wasn’t in the public report. The italicized language below is new in the classified report.

The Kremlin’s campaign aimed at the US election featured disclosures of data obtained through Russian cyber operations via WikiLeaks, as well as via the Guccifer 2.0 persona and DCLeaks.com, which are both likely GRU operations; GRU intrusions into US state electoral infrastructure; and overt propaganda. Russian foreign intelligence collection both informed and enabled the influence campaign, [redacted]

[snip]

Public Disclosures of Russian-Collected Data. We assess the GRU used both the Guccifer 2.0 persona and DCLeaks.com operationally to release US [victim] data obtained in GRU cyber operations publicly and in exclusives to media outlets. We have high confidence that Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks.com published GRU- hacked data, but moderate confidence that they were under direct GRU control [redacted]. We base our judgments on several factors: the information that was disclosed was information we assess the GRU accessed as part of its operations against US political targets; the initial data leak occurred the day after the US cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike publicized Russia’s intrusion into the DNC; and signals intelligence placed the operators of Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks.com in Russia. 

Guccifer 2.0, who claimed to be an independent Romanian hacker, made multiple contradictory statements and false claims about his identity throughout the election; [redacted] intelligence indicated the persona was controlled from Russia, and press reporting suggests more than one person claiming to be Guccifer 2.0 interacted with journalists, based on [redacted] and interactions with the press.

Content that we assess was taken from [redacted] e-mail accounts targeted in March 2016 by a GRU cyber espionage unit subsequently appeared on DCLeaks.com in June.

On several occasions, the administrators of Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks.com logged in to accounts associated with those personas using a Russia-based mobile broadband provider [redacted] although they generally attempted to obscure the source of their Internet traffic.

Of particular interest, to me especially: the IC was pretty sure that Russia was using Guccifer 2.0 to disseminate the stolen files, but was less sure what the relationship between the persona and the spooks running it was. The passage includes the allegedly accidental log-ins via a Russian provider, which was reported years ago. But in early 2017, anyway, all this was ambiguous.

Given the conspiracy theories Tulsi is spewing, all these questions seem quaint now.

But the ambiguity from the period did carry over for some time later.

Yesterday, 252 Venezuelan men who had been held in CECOT concentration camp were flown to Venezuela. Among the people who survived their detention in El Salvador are Andry José Hernández Romero (the gay stylist), Neri Alvarado Borges (the guy kidnapped because of his autism-solidarity tattoo), and Christian, who came to the US as an unaccompanied minor and should have been protected under a prior agreement. The government including this declaration in the latter docket explaining that Nicolás Maduro has agreed to send back any of the 252 returned men for legal proceedings (though as written that appears to cover only adverse proceedings).

In exchange for the return to Venezuela of those men, Maduro released dozens of political prisoners and 10 US citizens or permanent residents.

The successful prisoner swap comes just ten days after a NYT story describing how both Marco Rubio and Ric Grenell were attempting to negotiate that deal, but Grenell fucked it up by offering better (and unapproved) terms than Rubio was offering.

The Trump administration’s top diplomat, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, was overseeing a deal to free several Americans and dozens of political prisoners held in Venezuela in exchange for sending home about 250 Venezuelan migrants the United States had deported to El Salvador.

But the deal never happened.

Part of the reason: President Trump’s envoy to Venezuela was working on his own deal, one with terms that Venezuela deemed more attractive. In exchange for American prisoners, he was offering to allow Chevron to continue its oil operations in Venezuela, a vital source of revenue for its authoritarian government.

The discussions, which included the release of about 80 Venezuelan political prisoners, and the two different deals were described by two U.S. officials and two other people who are familiar with the talks and sought anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the issue.

That attempted deal has been public since at least April.

Which raises the question: Was a third-country swap always the plan? Was that part of the reason why Emil Bove ordered a bunch of people at a March 14 meeting that the planes carrying the Venezuelan men — plus some Salvadorans who could implicate Nayib Bukele in ties to MS-13 — must take off, no matter what?

I’ll return to this question — it’s one I’ve been puzzling as the Administration goes to ever more extreme lengths to cover up what happened here.

Those 252 men were used as bait.

Was that always the plan?

Suspected Russian asset Tulsi Gabbard has released a report of screen caps out of context and one 114-page collection of documents purportedly showing what she claims is a conspiracy against Donald Trump.

It serves its purpose — because a broad swath of very stupid people are currently frothing madly about it on Xitter.

What Tulsi purports to show is that the FBI didn’t back expansive claims of Russian involvement in election interference in September and October 2016, refused to participate in a assessment in December, only for Obama to order a new assessment, after which — Tulsi claims — the assessment changed to reflect more confidence in Putin’s involvement.

In general, Tulsi accomplishes the circus trick of getting stupid people to buy her narrative by conflating whether spooks thought Russia hacked the US voting tabulation infrastructure with Intelligence Community confidence that Russia was involved in the hack of the DNC and DCCC and then involved in the dissemination of files stolen from it.

So:

Voting infrastructure

Hack and leak

Not the same things

Tulsi assumes her rubes won’t notice she’s doing that and — lo and behold!! — she’s right!!

As one example of how transparently shoddy Tulsi’s “work” is, note how she misquotes a story (which she attributes to spooks but which might come from Congress) talking about the larger Russian intelligence operation in 2016, claiming it pertains exclusively to the “U.S. Election Hack.”

Tulsi doesn’t link the underlying story, for good reason, because reading the story gives away her game.

While it does use the word “hack” in the title, it includes two details that undermine Tulsi’s information operation.

U.S. Officials: Putin Personally Involved in U.S. Election Hack

New intelligence shows that Putin became personally involved in the computer breach, two senior U.S. officials say.

Two senior officials with direct access to the information say new intelligence shows that Putin personally directed how hacked material from Democrats was leaked and otherwise used. The intelligence came from diplomatic sources and spies working for U.S. allies, the officials said.

[snip]

The latest intelligence said to show Putin’s involvement goes much further than the information the U.S. was relying on in October, when all 17 intelligence agencies signed onto a statement attributing the Democratic National Committee hack to Russia.

Most importantly, the story describes that the Intelligence Community got new information. Wow! An explanation for why the assessment changed in December 2016!!!! All readily available if you just check Tulsi’s sources!!

Just as importantly, nothing in the article addresses tampering with the voting infrastructure, the topic of almost all the other screen caps in Tulsi’s propaganda, in her effort to conflate the voting infrastructure, the hack and leak, and the larger information operation.

There are a slew of other problems with Tulsi’s book report. It ignores:

• The Russian investigation into Trump didn’t arise out of this intelligence. It arose out of Mike Flynn’s efforts to undermine the Obama sanctions on Russia in response, and Trump’s efforts to undermine the investigation of Flynn.
• The Russian investigation discovered abundant new evidence, including proof that Trump’s campaign learned of Russia’s operation in advance. Trump’s Coffee Boy, Campaign Manager, National Security Advisor, personal lawyer, and rat-fucker were all eventually adjudged to have lied to cover up aspects of Trump’s involvement in the Russian investigation. And through their confessions, we learned that Russia dangled an impossibly lucrative real estate deal, told a Trump campaign official and his rat-fucker about their operation, got campaign data and strategy — possibly in exchange for millions of dollars and involvement in a plan to carve of Ukraine — and then undermined Obama’s foreign policy to help Russia.
• After all these 2016 assessments, the NSA later developed evidence — according to the document Reality Winner leaked — that showed Russia did attempt to and had some success in hacking voting infrastructure.

Which is to say, Tulsi’s entire little book report is unrelated to the Russian investigation into Trump and her claims about hacking the election infrastructure were eventually revised.

But her report is not without interest.

If her story is true — if there is a shred of truth to her claims that Obama tried to alter the intelligence in 2016 — then evidence to that fact was available in 2020, when Kash Patel was reviewing precisely the same intelligence while serving as Ric Grenell’s handler, and that evidence was available from 2019 through 2023, when John Durham reviewed it all and determined that the spooks did nothing wrong.

In other words, if Tulsi’s allegations are true, it means Kash Patel and John Durham are part of the Deep State plot against Donald Trump!!!!

It means Trump’s hand-picked FBI Director was part of a sustained effort to cover-up Obama’s devious intervention in 2016.

If Tulsi’s allegations have any merit, then Pam Bondi must fire Kash Patel and include him, right along with all the nefarious actors Tulsi targets, because Kash covered this up when he could have helped Trump win the 2020 election.

Update: Corrected how long the primary document collection is.

Listen on spotify (transcripts available)

Listen on Apple (transcripts available)

Dick Durbin wrote another of a slew of letters Democrats have sent to Pam Bondi and others about Jeffrey Epstein this year. This one provides details of the review of the Epstein file Bondi ordered:

According to information my office received, you then pressured the FBI to put approximately 1,000 personnel in its Information Management Division (IMD), including the Record/Information Dissemination Section (RIDS), which handles all requests submitted by the public under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and Privacy Act, on 24-hour shifts to review approximately 100,000 Epstein-related records in order to produce more documents that could be released on an arbitrarily short deadline. This effort, which reportedly took place from March 14 through the end of March, was haphazardly supplemented by hundreds of FBI New York Field Office personnel, many of whom lacked the expertise to identify statutorily-protected information regarding child victims and child witnesses or properly handle FOIA requests.

My office was told that these personnel were instructed to “flag” any records in which President Trump was mentioned.

