OMG: Jamie Raskin drops BOMB on Pam Bondi

I'm joined now by Congressman Jamie Raskin. Congressman, thanks for joining me again. Hey, Brian. Good to see you, man. So there was a moment during the Pam Bondi hearing that really caught everybody's attention. I think this was actually the most viewed after the fact clip during the entire hearing. I'm going to throw that right here on this screen.

The American people need to know this. They are talking about Epstein today. This has been around since the Obama administration. This administration released over 3 million pages of documents, over 3 million, and Donald Trump signed that law to release all of those documents. He is the most transparent president in the nation's history and none of them, none of them, asked Merrick Garland over the last four years one word about Jeffrey Epstein. How ironic is that? You

know why? Because Donald Trump, the Dow, the Dow right now is over, the Dow is over $50,000. I don't know why you're laughing. You're a great stock trader. As I hear Raskin, the Dow is over 50,000 right now.

So Congressman, that was Pam Bondi basically crashing out over the fact that people dared ask her questions about Epstein when the Dow is over 50,000. And she actually referred back to you because you were, it seems, rightfully laughing at the fact that Pam Bondi's deflection attempt here was to say that we couldn't put that we can't answer any questions about Epstein when the Dow is so high. Can I have your reaction to what it was like when that moment took place?

Well, I warned her before we started in my opening that we were not going to tolerate her changing the subject, filibustering, insulting members, engaging in ad hominem attacks in order to eat up our time. We only get five minutes a piece, and we each had about five hours of questions for Pam Bondi about all of the corruption and lawlessness engulfing the Department of Justice. So as you know, as all of America now knows and can see, she didn't answer any of our questions.

She dodged pretty much every substantive question there was, certainly from the Democrats and many from the Republicans, including from Thomas Massie. And she would literally just change the subject. So you would ask her about what she's doing to make amends with the Epstein victims whose privacy rights were violated because Pam Bondi published their names, phone numbers, addresses, and private information in the published materials when she was under

strict orders to redact all of that. And then she would talk about how great the DAO is. And she's the attorney general. She's not the governor of the Fed. And of course, whatever, they don't have anything to do with the economy. Certainly when when jobs are being lost, when the economy is crashing, they pretend they have nothing to do with it. But only when it's going up, they want to take credit for it. So in any event, yeah, then I think that she may have gotten her insults mixed up. She arrived with a burn book, I think they call it, with all of the insults compiled for each

of the members. And I am not a stock trader. I believe that I have just mutual funds from the days when I was a law professor. So I think she must have confused those with insults she had been preparing for somebody else. But she also did remember to call me, I think, a washed up loser lawyer. I didn't hear that exactly. If I'd heard it, I would have said, no, actually, I'm a washed up loser law professor. But in any event, you know, she was just filled with insults and complete distractions from what we were there to talk about the massive invasion of people's civil rights and civil liberties

taking place in Minneapolis and around the country and her outrageous betrayal of all of the Epstein victims and her obstinate refusal to do anything to prosecute the multitude of crimes that are so clearly

Present there and that's a part. I want to dig into here because she said while she was testifying that that she that she would You know Pleading basically with any survivors or anybody with information to come to the DOJ that they would welcome these people with open arms There were an entire Roseworth of survivors seated behind her. And when they were asked point blank if the DOJ had reached out to them

or even responded to their overtures to the DOJ, that they had all been ignored. And so how do you square those two things when you say out of one side of your mouth that you're seeking out this information that would help get to the bottom of these crimes.

But then when you have people who have that information, you basically close your door to them.

Right. And it's perfectly clear to me now that we are living through, uh, one of the greatest, if not the greatest coverups of American history. And it goes all the way back to Alex Acosta, who was later made the secretary of labor for Donald Trump. But when he was the US attorney in the Southern District of Florida, there was a 60 count federal, 60 federal count indictment ready to go against Jeffrey Epstein and Glenn Maxwell

and other co-conspirators for this massive international child sex trafficking ring. And then suddenly it got thrown overboard for one count of state solicitation to prostitution with the sweetest of sweetheart plea bargains of all time where Jeffrey Epstein took one year, but it wasn't one year in jail or in prison. He was free for 12 hours during the day and he would go and spend the night down at the county facility and was free to continue frolicking with all of his criminal games during the daytime.

