{"id":7889985,"date":"2025-11-17T06:15:00","date_gmt":"2025-11-17T14:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thewrap.com\/?p=7889985"},"modified":"2025-11-17T12:31:36","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T20:31:36","slug":"epstein-emails-conspiracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thewrap.com\/epstein-emails-conspiracy\/","title":{"rendered":"The Epstein Emails Show That Conspiracy Theorists Are Right: \u2018Eyes Wide Shut\u2019 Is Real"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

The shocking revelation in the trove of 20,000 emails from the sordid world of Jeffrey Epstein is not that crimes were being committed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s more sinister. The emails are disturbing because what they reveal\u00a0\u2014\u00a0and in fact\u00a0prove \u2014<\/em>\u00a0is that conspiracy theorists are right. That their theories of full-on corruption in the upper spheres where power lives\u00a0are valid. That\u00a0the “Eyes Wide Shut“<\/em> cabal of political and financial interests married to sexual deviance depicted in Stanley Kubrick’s 1999 film is not, in fact, fiction. It is reality.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So often journalists like myself attempt to demonstrate to family members and voters in the far reaches of the country, away from centers of power and money, that their conspiracies are false. That politicians are flawed, but that corruption is not the norm. It isn’t how we all operate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the Epstein emails suggest otherwise. They suggest that in fact there is a widespread code among people with power and money who support one another. They are pals no matter what side of the aisle. They are in the club no matter the sins of their members \u2014 transgressions that get contextualized, explained away, “understood.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“Eyes Wide Shut” (Warner Bros.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Leave aside, for a moment, Donald Trump\u2019s involvement in any of this. His name appears more than 1,600 times in the email release, according to a Wall Street Journal review,<\/a> and we all know how hard he\u2019s fighting to keep the files from the Department of Justice investigation from being released.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the <\/strong>web extends beyond the President of the United States. Epstein’s email pals range across the landscape of the politics and trip across business, media, tech, academia and society, from former Harvard president and U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers to former White House Democratic counsel Kathy Ruemmler. From MAGA dark knight Steve Bannon to prime ministers across northern Europe and Gulf oil dignitaries. <\/p>\n\n\n

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\n\t\t\tRead Next<\/strong>
\n\t\t\tThe Epstein Firestorm Comes Roaring Back, and Donald Trump Is Getting Scorched | Analysis\u00a0<\/a>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

They include chummy conversations with a New Age health guru Deepak Chopra and a New York PR fixer Peggy Siegel, with a New York Times journalist Landon Thomas Jr, a Bonfire of the Vanities simulacrum Michael Wolff \u2013 and Harvard literature professor and poet Elisa Lew, whom Epstein gave a <\/strong>$500,000 donation for her TV project, \u201c<\/strong>Poetry in America.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In an email, she recommended he read \u201cLolita\u201d by Nabokov, \u201ca man whose whole life is stamped forever by his impression of a young girl.\u201d (No, I am not making this up. And \u2014 just a guess \u2014 Epstein was probably already familiar with the novel.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The emails include real-time texting with US Virgin Islands Congresswoman Stacey Plaskett while she was soliciting public testimony from former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, live on C-SPAN.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGreat outfit,\u201d he texted her during the 2019 hearing, later advising: \u201cCohen brought up RONA \u2014 keeper of the secrets,\u201d <\/strong>referring to Rhona Graff, Trump\u2019s longtime executive assistant, before pushing her to ask about other \u201chenchmen\u201d in the Trump organization. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time these emails were being exchanged, Epstein had already pleaded guilty to procuring a girl younger than 18 for prostitution and sentenced to 18 months in prison (serving only partially). That was in 2008. By the 2010s he was back in the saddle, with dinner invitations accepted, his private jet sought after \u2014 and apparently his friendship and advice. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In March 2019, Summers whined to Epstein that a woman had \u201cblown off\u201d a weekend plan and complained about \u201cbeing the friend without benefits.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Epstein replied with his best dating advice:  \u201cShe\u2019s smart \u2026 making you pay for past errors \u2026 you reacted well.. annoyed shows caring \u2026 no whining showed strength.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell attend de Grisogono Sponsors The 2005 Wall Street Concert Series (Photo by Joe Schildhorn\/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Just a few months after this exchange, Epstein was arrested again, this time by the feds, on charges of sex trafficking. As a reminder, the search of his Manhattan townhouse at the time turned up evidence of sex trafficking and “hundreds\u2014and perhaps thousands \u2014 of sexually suggestive photographs of fully \u2014 or partially \u2014nude females,\u201d according to the indictment. In a locked safe, there were CDs with handwritten labels<\/a>: “Young [Name] + [Name],” “Misc nudes 1,” and “Girl pics nude.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSo many people tried to ingratiate themselves with him,\u201d observed Julie K. Brown, the intrepid journalist from The Miami Herald who first exposed Epstein\u2019s crimes and has doggedly pursued the story long after. She hopped on the phone with me on Sunday. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I asked Brown if she thought the emails validated those who believed in wacky Pizzagate-style theories (where Hillary Clinton was bizarrely accused of participating in a pedophile ring). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat do you mean by conspiracy? (Ghislaine) Maxwell and Epstein \u2014 that was a conspiracy,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s exactly the way they should be looked at. He got away with this. And our criminal justice system is broken. People who have money and power get away with crimes. That\u2019s just a fact. [The email trove] shows that people are willing to overlook even the worst crime if they think that somehow they\u2019re going to benefit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She added: \u201cIt\u2019s what they call the swamp.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The swamp is specifically what Donald Trump promised to clean up. But he and Epstein are the swamp. We already knew about the likes of Bill Gates, Bill Clinton and ex-Prince Andrew. But these emails suggest a much wider group of elites who accepted Epstein as fine company.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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You remember the scene in “Eyes Wide Shut” when Tom Cruise finds that weird orgy mansion with masks and creepy rituals? I always found that scene eye-rolling. But can we honestly argue that Epstein’s Pedophile Island isn\u2019t just like that? It’s the deep state network depicted in “One Battle After Another” <\/em>with sex instead of racism as the social glue. And it validates what has animated so much of the MAGA movement and the populist anger among progressives: the belief that the system is rigged. That regular people cannot get access to the byways of power or, eventually, money. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the antithesis of democracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I used to scoff at the notion that there was a vast conspiracy of men \u2014 from public figures to shadowy spooks \u2014 who trafficked in women across the world. I don’t any more. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The question is: What are we going to do about it? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s a new PSA released by Epstein survivors: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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NEW: Epstein survivors release the most powerful PSA I have ever seen.

Make this go viral so every member of the House of Representatives sees it. pic.twitter.com\/Cb5mUqQDFd<\/a><\/p>— Aaron Parnas (@AaronParnas) November 16, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote>