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60 Minutes Quietly Killed Story About Epstein’s Shady Banking Tactics

Senator Ron Wyden sat for an interview with correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi about Jeffrey Epstein’s bank transactions. Alfonsi was fired for other reasons shortly after, and the story never aired.

A woman holds a stack of papers titled "The Partially Redacted Epstein Files" as survivors of his abuse meet with Senators on Capitol Hill.
Alex Wroblewski/AFP/Getty Images

CBS’s 60 Minutes had the scoop on Jeffrey Epstein’s sketchy financials—before the Bari Weiss-run network fired the reporter fronting the investigation.

A new report by Democratic Senator Ron Wyden revealed that Deutsche Bank AG, JPMorgan Chase, and Bank of America enabled Epstein by permitting millions in suspicious transactions over the course of the sex offender’s criminal career.

Deutsche Bank AG failed to promptly notify authorities of more than $250 million in questionable transfers tied to Epstein, according to Wyden’s report. Those included cash amounts to pay women in Russia and Eastern Europe—which the bank retroactively informed U.S. officials of after Epstein was arrested on sex trafficking charges in July 2019.

Bank of America Corp. reported $170 million in Epstein-related transactions tied to billionaire Leon Black. The bank, according to Wyden’s report, noted years later that the transactions had “no apparent economic, business, or lawful purpose.”

JPMorgan Chase, as previously reported, processed more than $1 billion for Epstein, despite internal concerns at the bank.

Yet former 60 Minutes correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi had the story months ago, having interviewed Wyden in March about her own investigation into Wall Street banks’ and the U.S. Virgin Islands government’s relationship with Epstein, according to Bloomberg.

But the report, and Wyden’s interview, would never air: Alfonsi was fired by CBS News leadership in the midst of a major network shakeup two months later in May, when she publicly criticized Weiss’s editorial grip on the storied news magazine. Weiss had blocked a segment Alfonsi previously reported on Donald Trump’s deportation program and El Salvador’s notoriously lethal CECOT prison.

A spokesperson for CBS News confirmed to Bloomberg that Alfonsi had interviewed Wyden earlier this year, but said the story had not been finished by the end of the last 60 Minutes season. The spokesperson did not elaborate on whether the show intended to air the segment during next season.

Trump Personally Calls Rep. Accused of Abuse to Warn About Midterms

“Things aren’t looking good,” Donald Trump told Representative Max Miller.

Representative Max Miller speaks at a podium during an event. Donald Trump stands behind him.
Representative Max Miller and President Trump
Eli Hiller/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Representative Max Miller and President Trump

President Donald Trump reached out to Ohio Representative Max Miller, who is facing allegations that he assaulted his ex-wife and child, to warn him that his candidacy is in jeopardy. 

In a phone call, Trump told Miller that “things aren’t looking good” for the November midterms, Axios reported Monday night. 

While Trump may be delivering—or simply hoping to give the impression of—tough love behind closed doors, the president defended Miller while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office earlier Monday.

“It’s a very sad thing. I know Max. He’s a good person. I mean, I’ve always thought he was a very good person, and I’m gonna let the families figure that out,” Trump told the press.

The president alluded to knowing the family very well. Before running for office, Miller was a Trump White House aide. Miller married Emily Moreno, his now ex-wife, at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, in 2022, and received the president’s official endorsement for Congress that same year.  

Moreno has accused Miller of assaulting her, throwing a pot of boiling water on her, holding a gun to her head, and breaking their two-year-old daughter’s collarbone. Last week, Moreno filed for a new restraining order against her ex-husband, alleging that he’d physically grabbed one of her attorneys and used a profane slur. 

In a statement Sunday, Ohio Senator Bernie Moreno, Emily’s father, said that Miller should “not serve in the House of Representatives.” 

“As he has admitted privately, Max Miller needs serious psychological help. He is a danger to my daughter, and I hold my breath every minute he has custody of my granddaughter,” Moreno wrote on X

Miller responded saying that Moreno’s statement was “all political.”

Miller was dealt another blow Monday night when his ex-girlfriend, former White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham, filed a temporary restraining order against him.

Court Rules Trump Clearly Wanted to Discriminate Against New Citizens

A federal court has blocked the Trump administration’s ban on voter registration assistance for new citizens.

A new citizen in Rhode Island smiles as she's handed a bag of voting materials. Other new citizens sit near her.
A new citizen in Rhode Island is handed a bag of voting materials during a naturalization ceremony, July 22.
John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
A new citizen in Rhode Island is handed a bag of voting materials during a naturalization ceremony, July 22.

The Trump administration’s attempt to prevent new American citizens from receiving help on voter registration was blocked in federal court Monday.

U.S. District Judge Adam B. Abelson paused a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services policy from last August preventing nonpartisan groups from helping new citizens register to vote.

Under the policy, only state and local election officials were allowed to offer help with voter registration at citizenship ceremonies, prompting the League of Women Voters and National Council of Jewish Women (NJCW) to sue the government over it.

“NCJW has amply shown a likelihood of success on the merits of its claim that the Ban was motivated by discriminatory intent,” Abelson wrote in his ruling. “The various statements by government officials leading up to the Ban that NCJW cites further support this conclusion, including USCIS Director Joseph Edlow’s statement that immigrants threaten to reshape the nation electorally by becoming citizens.”