[snip]

5. Aside from the negative backlash you received over the February 27 record release, what was the purpose of placing almost 1,000 FBI IMD personnel on 24-hour shifts to review Epstein-related records over the course of a two-week period in March?

6. Who made the decision to reassign hundreds of New York Field Office personnel to this March review of Epstein-related records?

7. Why were personnel told to flag records in which President Trump was mentioned?

a. Please list all political appointees and senior DOJ officials involved in the decision to flag records in which President Trump was mentioned.

b. What happened to the records mentioning President Trump once they were flagged?

c. Is there a log of the records mentioning President Trump? If yes, please transmit a copy of the log to the Committee and the OIG.

Remember: Trump’s appointees have fired two people who would know details of this: the head of the NY Field Office, James Dennehy, who was forced to retire amid allegations the NYFO was sitting on the files, and Maurene Comey, who has been involved in FOIA responses regarding these files.

Either could now give protected whistleblower statements to Durbin.

But they’re not the only ones.

In her bid to review these files, Bondi created one thousand witnesses to what is in the Epstein file — and Bondi’s attempt to politicize the search for Epstein files.

One thousand.

Update: Durbin’s staff has now posted the letter, plus letters he wrote to Kash Patel and Dan Bongino. Of both FBI men, Durbin asked why they said the video was “raw” when it had actually been altered.

13. Why does the July 7 memorandum describe the surveillance footage as “full raw” when it was modified?

a) Please describe in detail all of the modifications made to the “full raw” surveillance footage before its publication.

And of Kash, he asks what conspiracy theories Kash was chasing.

15. What are the conspiracy theories you are referring to in your July 12 tweet that “were never true?” If there are more than one, please explain each in detail.

He also asked why Bongino had to take a day for his fee fees.

15. Is this dispute between you and White House and DOJ officials the reason behind your July 11 absence from work?

Charlie Kirk and the President’s failson are very impressed with President Trump’s order that Pam Bondi seek to release grand jury transcripts.

Trump gave the order in response to a WSJ report describing a birthday letter, signed by Trump, included in a book that Ghislaine Maxwell made for Jeffrey Epstein’s 50th birthday in 2003.

It isn’t clear how the letter with Trump’s signature was prepared. Inside the outline of the naked woman was a typewritten note styled as an imaginary conversation between Trump and Epstein, written in the third person.

“Voice Over: There must be more to life than having everything,” the note began.

Donald: Yes, there is, but I won’t tell you what it is.

Jeffrey: Nor will I, since I also know what it is. 

Donald: We have certain things in common, Jeffrey. 

Jeffrey: Yes, we do, come to think of it. 

Donald: Enigmas never age, have you noticed that? 

Jeffrey: As a matter of fact, it was clear to me the last time I saw you. 

Donald: A pal is a wonderful thing. Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret.

WSJ describes that this book was examined by Epstein and Maxwell investigators.

Pages from the leather-bound album—assembled before Epstein was first arrested in 2006—are among the documents examined by Justice Department officials who investigated Epstein and Maxwell years ago, according to people who have reviewed the pages. It’s unclear if any of the pages are part of the Trump administration’s recent review.

But while there are titillating allusions in the letter, such as the reference to a new secret every day, there’s is not any conceivable reason why this letter would be presented as evidence against either Epstein or Maxwell. It does not overtly describe trafficking minor women at all.

The order that Bondi unseal grand jury materials will do nothing but impress people like Kirk and Don Jr, designed to create a likely unsuccessful drawn out legal fight in which, even if the transcripts were released, would not include this book.

SQUIRREL! Trump yelled, when cornered.

And it worked not just for Charlie Kirk, but also for NYT’s Glenn Thrush, a politics reporter who survived a Me Too scandal repurposed to cover DOJ. It took him 11¶¶ before he explained that a judge was unlikely to release any transcripts, and another paragraph before he explained that the vast bulk of the evidence is in FBI custody.

Mr. Trump’s stated desire to address the “ridiculous” publicity around the case may not be enough to convince the judge to release the transcripts. Grand jury transcripts are, under federal guidelines, kept secret to protect crime victims and witnesses. They are typically released only under narrowly defined circumstances.

Even if the transcripts are made public, which might involve months of legal wrangling, the evidence represents a fraction of material collected in the investigation. Over the past several months, dozens of F.B.I. agents and prosecutors with the Justice Department’s national security division were diverted from other assignments to review thousands of documents and a vast trove of video evidence, including footage from video cameras in the prison. [my emphasis]

If the grand jury evidence is a subset of the larger FBI stash, Glenn, then Bondi could release the letter herself, on her own authority, today. At least tell your readers that, Glenn, even if you don’t make the entire story, “Cornered by WSJ story, Donald Trump attempts a limited hangout.”

