If you were searching for information about next week’s Republican midterm convention in Dallas, Google had an interesting suggestion.
The Epstein files.
A fake website posing as an information hub for the GOP convention spent weeks looking enough like the real thing to attract visitors—and, at some point this week, began sending those visitors straight to the Justice Department’s online Epstein Library, according to the New York Times.
The site, gopdallas2026.com, was not the official Republican convention website. That’s gopconvention.com, which remains online and is promoting the Sept. 9-10 event at the American Airlines Center.
But the fake site apparently had a much better relationship with Google.
Searches for the Republican midterm convention could return gopdallas2026.com prominently, sometimes ahead of the actual convention website. Visitors clicking the result were presented with what looked like a legitimate convention information site.
It promised information about registration, VIP experiences, media credentials and the event itself.
Then came the redirect.
Instead of convention information, visitors were sent to a Justice Department webpage containing records related to Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender whose connections to Donald Trump, as well as other prominent political, business and social figures have remained a politically sensitive issue.
And the fake site had apparently been around for a while.
Archived versions show that it previously operated as a much more conventional-looking convention website. It used the headline “The Great American Comeback Midterm Convention,” featured fireworks and a photo of President Donald Trump, and included a list of potential speakers.
It even had pages for credentials, media and vendors.
There was, however, a disclaimer at the bottom saying the site was an independent informational resource and was not affiliated with or operated by the Republican National Committee or the official convention.
That disclaimer didn’t exactly stop people from using it.
According to reporting, some news organizations initially cited information appearing on the site, while some reporters used it to submit requests for convention credentials.
Then, sometime after an archived version captured the site on Aug. 27, the destination changed.
Now the website leads somewhere entirely different: the DOJ’s Epstein files library.
The RNC has disputed any suggestion that its actual website was hacked. Its official convention site remains separate and operational.
RNC spokesman Zach Parkinson blamed a Democratic-aligned creative operation, pointing to reporting that cited a Republican opposition-research firm’s digital analysis.
“Democrats are too broke to have their own midterm convention, so they settled for a sad, fake little website,” Parkinson said.
The person identified in reporting as being connected to the site’s creation also appeared to acknowledge the stunt.
Yosi Sargent, founder of the Democratic creative agency TaskForce, told The New York Times in a text message: **“We made you look.”**
He described the site as satire intended to draw attention to the Epstein files.
That certainly seems to have happened.
The Republican convention is scheduled for next Wednesday and Thursday in Dallas and is the party’s first-ever national midterm convention. President Trump and Vice President JD Vance are scheduled to headline the event.
And just as Republicans are preparing to put their 2026 message on display, an entirely separate website has managed to attach a very different message to the event.
Search for the convention. Click the result. And suddenly, you’re reading about Epstein.
The real GOP convention website is still right where it’s supposed to be. The fake one just took a much more controversial route.
