Tag: secrecy

Epstein files release in chaos as Trump officials scramble to redact thousands of documents hours before deadline

Donald Trump‘s Department of Justice is working around the clock to redact thousands of pages from the Epstein files before their legally required release Friday.

White House officials are bracing for the release of the files after Trump has been the subject of rampant speculation about his connection to Epstein. 

Also believed to be in the files are former President Bill Clinton, the former Prince Andrew, and others.

There are fears that the same rushed workflow and deadline could lead to similar mistakes to the release of the JFK assassination files, which unintentionally revealed the social security numbers of more than 200 people. 

Pam Bondi’s DOJ lawyers are worried that the the Justice Department’s National Security Division don’t have the proper guidance on how to provide the most information legally possible. 

Attorneys for the DOJ are reportedly working on over 1,000 documents per week to get the files ready in time to meet their deadline, CNN reported. 

They must be able to edit the files to protect the victims of the late billionaire pedophile and meet executive and legal privacy requirements. Many are preparing for more to be redacted than is legally necessary. 

‘Either they’re going to screw it up or they’re going to withhold things. It wouldn’t surprise me. Some of it may be incompetence as much as deliberate,’ a non-DOJ lawyer awaiting the release said. 

The DOJ has asked additional counter-intelligence specialists to drop everything else they were doing to process the files. Some refused the assignment.  

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Western officials ‘alarmed’ over secret FBI-Ukraine meetings – WaPo

Western officials are concerned by the secrecy surrounding meetings between Ukrainian negotiators and the FBI, the Washington Post reported on Saturday, citing sources.

Kiev’s lead negotiator, Rustem Umerov, has visited the US three times in recent weeks to meet with President Donald Trump’s top envoy, Steve Witkoff, and also held closed-door talks with FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino.

Several unnamed Western officials said the meetings could be aimed at speeding up Kiev’s acceptance of Trump’s peace roadmap. Leaked versions require Ukraine to abandon its NATO ambitions, drop its territorial claims, and cap its army at 600,000 – terms which Kiev and its European backers believe favor Russia.

Ukraine’s ambassador to the US, Olga Stefanishina, confirmed the FBI meetings, but declined to provide details. Sources say the secrecy “has caused alarm” among those not privy to the talks over their true purpose.

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Taxpayers Asked To Fund A Hospital Takeover They’re Not Allowed To See

When Connecticut lawmakers pushed the UConn Health hospital acquisition bill through the November special session — without a public hearing — it was clear transparency was not the priority.  

Now UConn Health, the state-run hospital system preparing to spend roughly half a billion taxpayer dollars acquiring Waterbury Hospital, has taken that secrecy a step further. Under the legislation rushed through the November special session — which authorizes UConn Health not just to purchase Waterbury Hospital but potentially to acquire additional struggling hospitals in the future — the financial stakes extend far beyond a single transaction. Yet in its Certificate of Need filing, UConn has asked state regulators to seal its cost and market impact review (CMIR) — the central analysis used to evaluate how the deal would affect prices, competition, access, and the financial risks taxpayers may ultimately assume.

The legislature avoided public scrutiny when passing the legislation. UConn Health is now avoiding scrutiny on the financials themselves. 

According to its filing, UConn Health plans to invest $195 million in Waterbury Hospital over the next two years, including $13 million paid directly to Prospect Medical Holdings, the California based, bankrupt for-profit chain that allowed the hospital to deteriorate. But the upfront investment represents only a small portion of the true cost. The bulk will come from $390 million in UConn 2000 bonds, state-backed debt. Once interest is included, taxpayers will ultimately shoulder roughly $500 million. 

The financial risk is not theoretical. It falls squarely on Connecticut residents. 

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How Gabbard’s ‘hunters’ pounced on secret CIA warehouse for Kennedy files

The officials arrived at the secret CIA archival facility in the Washington area one morning in early April. Their mission: to seize still-classified CIA files on the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy, John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.

The team pulled up in their vehicles unannounced, catching the spy agency off-guard, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

They were acting on behalf of Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, who wanted to take documents out of the hands of the Central Intelligence Agency and start the process of declassifying them at the National Archives, the people said.

One of the people familiar with the matter said the CIA wasn’t aware that it was about to receive direction that day “from a higher government agency.” The person also described the moment as probably the most confrontational point in the still young relationship between Gabbard’s office and the CIA.

The official leading the search, a Defense Intelligence Agency official named Paul Allen McDonald II who was on temporary assignment to Gabbard’s office, declared that they were “on a mission” from Gabbard, two of the people said.

A Trump administration official who made a brief appearance that day after arriving in her minivan, Amaryllis Fox Kennedy, was a CIA veteran herself and the daughter-in-law of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. She did not have the necessary badge to access the warehouse but was waved in, the two people said. One said Fox Kennedy spent about an hour there, focusing on efforts to digitize the massive archive of papers.