Abelson also cited Edlow’s comments to right-wing website Breitbart last year, in which he claimed that Democrats’ “long-term plan, I think we have to assume, was to grant some sort of mass amnesty, make them all citizens, and then spread them out to try to change demographics elsewhere throughout the country.”

The ruling restores the agency’s previous policy, where nonpartisan organizations are allowed to help with voter registration when state and local election officials aren’t able to attend naturalization ceremonies. It’s a policy that was in place for decades until 2025, including during Trump’s first term, and thousands of new voters have benefited. In 2024, the League of Women Voters helped to register over 122,000 new voters at naturalization ceremonies.

Abelson’s ruling is not final, but only pauses USCIS’s policy while it gets a full review in federal court. The government’s own words won’t help its case, considering that many administration officials, including Vice President JD Vance, have echoed statements alluding to the white nationalist “great replacement” theory that liberals and the left seek to replace a white electorate with nonwhite immigrants. For now, though, new citizens should have an easier time registering to vote.

Trump Furious as Jeanine Pirro “Choked” in Reflecting Pool Case

Trump is considering firing the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia after she dropped the Reflecting Pool “vandalism” case.

U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro looks on during a press conference.
U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro

President Trump is not happy over how Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, handled the prosecution of alleged vandalism at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

CNN reports that Trump is considering firing Pirro, a former Fox News host, over the Department of Justice’s legal admission that the pool’s peeling stemmed from “flawed” renovation work and not vandals like ex–Olympic canoeist David Hearn, who was federally indicted before charges against him were dropped.

One unnamed source told CNN that Trump is “furious” with Pirro and thinks that it’s “highly likely she’s removed from her job,” while another told the network that the president was “blindsided” by the DOJ filing from Pirro’s office.

“The president did not know beforehand that she was going to do that,” the source told CNN.

Trump confirmed his dissatisfaction with Pirro Monday, telling reporters in the Oval Office that he thinks “she choked, because the judge was really vicious. Instead of going after the people that did it, the judge went after her and went after her department, and I guess she choked. I don’t know what the hell happened.”

When a reporter asked Trump if he was reconsidering Pirro’s role, he snapped.

“I don’t know what—you’re fake news. Don’t ever talk again. You’re fake news, one of the worst in the business. Fortunately, nobody watches you,” Trump said.

Trump has made construction, beautification, and renovation projects around Washington, D.C., his highest priority in his second term, but his $14 million efforts to “fix” the Reflecting Pool keep failing. The “American flag blue” paint he added because he didn’t like the look of green algae was quickly obscured by, well, algal blooms. His contractors added hydrogen peroxide to kill the algae, failing to realize that it’s a paint thinner, and the blue lining started to peel away.

Unwilling to admit that he caused the peeling, Trump went on a witch hunt against alleged vandals, which is where the spurious charges from Pirro’s office against Hearn came from. Now that the case has fallen through, Trump may soon take out his anger by firing Pirro. Meanwhile, the pool looks much worse than before.

Republicans Now Trying to Trick Voters Into Limiting Their Own Power

Missouri Republicans are pushing a devious ballot measure this primary election.

A person writes at a table with a big "Vote" cardboard divider blocking him and his ballot from view.
Jeff Kowalsky/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Missourians are about to vote on their own power to change the state constitution.

Missouri, along with 26 other states and Washington, D.C., has a process by which voters can gather signatures and initiate amendments to the state constitution by putting a ballot measure to a vote. As it stands, if a citizen-led amendment wins a simple statewide majority—six of Missouri’s eight congressional districts—the initiative will pass.

But Tuesday’s primary election might take that away.

Amendment 4, placed on the ballot by Missouri Republicans, would require any citizen-led amendment to pass in all eight districts, rather than the traditional six. This means that any single district could tank an amendment, regardless of popular support in the rest of the state. No other state makes it that hard.

“I view it as a politician’s power grab,” Franklin County resident Derek Schriewer told The Missouri Independent. “They are trying to take away a typical function that we have had for over 100 years for citizens to be able to hold politicians accountable.”

Doug Kerr, chairman of the Knox County Republican Central Committee and a staunch supporter of Amendment 4, argued that GOP interests were not getting enough representation—despite the Republican supermajority in the state legislature.

“Our voices are not being heard,” Kerr told The Missouri Independent. “We’re not just a democracy. We are a democratic republic, and the rights of the minority should at least be heard. And right now, they’re not.”

Amendment 4 has powerful allies, and not just among Republican state representatives. It has also been endorsed by Missouri’s most salient agricultural lobby, the Missouri Farm Bureau, as well as the Missouri Right to Life PAC. Campaign spending, both for and against the measure, is through the roof, and Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins is predicting the highest primary turnout among Missouri voters since 2004.

In recent years, Missouri voters have relied on citizen-led amendments to expand Medicaid access, legalize recreational marijuana, approve sports betting, and enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution.

The irony of Amendment 4 is that it only cuts one way. Lawmakers aren’t limiting their own power to change the state constitution—they will still have the power to put constitutional amendments on the ballot. But if voters want to do the same thing, they’re out of luck.