And then meantime, there was a non-prosecution agreement made for a lot of other people who were involved in his orbit. That was the beginning of this outrageous double standard of justice that we've seen for Epstein and what a lot of my colleagues are calling the Epstein class of rich and powerful men

who seem to be able to get away with everything. And there were Republicans in there and there were Democrats in there. The difference is the Democrats are saying, let the chips fall where they may. All of those crimes should be identified and prosecuted. And anybody who raped an underage girl should be going to prison. Anybody who participated in human trafficking should be

going to prison, regardless of political party. You will never hear the Republicans, except for Thomas Massie and one or two others say that because for them, Donald Trump is by definition always innocent or as he said today, 100 percent exonerated.

Right. Congressman, have you had the opportunity to go look at, I would say the unredacted files, but from all of the reporting and everything I've heard from your colleagues, they're largely not unredacted. But have you had the opportunity to go through and look? Yeah, I think because I'm local here, right

near D.C. in Maryland, I think I was the first person to get over there and I spent four

or five hours there. So in your in your in your time that you've spent looking over these files, did anything strike you? Was there anything that you hadn't

known before? Any any information that you can share on the existence of co-conspirators? Well, there are a couple of interesting things that I will share with you, but I do want to start with the big picture here, Brian, which is I want you to think about the various levels of redaction and evasion that are taking place. First of all, there are six million documents and Pam Bondi said, we're just gonna show you 3 million. 3 million of the others are duplicative. Well, if they're duplicative, just release them. But any event, we know they're not duplicative

because the number of the victims said they were looking for the memos, the prosecutor memos of their original victim statements and they're not in there. So those have been withheld along with a number of other government documents,

including the original trial memorandum that had been written by the Department of Justice. They've suppressed that. So they're hiding a lot of stuff there. So that's the first level. Actually, let me start again.

The first level is really everything that's been destroyed. Anything that's been destroyed or just disappears at the first level. Then we've got the stuff that still exists, but they don't want us to see. And so that's part of the 3 million documents.

They're not showing us. Then we get to the 3 million documents that they've shown us, but 200,000 pages of those have been partially or completely redacted, entire pages that are just blacked out, deleted out.

And remember, there was one instruction which is delete or redact only the names of the survivors. They failed to do that. They released names, addresses, phone numbers and identifying information from more than 100 of the survivors. But meantime, they redacted the names and identifying information of lots of criminals, potential co-conspirators, enablers, accomplices, and so on. So there are tons of redactions in here, and they've set this up like some kind of video game.

This is not a game. We passed a law compelling them to release all of video game. This is not a game. We passed a law compelling them to release all of the information. But from Donald Trump on down, they are determined to keep us from

seeing all of the material. Now, the second part of that question are, are, were there, was there anything striking that you found that you hadn't known before?

So I punched in the name Trump or Donald or Don, which came up with more than a million. I don't know if every Donald or Don that was flagged was necessarily Donald or Don Trump, but there is a lot of Donald Trump through these files. The first file that appeared for me was an email that Donald Trump was, and remember this one was redacted, so I got the unredacted version. This email was from Jeffrey Epstein to Glenn Maxwell. And he's forwarding an email from Jeffrey Epstein's lawyers to Jeffrey Epstein.

The lawyers said that there was going to be a deposition of Donald Trump that got switched over to a 20-minute interview. This is back in 2019. They gave a synopsis record of what was discussed there and the paragraph said something effectively to this point, which is Trump saying that Epstein was not a member of Mar-a-Lago, but he was a guest at Mar-a-Lago, and no, he was never sent away. And so the Epstein team seemed to be pleased by this. Whether or not it

was true, I don't know if he was sent away and Trump decided to lie about it then, or he wasn't sent away and he told the truth about it, who knows. But we do know that whichever is the case, it is the opposite of what Donald Trump is saying now, because he is claiming that he did in fact send Epstein away and somehow exiled him and expelled him from Mar-a-Lago and his estate.

And that is at odds with what was recorded, at least in this memo. So there's a lot of rich stuff in there, but I think that we're not going to find the direct we're certainly not going to find any direct evidence of crimes by Donald Trump, because I'm sure that's the first thing that team of 1000 FBI agents were looking for when they went to scrub everything clear of Donald

Trump's name.

