Background Briefing: August 5, 2025
The House Subpoenas the Epstein Files and Laura Loomer is Back in the Oval Office
We begin with some of the breaking stories today as uncertainty grows over the economy and the House Oversight Committee moves to subpoena the Epstein files and Trump’s favorite influencer Laura Loomer has yet another Oval Office meeting with her hero after White House insiders did everything they could to keep her away from Trump. Joining us is Jacob Heilbrunn, the Editor at the National Interest and a non-resident senior fellow at The Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center and a columnist for The Spectator. His books include They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neocons and America Last: The Right’s Century-Long Romance with Foreign Dictators. He is also editor-at-large of The Jerusalem Strategic Tribune and his latest article at The National Interest is “The American Economy Is Paying for Trump’s Tariffs.”
The Dirty Deal Already Made Between Trump and Ghislaine Maxwell
Then we look into the dirty deal already made between Ghislaine Maxwell and Trump’s lawyer, now the Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche who has already rewarded Maxwell by springing her from a violent and putrid prison to a Club Fed minimum security camp that is not supposed to take in a sexual predators but somebody obviously pulled strings for the depraved socialite. Joining us to speculate on what Maxwell has already offered Trump is Steven Harper, an adjunct professor at Northwestern University, and regular contributor to The American Lawyer. He is the author of several books, including The Lawyer Bubble — A Profession in Crisis and Crossing Hoffa — A Teamster’s Story. He blogs at The Belly of the Beast and has an article at Common Dreams we discuss, “Ghislaine Maxwell Seems to Have New Friends in High Places.”
As Netanyahu Plans to Reoccupy Gaza, Speaker Johnson Meets Settlers Telling Them They Are the “Rightful Owners” of Palestinian Territory
Then, with Netanyahu planning to reoccupy Gaza against the wishes of the IDF while Speaker Mike Johnson visits far-right Israeli settlers telling them they are “the rightful owners” of Palestinian territory, we speak with Chris Hedges, the former Pulitzer Prize–winning Middle East Bureau Chief for The New York Times. An Arabic speaker, he spent seven years covering the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, much of that time in Gaza. He is the author of 14 books including Empire of Illusion, Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt, and The Greatest Evil Is War. His latest book is A Genocide Foretold: Reporting on Survival and Resistance in Occupied Palestine.