The early April episode, which has not been previously reported, lasted until 2 a.m. the next morning when a massive trove of documents was eventually transferred to the National Archives, according to two of the people.

The case casts new light on the tension between two forces in Washington, the CIA and Gabbard’s ODNI, as Trump appointees sought to act on the president’s orders to swiftly release the full accounting of Kennedy’s murder in 1963, as well as the high-profile 1968 assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.

White House spokesman Steven Cheung said Trump had full confidence in both Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe. “Efforts by the legacy media to sow internal division are a distraction that will not work,” Cheung said.

A spokesperson for the Director of National Intelligence said the ODNI “has worked in close coordination with the CIA since the beginning of the administration to carry out this historic release of files.”

Trump issued an executive order in January instructing Gabbard and the other intelligence agencies to declassify records related to the JFK, RFK and Martin Luther King Jr. assassinations.

Reuters could not independently determine if Gabbard directed this specific mission at the archives or the extent to which Trump may have been briefed ahead of time about individual missions related to the declassification effort.

The Director of National Intelligence serves as principal intelligence adviser to the president and has oversight over the 17 other agencies, including the CIA. The job typically includes managing interagency tensions.

In a joint statement, Gabbard’s ODNI and the CIA said the two agencies “have and will continue working hand-in-hand to release and declassify documents of public interest and execute President Trump’s mission of restoring trust in the intelligence community.”

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DOJ Renews Bid To Have Court Unseal Epstein, Maxwell Grand Jury Materials

The Department of Justice (DOJ) renewed its request on Nov. 24 to unseal grand jury materials related to the case of deceased convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, following the passage of the Epstein Files Transparency Act last week.

In a motion filed to a U.S. District Court in the Southern District of New York, the DOJ said the Epstein Files Transparency Act—which President Donald Trump signed into law on Nov. 19—reflects the congressional intent to override grand jury secrecy.

“In the light of the Act’s clear mandate, the Court should authorize the Department of Justice to release the grand jury transcripts and exhibits and modify any preexisting protective orders that would otherwise prevent public disclosure by the Government of materials of which is required by the Act,” it stated.

The DOJ said it would make appropriate redactions to protect victims’ identities and other personal information. The law requires that any redactions be accompanied by a written explanation, which must be published in the Federal Register and submitted to Congress.

It requested that the court issue an expedited ruling, as the Act requires the DOJ to release all unclassified records and investigative materials related to the case within 30 days.

In August, U.S. District Judge Richard Berman denied the DOJ’s bid to unseal the grand jury materials, ruling that officials had failed to provide sufficient justification for unsealing the files and citing potential safety risks to victims.

U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer on Aug. 11 denied a similar motion in Maxwell’s case, finding that granting the motion “would bloat the ‘special circumstances’ doctrine, which to date has warranted disclosure in only a tiny number of cases, all involving unique testimony by firsthand witnesses to events of obvious public or historical moment.”

After the Epstein files bill cleared the Senate, the DOJ filed a renewed motion on Nov. 21 to a U.S. District Court in Florida to unseal the grand jury materials, followed by a second filing in the Southern District of New York on Nov. 24.

Grand jury materials are typically kept private. Exceptions outlined in federal rules allow the unsealing of materials, and special circumstances, including public interest, can permit unsealing outside those exceptions.

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Trump UFO Bombshell Incoming?

Documentary filmmaker Dan Farah has boldly predicted that President Trump could be the first world leader to spill the beans on UFOs, dropping a “major announcement” about non-human tech and extraterrestrial intel—sparking feverish speculation: Is this engineered hype to divert from global flashpoints, or a seismic shift toward transparency? 

Farah made the claim on Joe Rogan’s podcast while promoting a new documentary titled The Age of Disclosure. As Farah teases amnesty for black-budget insiders, is Trump poised to unmask aliens, or is this another misdirect?

Farah asserted: “I wouldn’t be surprised if it happens soon after the film comes out — the sitting president has to step to the microphone and say: humanity is not alone in the universe. We have recovered technology of non-human origin. So have other nations. There is a high-stakes, secret cold war race to reverse engineer this technology. We need to win this race.” 

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Inside the Pentagon’s Review of Christopher Mellon’s Alleged UFO Crash Retrieval Text

A newly released set of Defense Department documents reveals how the Pentagon handled former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Christopher Mellon’s request to publish a message he said referenced an alleged effort to exploit “recovered off-world technology.” The records also reveal that Mellon’s first attempt to submit the material was returned to him after a DOPSR employee deemed his three-page mailed package a “security threat,” a detail he did not disclose in his public article.

The documents, sent to The Black Vault under FOIA case 24-F-1134, include Mellon’s original submission to the Defense Office of Prepublication and Security Review (DOPSR), internal emails, coordination records, and the March 1, 2024 approval that cleared him to release the message.