You know, we we have enough evidence now of the existence of these co-conspirators. For example, I spoke with Congressman Ro Khanna and he had searched first and foremost for that email that was sent from the child sex trafficking unit years and years back about the existence of 10 co-conspirators. So there are co-conspirators that are that are alluded to in the Epstein files. I also spoke with Congressman Robert Garcia yesterday, and he spoke about the fact that

there were also recruiters in the Epstein files that are now that are now coming to the surface. So if there are the existence of these co-conspirators and more information is obviously going to come out, how does Kash Patel and Todd Blanche get off saying that there are there's nobody else that Jeffrey Epstein just trafficked more than a thousand girls to nobody when we know based on what we've seen from these files that those people do indeed exist.

Right. They're basically saying that there were two people who committed crimes, Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein. Yeah. And they ran a billion dollar global child sex trafficking ring with no customers, no accomplices, no co-conspirators and so on. I mean, it's absurd. It's ridiculous. But obviously, everybody on the government team has signed up for the Trump orthodoxy to try to make the whole thing go away. And what exactly is he afraid of? Well, there are different theories out there, but there's no hard proof yet, but it will come to

light exactly what it is that Donald Trump is trying to sabotage with all of these moves to

complicate and undermine an investigation. Congressman, you were a constitutional law professor prior to becoming a member of Congress. And so you'd be able to speak to this this little bit of history better than I think anybody would. But as it relates to the Watergate cover up, how could how could though how could that situation be analogous to what we're seeing right now in the aftermath of the Trump administration?

Well, I mean, the Watergate looks like a Cub Scout prank compared to what we're living through right now. We're seeing the most thoroughgoing, systematic attack on the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the separation of powers, individual liberty and freedom that we've seen in the country essentially since, um, uh, you know, the days of a civil war and, uh, slavery where, you know, part of the country was literally at war with freedom for another part of the country.

And that's kind of where we are now, where if you're on Trump's team, then you can get away with any manner of corruption and self enrichment. But if you're considered an opponent, they will try to use the full force of the federal government against you.

But in terms of the consequences for the people involved, like the you know, the the attorney general, for example, during the Nixon era, how can how can that situation inform where we are right now? Because I think a lot of people are seeing all of this stuff play out and seeing criminal activity take place and that would be bad enough unto itself that there's no accountability for the people who committed

these crimes but there's another layer of criminality in that people at at the top of the DOJ you know are are participating in a cover-up and and by the way defying the law while they're doing something the Epstein the Epsteinarency Act mandated that all these files be released over a month ago, almost two months ago at this point, December 18th, and here we are. And so, you know, on so many different levels, we're seeing laws being broken. But how could this, the situation during Watergate be instructive for what we're seeing right now?

Well, Richard Nixon's attorney general did go to jail for covering up and entering as a complicit partner in criminality. The difference today, of course, is that Trump has completely corrupted and contaminated the entire Department of Justice and also the judiciary so that he's got a get out of jail free card with Trump versus United States, the Roberts Court's decision on presidential immunity that Richard Nixon could only have dreamed of.

I mean, that would have been in his wildest dreams that he would have something like that. So there, you know, there certainly is some historical precedent for the attorney general being held to account. And one can only hope that it would happen here. But Donald Trump has proven he is willing to absolutely go to the mats like a mob boss and issue pardons to everybody and to use the protection of the Roberts Court as much

as possible. On the other hand, he's massively unpopular. He's sinking in the polls. Democrats are winning all over the country and there is a renewed pressure to vindicate our constitution and our Bill of Rights.

And that's the struggle that we're in. We're in the fight of our lives right now.

Last question here. You actually made an unannounced visit to an ICE facility in Baltimore. So we're switching topics a little bit. Can you tell me about that unannounced visit to an ice facility in Baltimore. So we're switching topics a little bit can you tell me about that unannounced visit because Everything I've heard thus far from members of Congress is that any? Unannounced visits have been have been rebuffed by by these ice agents and and that members of Congress have been denied entry

Illegally, of course, but that's not stopped this administration and and the DHS from doing that anyway. Can you talk about your visit?

Well, 13 members of the House brought a lawsuit. Joe Nugus was first. So it's new goose versus ice to vindicate our rights to show up unannounced at an ice facility to conduct oversight. And that is a right that is written into federal law. So we went to court to guarantee that that right would be enforced, and we won.

