Thoughts After the Bondi Hearing

Imagine mishandling the release of the Epstein files under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, producing documents so heavily redacted they look like a CIA memo from the Cold War, while simultaneously failing to meet the Act’s own disclosure standards. And then, during a hearing, suddenly invoking concern for “the victims.”

Concern?

If the priority were victims, transparency would not require public pressure. It would not require selective compliance. And it certainly wouldn’t result in redactions that appear to shield powerful names more carefully than vulnerable ones.

You don’t get to obstruct, over-redact, and sidestep statutory intent, then drape yourself in moral language when the optics turn ugly.

Here’s the reality: when public trust erodes, sudden compassion looks less like empathy and more like damage control. If the administration truly cared about victims, the documents would reflect that priority. Instead, what they reflect is caution, just not for the people harmed.

And that’s the problem. When you protect reputations more aggressively than you protect truth, people notice.

A foundation built on opacity and spin doesn’t collapse because critics yell. It collapses when the paper trail contradicts the rhetoric.

And right now, the paper trail is doing all the talking.