With the Trump administration under fire from angry conservatives demanding the release of the federal government’s information about Jeffrey Epstein, increasing attention is turning to a trove that’s in private hands: Steve Bannon’s 15+ hours of videotaped interviews with Epstein.
The interviews took place between 2018 and 2019. That’s prior to Epstein’s July 6, 2019 arrest on sex-trafficking charges that eventually led to his death in a New York City jail, but after the Miami Herald put a new spotlight on Epstein’s manipulation of the criminal justice system after he was first investigated for sex crimes with underage girls in 2005, with the Herald tracking down scores of his victims.
In 2021, a trailer was released promoting an upcoming, Bannon-co-produced documentary called, “The Monsters: Epstein’s Life Among the Global Elite.” The trailer includes snippets from the interviews. However, nearly four years later, the documentary has yet to be released. Bannon says we can expect to see it early next year.
According to Epstein’s brother, Mark Epstein, the interviews were part of Bannon’s effort to salvage Jeffrey Epstein’s ruined public image. “[Bannon] told me he has like 15 or 16 hours of videotape of Jeff. He was trying to help Jeff rehabilitate his reputation,” Mark Epstein told NBC News. “They spent a lot of time together.”
According to Michael Tracey, who’s been diving into this summer’s eruption of Epstein controversy at his Substack newsletter, Bannon and Epstein are believed to have first met in December 2017, by which time Bannon was an alumnus of the first Trump administration and — more significantly — a renowned principal architect of Trump’s stunning, establishment-defying 2016 triumph.
Citing Michael Wolff’s book Fire and Fury, Tracey relates that Bannon participated in a media-strategy meeting with Epstein and others in late 2018 or early 2019. One of those others was former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. “[Epstein] probably can’t be hated any more,” Bannon is quoted as declaring at the planning session. “We’ve flatlined on this. He can’t get deader. While the chances of reviving him are remote, what’s the alternative?”
It remains unclear whether Bannon was helping Epstein as a favor, or as a paid consultant with a recent history of masterful molding of public opinion about a controversial character. At the time, Epstein was shelling out $3 million a month to a British PR firm. Offering another potential insight into the nature of their relationship, Epstein’s Paris butler told Radio France that Bannon was among American guests Epstein hosted in France, with Epstein routinely accompanied by “juenes femmes.”
Hellbound and Down 