Pam Bondi’s Replacement Reveals He’s Worse on Epstein Than She Was

The man tapped to fill Pam Bondi’s shoes isn’t any better at handling the Epstein files than she was.

Hours after Donald Trump named him as Bondi’s temporary successor on Thursday, acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche took to Fox News, weaving a bold-faced lie about the celebrity pedophile investigation to the network’s conservative audience.

“The Department of Justice has now released all the files with respect to the Epstein saga,” Blanche said. “[Former] Attorney General Bondi and I appeared in front of Congress voluntarily a couple weeks ago to answer any questions they had. We have made every single congressman—senator—available to come and see any document, redacted or unredacted, that they want.

“To the extent the Epstein files was a part of the past year of this Justice Department, it should not be a part of anything going forward,” Blanche added.

But the notion that the DOJ has released everything it has on the Epstein files just isn’t true.

The agency has released roughly 3.5 million pages of evidence related to Epstein’s crimes, but according to a memo from Blanche’s former office in January, the DOJ’s “collection efforts resulted in more than 6 million pages being identified.” That would suggest the agency has only released about half of the evidence that DOJ employees had already determined to be related to the case.

Failing to provide all of the documentation related to the Epstein files is in violation of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, passed by Congress and signed by Trump into law in November.

Lawmakers were quick to call out the discrepancy in Blanche’s numbers, indicating that the Epstein files are likely to be just as big an issue for the new DOJ chief as for his predecessor.

“This is a lie. About 50 percent of the files have been released and per our subpoena it’s illegal to withhold them,” wrote California Representative Robert Garcia on X, responding to a clip of the interview. “Blanche may think it’s over, but we are just getting started.”

At least one Republican similarly put Blanche to task, reminding the new DOJ head of the looming release deadline.

“Congratulations AG Blanche,” posted Kentucky Representative Thomas Massie. “Now you have 30 days to release the rest of the files before becoming criminally liable for failure to comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act.”

President Trump is seeking the largest military budget in this country’s modern history for 2027, even as a multitude of domestic issues—from health care to housing, to the general cost of living—continue to persist.

The White House on Friday requested $1.5 trillion from Congress, which would amount to a 40 percent increase from what the Pentagon spent this fiscal year. The budget would come at the expense of the social safety net, with the administration estimating at least $73 billion in cuts across domestic programs. This comes just days after Trump told his supporters at a private lunch that “it’s not possible for us to take care of daycare, Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things.”

The White House’s budget fact sheets state its intention to “cut woke programs” like the Environmental Protection Agency’s Environmental Justice Program, the Community Services Block Grants meant to address poverty, and the Community Development Financial Institutions Fund, which supports banks and lenders in underserved parts of the country. The Trump administration claims such programs have been “hijacked by radicals” and “advance critical race theory.”

Trump is asking for a trillion-dollar check for death and destruction while actively shutting down programs that help Americans of all backgrounds, all while so many people can’t afford to buy a home, pay off their student loans, or even break a leg.

This story has been updated.

President Donald Trump is bragging about committing war crimes in Iran—and promising to commit even more.

The U.S. military executed a double-tap strike on a highway bridge outside of Tehran, according to a U.S. official who spoke anonymously to The New York Times Thursday.

The two strikes reportedly struck the bridge roughly an hour apart, with the second arriving while emergency responders, who are considered protected civilians, were assisting the wounded.

In a post on Truth Social Thursday night, the U.S. president appeared to celebrate that strike and promise more destruction like it.

“Our Military, the greatest and most powerful (by far!) anywhere in the World, hasn’t even started destroying what’s left in Iran. Bridges next, then Electric Power Plants! New Regime leadership knows what has to be done, and has to be done, FAST!” Trump wrote.

The military official claimed the strike site was a planned military supply route for Iran’s missile and drone forces, but Iran’s deputy governor of Alborz Province, Ghodratollah Seif, flatly denied that characterization, according to the Times.

Seif said that there was “absolutely no military activity” on the bridge. The dead and wounded reportedly included civilians who had been picnicking in a nearby park for the final day of the Persian New Year.

A former State Department lawyer told the Times that the bridge appeared to have been “targeted not to provide any military advantage but in the hopes of coercing Tehran and generating content.”

Of course, extensive destruction not justified by a military necessity is a war crime, and these wouldn’t be the first the U.S. military has committed in Trump’s reckless war.

Despite being fired by President Trump on Thursday, outgoing Attorney General Pam Bondi may still have to respond to a congressional subpoena and testify under oath in two weeks.

Last month, five Republicans joined every single Democrat on the House Oversight Committee to vote to subpoena Bondi, and on Thursday, Democrats and even Republicans on the committee said that they still expected Bondi to show up and answer questions about her handling of the government’s release of files on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

“Pam Bondi and Donald Trump may think her firing gets her out of testifying to the Oversight Committee,” ranking member Robert Garcia posted on X, along with a statement on behalf of the committee’s Democrats. “They are wrong—and we look forward to hearing from her under oath.”

Republicans didn’t hold back, either.

“My subpoena still stands,” Republican Representative Nancy Mace posted. “When the Oversight Committee moved to subpoena Bondi, I did it by name, not by or not as the sitting Attorney General of the U.S. RELEASE THE EPSTEIN FILES.”

Representative Lauren Boebert, also a Republican member of the committee, made a joke about Bondi’s infamous comments about stock market gains in response to questions about Epstein during a congressional hearing in February.

“DOW fell below 50,000?” Boebert posted on X, suggesting she has little sympathy for Bondi and may also still support the subpoena.

Republican Representative and Oversight Chair James Comer isn’t being so forthcoming, though. In a statement, a committee spokesperson said, “Since Pam Bondi is no longer Attorney General, Chairman Comer will speak with Republican members and the Department of Justice about the status of the deposition subpoena and confer on next steps.”

Will Trump and his fellow Republicans stop Bondi from testifying? While the president was clearly dissatisfied with Bondi’s performance (and her firing may have had to do with more than just Epstein), he may try to keep her quiet because of how much she knows about him.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has fired the highest-ranking Army officer in the country in the middle of the U.S. war on Iran.

On Thursday, CBS News reported that Hegseth had asked Gen. Randy George, the Army’s chief of staff, to step down and retire. The Biden appointee’s term was set to end in 2027; Army chiefs of staff typically serve four-year terms. George joins more than a dozen high-ranking military officers who have been fired since Hegseth and his ultra-hawkish ideology took over at the Pentagon.

According to CBS, the Pentagon wanted someone who’d do a better job of listening to Hegseth and President Trump and their vision for the Army. “We are grateful for his service, but it was time for a leadership change in the Army,” an official said. The move comes at a crucial moment, as the U.S.-Israeli joint war in Iran grows more serious. On Thursday, Trump and Hegseth promised to bomb Iran “back to the Stone Age.”