The 17 pages released by the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) document DOPSR’s handling of Mellon’s submission from January through March 2024. The records show repeated delays, escalating internal pressure, and direct involvement from the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), which was tasked with coordinating on the review.

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US Air Force Silent on Alleged Covert UFO-Tracking Program Revealed by James Clapper

The United States Air Force has declined to say whether it operated a covert program dedicated to tracking Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP).

In the new documentary ‘The Age of Disclosure’, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper made a striking claim: a secretive Air Force program has been actively monitoring UAP, particularly over the highly classified Area 51 facility in Nevada – an epicentre of cutting-edge military development and testing.

Clapper, who also served as Chief of Air Force Intelligence, stated:

“When I served in the Air Force, there was an active program to track anomalous activities that we couldn’t otherwise explain – many of them connected with ranges out west, notably Area 51.”

Liberation Times asked the Air Force whether it could confirm or deny whether Clapper’s allegations were true. But the Air Force was unable to do so.

Instead, an Air Force official told Liberation Times:

“The Nevada Test and Training Range provides flexible, realistic and multidimensional battlespace to test and develop tactics as well as conduct advanced training in support of U.S. national interests.

“Several agencies have jurisdiction over various parts of the Nevada Test and Training Range. The U.S. Air Force controls the airspace over the range and roughly 2.9 million acres of land withdrawn for military use. Various organizations including the Department of Energy, Department of the Interior and private towns such as Rachel also manage portions of the land.”

Liberation Times also reached out to Susan Gough, spokesperson for the Department of War’s (DoW) UAP office, the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), regarding Clapper’s allegations. However, Gough stated that she had no information to provide at this time.

The documentary, which features Clapper’s allegations, was released this week on Amazon.

After watching the premiere in March 2025 at the SXSW Film Festival, Marik Von Rennenkampff, a former analyst at the U.S. Department of State and Obama administration appointee at the Department of Defense (now Department of War), wrote: 

‘In Age of Disclosure, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper states that a secretive, previously unknown U.S. Air Force program tracked UAP/UFOs, particularly over Area 51.

‘Congress must investigate.’

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President George HW Bush ‘knew’ of 1964 alien contact with humans in New Mexico: documentary

The truth is out there — and late President George H.W. Bush apparently knew it — telling a federal official that an alien made contact with humans at a secretive New Mexico air base in 1964, according to testimony in an explosive new documentary.

Eric Davis, an astrophysicist who was a scientific advisor on the since-disbanded Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, created by Congress in 2007 by late Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), claimed that Bush confirmed to him in a private conversation details of contact between the military and an alien creature at Holloman Air Force Base in Otero County.

Bush told him that three spaceships were seen approaching the base and that an interstellar being emerged from one ship and had a face-to-face encounter with military and CIA officials, Davis said during an interview in “The Age of Disclosure,” a documentary by filmmaker Dan Farah that went live on Amazon Prime on Friday.

“One of them landed on the tarmac and a non-human entity deboarded the craft that landed and interacted with uniformed Air Force and civilian CIA personnel,” Davis claimed.

“And when [Bush] asked for more details he was told that he did not have a need-to-know,” he relayed.

Bush, a former decorated Naval aviator and director of the CIA, was allegedly informed of the encounter after his term as president, according to Davis, who said the two spoke in a series of private conversations in 2003.

Davis didn’t describe the alien craft or the aliens, or discuss any material evidence for the claims.

The eagerly-awaited documentary focuses on a supposed top-secret government UFO-retrieval operation dubbed the “Legacy Program,” and features US officials who claim direct knowledge that aliens exist and have visited Earth — without actually providing new physical evidence.

Davis claims in the film that alien bodies were recovered in Russia in 1988, pulled from the wreckage of a large tic-tac shaped UAP, or unidentified anomalous phenomena.

Hal Puthoff, a former AATIP member, quantum physicist and longtime disclosure advocate, claimed there were several different types of ETs.

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UK wins fight to hide data linking Covid vaccines to deaths

Under a recent ruling by the UK Information Commissioner’s Office, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) will not be required to release data that may show a link between Covid-19 vaccines and excess deaths. The decision follows a two-year legal battle initiated by the nonprofit group UsForThem, which had filed a freedom of information request for access to the data.

The agency argued that releasing the information could cause “distress” to families of the deceased and be used to promote “misinformation” about the vaccines. Critics say this reasoning serves more as a shield for institutional self-preservation than public interest.

Legal director Ben Kingsley of UsForThem called the UKHSA’s decision “a desperation that this data should not, in any form, see the light of day.” The watchdog group TrialSite News wrote that by relying on emotional harm rather than scientific concerns, the government “inadvertently strengthened the very narrative it likely hoped to avoid.”

Among those speaking out are vaccine-injured individuals like Danielle Baker, a former hospice nurse who was left permanently disabled after receiving a Covid-19 shot.

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