Attorney General Pam Bondi is now the face of Trump’s latest whiplash-inducing reversal on the Epstein files—and her attempt to explain it is already blowing up online.
After spending months insisting the matter was closed and infuriating MAGA diehards in the process, Bondi is suddenly being forced to backtrack. And when pressed on why, she couldn’t get the words out.
The debacle started after a “deluge” of Republicans signaled they were ready to break with Trump and vote to release the Epstein documents. With a rebellion brewing, Trump made a sharp turn this week, telling the GOP to support a transparency bill he now says he’ll sign.
To contain the political fallout, Trump also ordered Bondi to investigate high-profile Democrats who had once brushed shoulders with Epstein—Bill Clinton, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, and former Harvard President Larry Summers. All three deny knowing anything about Epstein’s crimes, but Trump clearly wanted the spotlight pointed elsewhere.
For Bondi, though, this is a mess of her own making. Back in July, her department released a memo insisting there was nothing left to pursue. It declared that “no further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted” and that investigators “did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.” It was a full-stop conclusion.
So on Wednesday, when reporters asked what had changed, Bondi froze.
“Information that has come for, um, information. There’s new information, additional information,” she said—offering nothing that resembled an explanation.
She followed with, “We will continue to follow the law to investigate any leads,” but by then the damage was done. The clip spread instantly because it didn’t look like someone who had new evidence—it looked like someone struggling to justify a political flip-flop she didn’t see coming.
The awkwardness lands especially hard because of the July 6 memo, which tried to shut the whole thing down as Trump’s base was demanding the opposite. The memo said the DOJ review “found no basis to revisit the disclosure” and uncovered “no incriminating ‘client list’.” It even went further, stating: “There was also no credible evidence found that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals as part of his actions. We did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.”
MAGA fanatics didn’t buy that then, and they certainly don’t now. Bondi had already irritated them earlier in the year when she bragged that the files were “sitting on my desk”—only to hand out binders of mostly public info in a White House photo-op with right-wing influencers.
Now Trump’s reversal forces her to contradict the conclusions she previously defended. On Wednesday, with the political winds shifting, Bondi suddenly urged Epstein victims to come forward if they have “any information,” in sharp contrast to the DOJ’s earlier insistence that there was nothing new to find.
Whether this is a real investigative pivot or just another political detour doesn’t change the fact that Bondi’s struggle on camera said everything. The administration may have a new narrative, but Bondi clearly wasn’t ready to sell it.
Watch the clip below:
