The New York Times rolled out yet another breathless piece this summer suggesting it had unearthed a “bombshell” about President Trump’s past social life with Jeffrey Epstein, but anyone paying attention already knows the outlines of that story. The Times’ long-read recycles a decade of reporting about the two men socializing in Manhattan and Palm Beach without presenting actual new evidence that changes the factual record.
Reading the Times article is like watching the same liberal cable show replay an old clip and expect everyone to act surprised all over again; it leans on familiar anecdotes — including a reported Mar-a-Lago party where Epstein was the lone guest — that were extensively reported years ago. Those scenes make for lurid copy, but they do not, by themselves, prove the kind of criminal collusion the left desperately wants to pin on Trump.
Meanwhile, the notion that these revelations are “new” collapses when you remember the Michael Wolff tapes and other contemporaneous reporting that described Epstein’s claims about Trump long before the Times’ recap. Journalists like those at The Daily Beast first surfaced Epstein’s own descriptions of his relationship with Trump more than a year earlier, meaning this is more rinse-and-repeat than investigative breakthrough.
This isn’t an innocent exercise in journalism; it’s part of a coordinated media push that times sensational headlines to political moments, from document dumps to viral art stunts meant to inflame public opinion. The anonymous “Best Friends Forever” statue and the steady drip of selective releases have been used to manufacture outrage, while the Times and other outlets trumpet the narrative as if it were freshly discovered. The public deserves real evidence, not theatricality.
Conservative readers should be skeptical of the Times’ motives: the paper has a long history of playing prosecution by public opinion, running with claims that fit its political preferences and treating recycled gossip as new proof. If the press were serious about truth rather than scoring partisan points, it would demand hard, verifiable documents instead of assembling a mosaic of acquaintances, parties, and hearsay into a political weapon.
President Trump’s legal pushback — including his high-profile lawsuits against outlets reprinting salacious claims — underscores that this is a fight about reputations and power as much as it is about facts. Conservatives can support rigorous transparency about Epstein while also insisting that newspapers stop treating innuendo like indictment and start producing evidence that would actually stand up in court.
Americans tired of the media’s gotcha culture should demand better: release the full files where appropriate, but do not let hysterical headlines substitute for proof. As Glenn Greenwald and others have warned, shouting “bombshell” does not make one — and voters should remember that when the next round of recycled “revelations” arrives.