Thrush quotes Goldman making a point that there’s more in FBI custody, but doesn’t explain the import of it–that Bondi could release whatever copy of this letter the FBI has immediately.

Donald Trump is sufficiently concerned about this that he’s attempting to distract dim-witted people.

Including, apparently, NYT reporters.

Update: On Xitter, Thrush claimed this, in the third paragraph, alerted readers that Trump was affirmatively chasing data that would not have the letter.

The president cited “the ridiculous amount of publicity given to Jeffrey Epstein” for his directive, which falls far short of demands from some congressional Republicans to make public all investigative files collected by the department and the F.B.I., not just testimony presented in federal court.

As I laid out the other day, Chuck Grassley made a bunch of transparent excuses so he could cover up how Emil Bove gave advice to DHS that resulted in them defying an order from Judge James Boasberg.

It’s not me saying it. It is senior DOJ official Yaakov Roth saying it.

On March 16, he told Erez Reuveni and others that Bove was the one who — falsely — told DHS they could deplane flights that Boasberg had ordered be turned around without violating the court’s order.

On March 14, Bove said you might have to tell a judge “fuck you” to ensure Stephen Miller could use the Alien Enemies Act to deport people with no oversight. On March 15, Bove provided affirmatively false information to DHS, resulting in them defying Boasberg’s order — and with their actions, stranding hundreds of men, some completely innocent, in a brutal concentration camp in El Salvador.

Grassley must have recognized his arguments were transparent bullshit. Because in today’s hearing on Bove’s nominate, Grassley broke parliamentary rules to prevent Cory Booker, the home Senator on this nomination, from arguing against it.

As Sheldon Whitehouse notes, there are two parliamentary arguments that Bove’s nomination was not properly advanced. First, that Grassley blew off Booker’s point of order, then that there was a quorum to vote through the nomination.

HuffPo has more.

Chuck Grassley broke the rules to try to rush through Emil Bove’s lifetime appointment before — as Whitehouse noted — his conduct is investigated as criminal contempt.

He is protecting a guy who unloaded dozens of innocent men into a concentration camp. Worse, he is breaking the rules to promote Emil Bove to a lifetime appointment to reward him for stranding innocent men in a concentration camp.

I’ve often said that, this time, Donald Trump has chosen poorly of which people to make political martyrs.

Less than eight hours after proclaiming that the Jeffrey Epstein scandal was just some “new SCAM” perpetrated by Democrats, about four days after he first attempted to float the wildly illogical claim that the Epstein “Files [were] written by Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration,” DOJ fired Jim Comey’s daughter, Maurene.

According to the NYT, the letter terminating Ms. Comey cited Article II authority.

Ms. Comey was informed of her firing in a letter that cited Article II of the Constitution, which describes the powers of the president, according to two of the people.

In recent weeks, Pam Bondi’s DOJ has pursued an accelerating purge of prosecutors, public affairs professionals, and ethics advisors protected by civil service protections, also citing Article II authority. But somehow Ms. Comey’s firing took place after Trump started to lose his shit over his inability to squelch his own supporters’ mania about the Epstein scandal.

After Donald Trump started to go nuts about Epstein, Ms. Comey was fired on Trump’s own personal authority. It’s certainly possible this SCOTUS would uphold his authority to do so, if sued. But he’d have to spend a lot of time arguing about his own personal discretion in the decision to fire her.

He did this. Donald Trump did this.

And all the while, her role as a prosecutor in the Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, and Diddy cases would be at the forefront.

Even ignoring the insanely stupid timing of Ms. Comey’s termination, creating at least the appearance of a connection between Trump’s failing attempts to squelch conspiracy theories and her firing, there are two other details that Pam Bondi cannot have thought through.

First, the indictment of Epstein and the prosecution of Maxwell depended — as did the reporting from Julie Brown (which Miami Herald has now posted together) it built on — on developing the trust of the victims. Here’s how Geoffrey Berman described it in his book.

Over the next weeks and months, a team of FBI agents, NYPD detectives, and our prosecutors scrambled to make that happen. This meant that they identified victims, interviewed them, and went about the sensitive task of getting them to agree to testify in open court against their tormentor. Without the voices of these young women—girls when Epstein raped them—there was not a case. That our team accomplished these tasks without word leaking to Epstein or his lawyers that he was under investigation is a testament to their intelligence and deftness.

[snip]

I made a plea to the victims: Our job is not over, there is justice to be done, and we need your help. Epstein could not have done what he did without the assistance of others. We ask for your cooperation in our ongoing investigation into Epstein’s co-conspirators. The response was overwhelming. We conducted interviews that afternoon and in the days that followed. Over time, many other victims agreed to be interviewed. After the initial shock of Epstein’s death, I could feel the team refocusing and reenergizing.