So I took a copy of Nagoose versus Ice with me to Baltimore. The staff people were actually very decent and very forthcoming, but what I saw there was scandalous. This is an office building where one floor has been converted into holding cells. And I saw in one room that I would not try to fit more than 20 people in for a lunch. I saw 60 men packed together shoulder to shoulder.

They're there 24 seven. It's not even like a prison where you get an hour to walk around. So you're in there as long as you're in there. It seems like the average length is three days, but some people are in there six days or seven days.

There's one toilet and there is no shower. And they sleep like sardines with aluminum foil blankets on the floor. And you know, Pam Bondi has tens of billions of dollars in surplus money that they're engaged in all kinds of inside deals with, with all of the Trump people. In meantime, we're holding human beings like cattle pressed together like sardines just thrown together up against each other under really

unhealthy and unsanitary conditions that are liable to make a lot of people sick. And, you know, I don't know if I was the first member allowed to go that far because I was brandishing our court decision. I may have been. I wasn't allowed to speak to the men,

but I was able to press up against the windows and the walls of where they were being held. And they were gesturing to me that there was no shower, there was no water that they could get. They were pointing to the one toilet, the one open toilet over in the corner and we're

talking about dozens and dozens of men in there. There was a women's cell where there were about 33 women so that seemed to be slightly more civilized. But I was amazed when the staff people told me that that room that I saw with 60 people could accommodate more than 50 others.

To that end, we are right now in a moment where DHS funding is going to run out if Republicans don't agree to some conditions being proposed by Democrats. Can you talk about where where that process is right now? Because we are like on the brink of DHS running running out of their funding. But what would that actually mean in practice? Because ICE, thanks to the one big beautiful bill, does have funding for years, if I'm

not mistaken.

Right. And, you know, since I spent the afternoon up at the ICE facility, I've not caught up with whatever the most recent news is, but people are prepared for the possibility of an ICE shutdown. As you're saying, they're swimming in cash. I mean, there's no place in the federal government better funded than them with the possible exception of the Department of Defense, the Pentagon. But they have tons of money and

who knows what they decide to do in terms of what they keep open and what they don't.

And in that case, they sacrifice TSA agents and make it as inconvenient for American travelers as possible so that they can say the Democrats caused this big ice shutdown. Meanwhile, the you know, the people who are actually abusing their offices, abusing their positions of power, which are these ice agents, they'll continue their operations completely, you know, unabated. And and and meanwhile, Republicans get to run a PR campaign against the left.

Well, you got it. And, you know, I've spoken to some Republicans about this, and I've said it's time for a reset. You guys have got to deal with the reality of the situation. And I think their way of dealing with it is to say, well, we'll withdraw from Minneapolis. And some of them are asserting that, well, maybe Secretary Nome will leave and she'll be replaced with Homan instead.

Well, of course, that's unsatisfactory to us. We want to see systemic structural changes starting with Masks off and cameras on so we can find out what's going on. So there's identifying information About ice agents, so they're not the only Police or law enforcement force in the country that's walking around Masked like a paramilitary force in an authoritarian dictatorship.

And we've got to end that. But there are a whole lot of other things that we need to make sure are happening, too. And that's what our friends in the Senate are fighting for.

Right. And I would add qualified immunity, too, because we have seen that. Look, there there's no shortage of video footage showing what these ICE agents are doing. And in fact, we know the identities of the ICE agents. That's not stopping anybody from doing what they're doing. What will stop them is some real deterrent, some real deterrence and criminal consequences. But right now, they're basically largely blocked from that because of qualified immunity.

So I hope that among the conditions that are being imposed, that qualified immunity is right there alongside taking off masks and mandating the use of those body worn cameras.

Absolutely. Federal agents of all kinds, including ice, have to be liable and responsible for their actions just like state and local police officers. And we've got to make sure that they are criminally liable where they engage in criminal action and also civilly liable to tort suits so that the government pays for actions that they're instructed to undertake that end up injuring citizens.

And so there has to be relief for the families of all these people being wounded, injured and killed, uh, like the pretty family, like the Renee good family and so on.

We'll leave it there. Congressman Raskin, as always, thanks so much for taking the time. Congressman Raskin, as always, thanks so much for taking the time.

You bet.