Why did Donald Trump’s Secretary of Labor Alexander Acosta give a very lenient plea deal to Donald Trump’s friend, serial child rapist Jeffrey Epstein, when Acosta was a federal prosecutor?
Why did Trump reward Acosta a few years later by giving him a position in his cabinet?
These are questions that many people want answers to, and now it looks like we’re finally going to get those answers.
Earlier this month the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) opened an investigation into the Epstein-Acosta case. The DOJ is looking into whether federal attorneys, including Acosta, committed professional misconduct in Epstein’s criminal case.
To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.
And now House Democrats have also asked new Attorney General William Barr to reopen the criminal investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, based on a recent ruling by a federal judge that Epstein’s plea deal was illegal.
According to the Miami Herald:
“Fourteen Democratic members of Congress have asked the U.S. attorney general to reopen the criminal investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, the 66-year-old Palm Beach hedge fund manager accused of sexually trafficking underage girls.”
“The group, led by Florida Democrats Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Lois Frankel, and Jackie Speier of California, asked President Donald Trump’s new attorney general, William Barr, to reopen the controversial non-prosecution agreement under which Epstein and a group of unidentified co-conspirators received federal immunity for sex trafficking crimes.”
“The deal, negotiated by then-Miami U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta — who is now President Donald Trump’s labor secretary — allowed Epstein to plead guilty in state court to two felony prostitution charges. He served 13 months in the Palm Beach County jail, but had his private driver pick him up at the jail six days a week to go to his downtown office in West Palm Beach as part of an unusual work-release arrangement.”
William Barr’s response to this request will tell us a lot about how he will do his job as Trump’s attorney general. But this new development is about something much more important than just William Barr.
If the Epstein case is now brought back into the public eye we’re about to learn the details of Donald Trump’s involvement with Epstein’s sex parties with young teenage girls — and also about the president’s involvement in the coverup of Epstein’s crimes.
There is no question Jeffrey Epstein should go to prison for the rest of his life. But it’s not clear that House Democrats or the DOJ can make that happen.
But we do know this: House Democrats have decided to focus on the Epstein-Acosta-Trump scandal. If William Barr and the Department of Justice don’t give them the information they’ve requested they will start holding hearings.
If they do, the Democrats are likely to subpoena Labor Secretary Acosta and grill him in public during televised hearings.
Democrats — and the American people — want to know why Acosta gave such a sweetheart deal to a serial child rapist that was no more than a slap on the wrist.
They also want to know why Donald Trump rewarded Acosta with a cabinet job.
If these public, televised hearings show that Donald Trump was involved with Epstein’s multiple rapes of underage girls, then this is entire affair about to get much more ugly, and much more politically dangerous for the president.
It may even be enough for him to lose support among Evangelical Christians. But that remains to be seen.
I am a lifelong Democrat with a passion for social justice and progressive issues. I have degrees in writing, economics and law from the University of Iowa.