One big break was the cooperation of a victim, one of Epstein’s first, whom Maxwell and Epstein had recruited at a summer arts camp back when she was just fourteen years old. She is now an actress and married with children. She told us that Epstein and Maxwell approached her at the camp when she was fourteen. They took what seemed to her, at first, to be a genuine interest in her life and aspirations. Epstein paid for her voice lessons and some other arts instruction.

She had told no one about the abuse that followed, and specifically not her mother, who had naively believed that Epstein’s interest was benign—that he was a kind, wealthy man helping her daughter reach her dreams. It was difficult for her to come forward. She had never wanted her mother to feel guilty. (Her name, thankfully, has not been publicly revealed. Judge Alison Nathan, who was assigned the Maxwell case, allowed the victims to remain anonymous if they so chose.)

What she told us, and would later testify to, was that Maxwell was walking her pet Yorkie when she approached her at the camp. Epstein soon joined them and began asking questions. “He seemed very interested to know what I thought about the camp, what my favorite classes were,” she said.

They stayed in touch, and at one point he took her to Victoria’s Secret and bought her white cotton panties. Soon after, when she was alone with Epstein at his Palm Beach residence, he pulled his pants down, got on top of her, and masturbated. As she later testified at trial, “I was frozen and in fear. I had never seen a penis before. I was terrified and felt gross and like I felt ashamed.” What followed were group sessions involving Epstein, Maxwell, and other women, which began with “Ghislaine or Jeffrey” summoning everyone to follow them to Jeffrey’s bedroom or massage room. We continued to build the case and search for other victims.

The SDNY team, including Ms. Comey, spent a lot of time assuring victims that their willingness to testify might bring them some kind of justice.

I don’t know how the victims will respond to the news that Ms. Comey was fired before Maxwell’s appeals were exhausted (to say nothing of the Diddy sentencing, currently scheduled for October 3). But these victims put trust into Maurene Comey. Maurene Comey was one of the few people who convinced them she would take on very powerful people in search of justice for them.

And Pam Bondi fired her, on Donald Trump’s personal authority.

There’s one more detail. According to Berman, not long before he killed himself, Epstein proffered cooperation with SDNY, in another bid to get a sweetheart plea deal.

[Reid Weingarten] said that he had just come from meeting with Epstein at the Metropolitan Correctional Center and that his client was not happy. (Good! I remember thinking.) “I think my client might want to have an interesting conversation with your office,” he said.

I had expected an overture. With Epstein facing forty-five years in prison—a life sentence for a man his age—it made sense for him to want a deal. But my openness to one was quite limited. He’d already been given the deal of the century in South Florida, buying him more than a decade of undeserved freedom.

Prosecutors, though, never foreclose the conversation. At minimum, you may get new leads, more victims to talk to, additional perpetrators. “The Southern District is always interested in having interesting conversations,”

I said. I told my team to expect a call. A few days later, Weingarten reached out. He said that his client would come in for a proffer—an agreement between a defendant and a prosecutor’s office in which the defendant agrees to share information with the understanding that his statements won’t be used against him at trial.

But Epstein had one condition: he wanted assurances that the SDNY did not see him as a rapist. That was the end of that. He was a rapist, and we were not about to give him some other, more polite-sounding label.

Ms. Comey would be one of the people privy to that proffered testimony.

That doesn’t mean she’ll go release it, or even start naming the rapists who victimized the girls Epstein trafficked. Unlike Bondi and her top aides, Ms. Comey will presumably honor her ethical duty.

But having fired Ms. Comey, one of a few people who earned the trust of sex trafficking victims that she would go after the powerful to seek justice for them, and having claimed to do so on the President’s own authority, Pam Bondi has chosen to fire precisely the person who championed justice for sex trafficking victims … and she did so in Donald Trump’s name.

Update: I should say one more thing. It’s possible Bondi (“Blondi,” as Laura Loomer has dubbed her) did this in response to pressure from Loomer. As I noted here, Trump seems loathe to confront Loomer directly, and Bondi is trying hard to shrug off the pressure of Loomer.

But Loomer, for all her hubris, really is pretty dumb about politics outside of her bubble, to say nothing of the law. For example, she’s calling for a Special Counsel to be appointed on Epstein, but under Trump’s FL Get out of Jail Free Card, that would likely require Senate confirmation. So it would be especially rich if Bondi did something this stupid in response to pressure from Loomer.

Update: Politico reports that Ms. Comey sent a letter to colleagues warning against fear.

“If a career prosecutor can be fired without reason, fear may seep into the decisions of those who remain. Do not let that happen,” she wrote. “Fear is the tool of a tyrant, wielded to suppress independent thought. Instead of fear, let this moment fuel the fire that already burns at the heart of this place. A fire of righteous indignation at abuses of power. Of commitment to seek justice for victims. Of dedication to truth above all else.”

