A 12-foot statue of President Donald Trump and intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein holding arms and prancing collectively was erected on the Nationwide Mall early Tuesday.
Three plaques seem alongside the satirical faux-bronze statues, courtesy of a mysterious group that goes by the identify The Secret Handshake. The plaques word the statues are “in Honor of Friendship Month” in September.
“We have fun the long-lasting bond between President Donald J. Trump and his ‘closest buddy’ Jeffrey Epstein,” one plaque reads.
Different plaques characteristic quotes from a bawdy birthday card Trump apparently as soon as gave Epstein.
In a press release to HuffPost on Tuesday, the nameless chief of the Secret Handshake mentioned the statues converse for themselves.
“Nobody else publicly that we all know of partied with Donald Trump, traveled with Donald Trump and visited at Mar-a-Lago simply as a buddy, not simply as an affiliate. Since that is Friendship Month, we wished to have fun what’s presumably, no less than publicly, Donald Trump’s solely true buddy,” the group’s chief mentioned.
Trump and Epstein spent over a decade working in the identical social circles or attending varied high-profile occasions and events collectively. Trump additionally rode on Epstein’s personal airplane between New York and Florida. Trump had referred to as Epstein a “terrific man,” and Epstein said he believed he was Trump’s “closest friend.”
“He was loads of enjoyable to be with,” Trump told New York Journal in 2002.
The 2 males had a falling-out a few years in the past, and by the point Epstein was arrested on intercourse trafficking prices in 2019, Trump insisted he was “not a fan.”
The Secret Handshake Group
The Secret Handshake Group
The Secret Handshake Group
Epstein died by suicide in federal jail a month after his arrest, kicking off a firestorm of questions, controversy and conspiracy theories about his loss of life — and his life, particularly his connection to rich elites who have been launched to younger ladies or ladies by means of the disgraced financier.
When Trump ran for president, he leaned closely into conspiracy theories about Epstein and vowed to reveal these concerned.
However Trump’s thirst for transparency about Epstein’s crimes and associates has seemingly since vanished.
Legal professional Common Pam Bondi claimed in February that there was an Epstein “shopper listing” on her desk on the Justice Division. A month later, nonetheless, the Justice Division and FBI launched a press release saying Epstein by no means had a shopper listing and that no additional data tied to the Epstein probe can be made public.
That call was controversial, even amongst Trump’s base and administration. Issues solely received worse for him in July, when The Wall Avenue Journal reported that the president’s identify appeared many occasions in a “truckload” of paperwork reviewed by the Justice Division.
Calls for for the so-called Epstein information to be launched have intensified ever since, together with from ladies who said they were abused by Epstein and his associate Ghislane Maxwell. A bipartisan push by members of Congress to have the information launched is in limbo in the intervening time. Reps. Thomas Massie (R.-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) want 218 signatures to force a floor vote on a bill they launched that calls for the discharge of the paperwork.
In the meantime, FBI Director Kash Patel has been busy deflecting questions in regards to the Epstein information. Throughout a latest congressional listening to, as an alternative of answering questions on Epstein, Patel recited the ABCs.
The Secret Handshake has put up tongue-in-cheek monuments earlier than, together with a sequence of bronzed turds that honored the “courageous women and men who broke into the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to loot, urinate and defecate all through these hallowed halls to be able to overturn an election.”
Another statue of a large gold thumb crushing the Statue of Liberty appeared on the Nationwide Mall in June with a plaque on one aspect that learn, “Dictator Authorized.”
