He’s out. He says it’s because his entanglement with the Epstein scandal was a “distraction”.
You know who else is entangled with Epstein? Trump. Maybe he should follow suit.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Hey! Did you know Acosta was a Hispanic man?
And that Acosta tried to dramatically cut labor department budgets dedicated to combating human trafficking Trump labor secretary who cut Epstein deal plans to slash funds for sex trafficking victims:
I have long been a Pelosi defender, but if the Democrats just drop this because Acosta resigned they will be doing a massive disservice to the nation. This is about more than just getting Trump, which is obviously super important. Everything about Epstein and his crimes and his connections need to be brought into the light of day and those involved need to be punished.
I fear they’re just going to let SDNY handle it all, which may ultimately bring in Trump, Clinton and the rest, but this is the sort of massive web of influences that justifies significant federal oversight.
Ba-bye Alex. Maybe there needs to be some look into that non prosecution deal…like who was really behind it.
Perhaps the former Florida AGs at the time should follow him out the door: Rep. Charlie Crist (AG 2003-2007) and Rep. Bill McCollum (AG 2007-2011). I first ran into the Epstein story in 2016 stemming from Florida AG Pam Bondi’s connections to Trump campaign money shenanigans. At the time Epstein was a sidebar story…oh, and there’s this guy in Palm Beach, and Alex Acosta, and deals with the Florida AGs, etc.
By the way, a couple of stories yesterday dug into the “billionaire hedge fund manager” part of Epstein’s story. There’s speculation that Epstein wasn’t really a fund manager, but black mailing wealthy men who came to play. One of the first things I read about Epstein was the claim that there were cameras and mics around his places. There’s a fairly widely shown photo of Prince Andrew with one of the victims in Palm Beach, so it wasn’t all cloak-and-dagger. While that’s a fairly innocent shot, not difficult to imagine less innocent evidence.
This is the part that Congress needs to dig into. It’s likely outside of the scope of the SDNY investigation, but is the most important part of this from the perspective of our societal structure.
Unfortunately my knowledge of Acostas in US politics started and ended with Oscar Acosta. I really do need to find the time to catch up.
doubtthat — Absolutely. Someone here raised the question a few days ago of who was behind the deal in the first place. There were some very prominent business and political names already in the mix…Prince Andrew, Donald Trump, Tom Barrack (big $$ friend of DJT), Bill Clinton, Ehud Barak, etc. It’s conspiratorial thinking perhaps to imagine a big name pushing to cover it up, but it’s difficult to understand why a US Attorney (Acosta) would go to such lengths to protect him without someone to support it.
I will be curious about what AG Barr might want to do in the coming weeks and months.
uncle frogy
Oh my sweet, summer child. He’ll whinge, whine and bluster his way out of it. If that doesn’t work he’ll throw money at it till it goes away.
He can’t follow suit. He needs the protection of the Presidency to stay out of jail.
AG Barr recused himself bc Barr’s dad was the headmaster that first employed Epstein. Indeed, the phrase Epstein-Barr (ala the member of the herpes viridae family) was used to describe the relationship!
It appears that Epstein decades ago wanted to open up a modeling agency ala one that Trump had (which I never knew about). Anyway, it makes you wonder that if SDNY pushes hard enough, as they apparently are, that Epstein, if he has information, may sing and that may finally implicate Trump in a way in which all his well documented past assaultive behavior will be taken seriously. Maybe we will see a ‘cosby’ type effect finally happen with Trump.
Huh, that’s surprising. I wonder what the political calculations of that were.
Isn’t it typical though? Centrist Democrats spend aaaallllllll the time whining that somebody else should take responsibility – Trump should impeach himself, GOP should be bipartisan, constituents should sign their dumb petition, so-and-so should resign – and when someone finally does, they’ll claim credit for it. Aside from the evil, small wonder the GOP doesn’t want to “work together”.
To be clear though, “what Democrats might do” was not a part of the GOP’s calculations. D’s didn’t matter. Nothing, EVER, gets, done, except what the GOP decides ought to be done.