[snip]

In her parting message, Comey wrote that during her nearly 10 years at the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s office, her goal was “making sure people with access, money, and power were not treated differently than anyone else; and making sure this office remained separate from politics and focused only on the facts and the law.”

“Fear,” she wrote, “was never really conceivable.”

There was a delightful moment on Xitter today (and by “delightful … on Xitter” I mean yet another stunning shitshow at Elon’s Nazi Bar), when Jonathan Martin presumed to fact check just one element of Trump’s latest tweet attempting to enforce loyalty around Epstein.

It’s as if Martin genuinely believes that the things included in Trump’s tweet are factual assertions. It’s as if Martin has no fucking clue that this tweet — virtually all Trump tweets — are an attempt to reinforce polarization pivoting around himself as the center of all power: In group, out group, create your very own reality by tweet to which your in group must adhere and the out group reinforces by posing in opposition to it. This is, they always are, about reinforcing his cult.

Let’s lay out all the things that lefties and journalists like Martin are disseminating today, as if they were transparent statements of truth, clinging to their blind faith that language is transparent, even when wielded by a guy who doesn’t hide his authoritarian aspirations.

The Radical Left Democrats have hit pay dirt, again! Just like with the FAKE and fully discredited Steele[*] Dossier, the lying 51 “Intelligence” Agents, the Laptop from Hell, which the Dems swore had come from Russia (No, it came from Hunter Biden’s bathroom!), and even the Russia, Russia, Russia Scam itself, a totally fake and made up story used in order to hide Crooked Hillary Clinton’s big loss in the 2016 Presidential Election, these Scams and Hoaxes are all the Democrats are good at – It’s all they have – They are no good at governing, no good at policy, and no good at picking winning candidates. Also, unlike Republicans, they stick together like glue. Their new SCAM is what we will forever call the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax, and my PAST supporters have bought into this “bullshit,” hook, line, and sinker. They haven’t learned their lesson, and probably never will, even after being conned by the Lunatic Left for 8 long years. I have had more success in 6 months than perhaps any President in our Country’s history, and all these people want to talk about, with strong prodding by the Fake News and the success starved Dems, is the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax. Let these weaklings continue forward and do the Democrats work, don’t even think about talking of our incredible and unprecedented success, because I don’t want their support anymore! Thank you for your attention to this matter. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! [my emphasis]

Here’s what Trump’s latest post looks like as a series of truth claims, with my assessment of the truth — or, more often, the utility — of each.

Democrats have hit pay dirt. There’s a great deal that is not said in this sentence, perhaps to avoid the logical conflict of his past screed about Epstein, where in sequential sentences Trump said, repeatedly, that Democrats created the “Epstein files,” but then asked, “Why didn’t these Radical Left Lunatics release the Epstein Files?” Perhaps Trump is assuming familiarity with that earlier screed. Nevertheless, he starts by claiming that Democrats are succeeding at … he doesn’t say what, with the Epstein story. That’s actually true though: the Democrats’ focus on Epstein is undermining Trump’s coalition, but they’re able to do so largely thanks to Trump’s own reliance on conspiracy and the ineptitude of his own Deep State.

The Steele dossier is fake. Note, Trump actually issued two versions of this tweet, the second one just to correct the spelling of “Steel.” I think Trump is justified in claiming that some — but not all — of the allegations in the Steele dossier are fake. That’s why he has spent years building his polarization around it.

The Steele dossier is fully discredited. Again, I think it’s fair that the dossier itself has not stood up to scrutiny.

Dems created that story. While it is true that, after Oleg Deripaska first paid Christopher Steele (indirectly) to hunt down dirt on Paul Manafort, the dossier itself was funded (indirectly) by Democrats. But there’s abundant reason to believe that Deripaska, who learned about it in real time, was able to fill it with disinformation (though Steele denies this). And the most inflammatory allegation — that Michael Cohen colluded with Russia to address the Russian scandal — likely involved Dmitry Peskov’s office, the one guy who definitely knew that Cohen and Trump were both lying to hide that they had been in direct communication with the Kremlin, with Peskov’s office, during the election, in pursuit of an impossibly lucrative real estate deal. So while Democrats paid Steele (again, indirectly), they didn’t create the false stories. There’s very good reason to believe Russia created at least some of them.

The 51 people who signed a letter saying that the Hunter Biden laptop looked like a Russian information operation were analysts. Here’s where Trump starts telling a series of lies about the letter that 51 former spooks wrote raising questions about the Hunter Biden laptop. By calling them “Intelligence” analysts, Trump attempts to denigrate them in two ways. He is attacking the very idea of intelligence. And he is minimizing the qualifications of many of those — including John Brennan and James Clapper — who signed the letter. Plus, while some of the signatories were analysts, some had other intelligence functions, including operational roles.

The 51 former spooks lied. The former spooks did not lie in real time — they expressed an opinion that the emails published by Rudy Giuliani had the earmarks of a Russian information operation and substantiated the reasons for that opinion with a number of true reasons. And some of the people who signed the letter say they still believe the Hunter Biden laptop — the packaging up of all the records on one laptop — could be an information operation. Nothing in the Hunter Biden prosecutions disproves that — the FBI never digitally validated the laptop, never did an index of what was on it and when it got added. Indeed records prosecutors themselves submitted suggest that the copy of a laptop that John Paul Mac Isaac shared with Rudy did not match the laptop as it was earlier shared with the FBI.

The 51 former spooks “swore” the laptop came from Russia. The 51 spooks did not swear the laptop came from Russia. They wrote an unsworn letter asserting that it had the earmarks of Russian involvement, even stating “we do not know if the emails, provided to the New York Post by President Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, are genuine or not and that we do not have evidence of Russian involvement.”

Dems created that story. Again, Trump is misstating the Democrats’ role here. Dems definitely were behind the writing of the letter (though with the involvement of non-partisan spooks). But Rudy was the guy who — after soliciting help from alleged Russian intelligence agents over the course of a year — released the files in such a way that they could not be verified.

The laptop came from Hunter Biden’s bathroom. This allegation, like a recent claim Trump has made that the laptop came from Hunter’s bedside, doesn’t match the known facts but is very interesting nonetheless. The stated provenance of the laptop shared with John Paul Mac Isaac is that Hunter Biden dropped it off and JPMI offered it up to the FBI. But there is another laptop — the one Keith Ablow sat on for a year — that did come from inside a cottage Biden was renting that directly abuts on Ablow’s office. This claim the laptop came from Hunter’s personal space doesn’t make sense, but it seems to envision the possibility that Ablow (who is friends with Roger Stone) had a role in the Rudy laptop caper.

Russia, Russia, Russia is a “totally fake and made up story.” Trump’s Coffee Boy, Campaign Manager, National Security Adviser, personal attorney, and rat-fucker were all legally adjudged to have lied to cover up details of Trump’s ties to Russia in the 2016 election. They lied about:

• An impossibly lucrative business deal that Michael Cohen and Trump were chasing during the election
• When and how the Trump campaign learned that Russia planned to release stolen emails to hurt Hillary
• What Manafort said during an August 2, 2016 meeting with alleged Russian spy Konstantin Kilimnik, at which they discussed:
  • The campaign strategy to beat Hillary in swing states
  • A plan to carve up Ukraine
  • How Manafort would get paid, including by Deripaska, whom the FBI also alleges has ties to Russian intelligence
• Whether and how Roger Stone got advanced notice of the stolen files WikiLeaks would later drop, starting around the same time his lifelong buddy Manafort had that meeting with Kilimnik
• Trump’s plans to undercut President Obama’s efforts to punish Russia for the election interference

Russia is not a totally fake story in the least: It’s true that those lies — and Trump’s rewarding of them with pardons — prevented Robert Mueller from ever explaining what the men were lying about. But that doesn’t make it fake; it makes the truth unexplained. Data mules who disseminate such claims without correction are complicit in disinformation.

Dems created that story. While Democrats supported the investigation into Trump’s aides, they didn’t contribute in any way to the lies told by his Coffee Boy, Campaign Manager, National Security Adviser, personal attorney, or rat-fucker. Indeed, Trump’s own actions — his attempts to dismiss the import of Mike Flynn’s lies — caused the FBI to keep digging.

Hillary Clinton is crooked. Trump’s DOJ conducted two extended investigations into Hillary Clinton, first the Clinton Foundation, and then her concerns about Trump’s Russia ties. Very motivated prosecutors never managed to implicate her in any crime. Meanwhile, much of what Trump claims implicates Hillary — like a corrupt foundation or making false public claims about an opponent or weaponizing the FBI to fabricate a case against one’s political adversaries — are things he himself does, on top of the open financial corruption.

Hillary Clinton had a big loss in the 2016 Presidential Election. In 2016, Hillary had the exact same electoral loss that Trump had in 2020: 232 Electoral Votes to 306. But Hillary won the popular vote.

The Russia story was used to “hide” Clinton’s loss in the 2016 Presidential Election. Hillary Clinton freely conceded the election. And while she has said Russia had a factor in the loss (a claim that has never been tested), most Democrats, including Hillary, point to Jim Comey’s shenanigans as the proximate cause for her loss, a claim Trump himself reinforced when he fired Comey.

Democrats are only good at hoaxes. This section begins Trump’s attempted jujitsu at creating polarization around political success or failure. Democrats actually suck at hoaxes, as the spectacular backfiring of the Steele dossier shows.

Democrats are no good at governing, policy, or picking winning candidates. Trump’s attempts to reverse Biden’s policies are already resulting in inflation and economic decline. And Democrats certainly picked the winning Presidential candidate in 2020!

Democrats stick together like glue. That Jonathan Martin even imagined Trump meant this as a serious fact claim is farcical. The Dems are squabbling right now over how much support to give their rising new star, Zohran Mamdani! But Trump is using this statement to set up artificial conflict in an attempt to regain the loyalty of his followers. That is, he’s attempting to contrast non-existing Democratic unity with alleged disunity on the right.

The Jeffrey Epstein scandal is new. The sweetheart plea deal that Alex Acosta signed with Jeffrey Epstein was in 2008. Acosta joined Trump’s cabinet in 2017. Trump’s hand-picked US Attorney Geoffrey Berman charged Epstein anew in 2019, the same year Epstein killed himself. Ghislaine Maxwell was charged under Trump, too, shortly after Trump’s AG fired Berman to stop various investigations implicating people close to him. Maxwell’s prosecution and conviction took place under the Joe Biden Administration — but Trump’s own DOJ just declined to intervene in Maxwell’s appeal to the SCOTUS. The scandal has rolled out over years, during many of which Trump himself was President and Trump’s own people, from his chosen FBI leads to his own family members to key pro-Trump trolls to his Vice President, have sustained Epstein as a current issue.

We will forever call the Jeffrey Epstein scandal “the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax.” Trump is, here, attempting to slot in the Epstein scandal as a hoax besides the other true things (plus the Steele dossier) that Trump has convinced his followers are not true. Trump is exceedingly good at repetition of his chosen labels so this one is likely to stick.

Those who “buy this ‘bullshit” are Trump’s “PAST” supporters. Trump here is playing a loyalty game, effectively pushing those who continue to chase the Epstein scandal into his out group.

Those past supporters have been “conned … for 8 long years.” After trying to push those adhering to the Epstein scandal to an out group, Trump falsely claims they’ve believed anything but what he has told them in the last eight years. Heck, Trump’s own FBI Director, Deputy Director, and Attorney General were very recently chasing this scandal, and Trump isn’t pushing them into an out group.

Trump has had more success in six months than perhaps any President in history. Trump has had political success, sure, with Republicans in Congress backing his policies largely unquestioningly. But his chosen policies are beginning to destroy America.

Trump’s past supporters “want to do the Democrats [sic] work.” Again, this is an attempt to push those adhering to the Epstein scandal into the off group, accusing them of disloyalty.

Trump’s past supporters should not “even think about talking of our incredible and unprecedented success.” This is yet more attempt to push those adhering to the Epstein scandal into an out group, a group he is attempting to prohibit from sharing in his claimed success.

Trump doesn’t want the support of those past supporters anymore. Trump of course wants the support of the 30% of his base that adheres to the Epstein scandal — as both a formal study and Harry Enten’s polling make clear, “Donald Trump would not have won the Presidency in 2024 if it were not for the backing of QAnon believers.” This is yet another attempt to lure people away from the Epstein scandal by pushing them into an out group.

Thank you for your attention to this matter. This is a new standard element to Trump’s tweets. Perhaps someone (Susie Wiles?) believes it gives Trump gravitas. Still, it’s nice that Trump is thanking us for doing what so many can’t withstand, paying attention to his every tweet.

Trump wants to make America like it was in some idyllic past. The slogan “make America great again,” mobilizes an every-moving sense of nostalgia (and, for many, racism) that works especially well with disaffected people. Repeating it as Trump does reinforces his in-group that believes the past was some kind of idyllic time.

This post is, at current count, almost 2,200 words, 1,900 if you exclude the actual tweet. This is the kind of fact checking and context that journalists should do every time before they disseminate Trump’s tweets. Doing anything less — disseminating a 200th tweet that claims “Russia Russia Russia is a hoax” without rebuttal is simply cooperating in the disinformation (to say nothing about how critical comments reinforce the out group dynamic).

These are not truth claims, poor naive Politico “Senior political columnist,” Jonathan Martin. I’m sorry I need to explain this to you, eight years into Trump’s regime by tweet. I’m sorry you haven’t thought about how much disinformation you helped to repeat unquestioned over those years. But these were never truth claims.

This tweet, like most of Trump’s tweets, is an attempt to reinforce via repetition — especially repetition of Trump’s false claims of victimization — the polarization and tribalism that leads his followers to adhere to him so unquestionably. It is true that Epstein is posing unprecedented challenges for this operation. But journalists would do well to use this moment to think about how Trump’s tweets work, and have always worked.

* In a rare move, Trump issued a second version of this post, correcting an initial misspelling, “Steel.”