America
Newly released emails reveal Jeffrey Epstein’s correspondence with Trump ally Tom Barrack
Democratic members of the US House Oversight Committee have published three emails belonging to financier Jeffrey Epstein on the X platform. Epstein, who was found dead in prison, had faced allegations of human trafficking involving minors.
The documents, submitted to the committee by Epstein’s heirs, suggest that US President Donald Trump was aware of the investor’s actions.
In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitution and was convicted of sexually abusing a minor.
Epstein was arrested again in the summer of 2019 and charged with sex trafficking and forcing victims, including 14-year-old girls, into prostitution.
The billionaire died under suspicious circumstances in his cell in August of that year before his trial began; it was alleged that he committed suicide.
Epstein’s close associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, is serving a 20-year prison sentence for aiding and abetting sex trafficking.
According to The Washington Post, Trump and Epstein met in the early 1980s when they were neighbors in Florida. The two were frequently seen together during that period, and Trump traveled on Epstein’s private jet several times. However, their relationship deteriorated in the early 2000s.
Trump has repeatedly denied being friends with or having a business relationship with Epstein.
Correspondence with Barrack in 2016
Among the published documents is correspondence between Epstein and Tom Barrack, a close friend of US President Donald Trump and ambassador to Türkiye, from 2016.
In a message dated March 9, 2016, Epstein wrote to Barrack:
“FYI: I am getting calls from many journalists throughout the week about both Donald (Marla, beauty pageants, Mar-a-Lago, etc.) and Clinton… The calls about Clinton have recently decreased, but my response is always ‘I have nothing to say,’ or I try to ignore them completely. I have been caught off guard with questions on the street a few times, but I am more careful now.”
Barrack gave a brief reply to Epstein, saying, “Hope you are well, let’s catch up.”
Epstein then responded, “Send a picture of you with the kid.”
🚨🚨🚨BREAKING: In 2016 Epstein wrote to Tom Barrack, Trump's long time friend and Ambassador to Turkey,"fyi I receive many calls a week about both Donald ( [REDACTED,] beauty contest, mara lago etc)…my answers are always I have nothing to say. or I try to ignore altogether.." pic.twitter.com/VrLi4KosSI
— Daniel Boguslaw (@DRBoguslaw) November 12, 2025
In another message sent by Epstein to his associate Ghislaine Maxwell in 2011, it was revealed that an unnamed victim “spent a few hours with Trump (at my house) but never mentioned Trump.”
Epstein added a note to his message: “I want you to understand, the dog that doesn’t bark is Trump.”
Correspondence between Epstein and Michael Wolff, the author of the book Fire and Fury, from 2015 and 2018 has also been made public. In the emails, the two discuss what strategy to follow regarding potential statements about Trump.
Wolff suggests letting Trump’s own words get him into trouble, writing, “If it really looks like he’s going to win, you can save him by creating a sense of indebtedness.”
In another message sent to Wolff in January 2019, Epstein stated, “Of course he knew about the girls, because he told Ghislaine to stop.”
Meanwhile, Republicans have accused Democrats of “fabricating a false story to smear Trump.” Party officials stated that the victim mentioned in the emails is Virginia Giuffre, who claimed to have been deceived by Ghislaine Maxwell and to have worked at Trump’s properties at a young age.
According to The New York Times, Giuffre said in a 2016 statement that she did not participate in or witness any abuse of minors by Trump but had heard he was present at Epstein’s mansion. Giuffre committed suicide this spring.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt described the Democrats’ release of the emails as “a malicious attempt to distract from President Trump’s historic achievements.”
In response, the Democratic Chairman of the Oversight Committee, Robert Garcia, shared the following message on his X account: “If what we published bothers you, there’s an easy way to fix it. Have your boss UNSEAL THE FILES TODAY.”
During his election campaign, Trump had promised to declassify the documents in the Epstein file. In February, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced that she had a “list of individuals to whom Epstein offered the sexual services of underage girls” on her desk, but later corrected her statement, saying she was actually referring to “general files related to the case.”
Bondi subsequently released declassified documents from the case. The documents included private jet flight logs, an address book, a list of evidence, and a “masseuse list.”
However, the FBI and the Department of Justice announced that a document referred to as a “client list” does not exist.
Allegations that Trump’s name appears in the Epstein files have continued to create pressure from both Democrats and Republicans for the full public disclosure of the documents.
Trump responded to his intra-party critics with the words, “Because of that guy who just won’t die.”
According to The New York Times, interest in the issue had waned due to the US government shutdown. However, it is believed that the Epstein files could be brought back to the forefront once the process ends.
Last week, The New York Post reported that Epstein was offered a deal in 2019 to testify against Trump in exchange for his release. A petition from Epstein’s former cellmate, Nicholas Tartaglione, stated that the financier was told he “wouldn’t have to prove anything until Trump’s people debunked it.”
America
Data leak exposes Peter Thiel’s secret ‘Dialog’ network of politicians, regulators, and tech elites
“Dialog,” an exclusive, highly secretive association founded by billionaire technology investor and Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel, has had its internal records exposed online. The leaked documents reveal the identities of influential figures spanning US politics, finance, national security, and technology who have participated in the group’s private gatherings.
According to a report by WIRED, the society’s internal directories and registry records were left exposed on the internet, laying bare the attendee lists for its highly restricted events.
Established by Thiel in 2006, Dialog is an invitation-only private organization that convenes US officials, foreign government representatives, and Silicon Valley executives for off-the-record annual retreats. For nearly two decades, the organization has consistently declined to disclose its membership rolls.
The exposure began when a directory embedded in the source code of the group’s website was discovered by Swiss hacker maia arson crimew. Known for previously exposing the US government’s No Fly List and breaching the systems of security camera firm Verkada, the hacker told WIRED that the directory was uncovered via an anonymous tip. WIRED independently verified the authenticity of the directory’s contents.
Separately, a source provided WIRED with the registration list for Dialog’s upcoming 2026 retreat.
The list features the names of 222 individuals, detailing each attendee’s membership status and designation, including classifications such as “active member” and “guest.” The retreat is scheduled to take place from August 12 to 16, 2026, at the Powerscourt Hotel, located just outside Dublin, Ireland.
The leaked data also details a program composed of closed-door sessions. Panel titles include: “Does Money (Really?) Buy Happiness,” “Bring Back Nuclear Power,” “Navigating WWIII,” “Battlefield Technologies,” and “How Is Your Sex Life?”
Other scheduled discussions include a session titled “Start a Cult,” led by the founder of the Christian networking site Pray.com, and “Start a Party,” conducted by a former White House national security official.
While some of the documents contain the standard material of typical thought-leadership conferences, they also reveal an extraordinary convergence of institutional and private power.
Among the registry records is General Alexus Grynkewich, the Commander of US Air Forces Central Command who took office as the Supreme Allied Commander Europe of NATO and Commander of US European Command in July 2025. The leaked list indicates that Grynkewich has attended Dialog events since 2021.
The website directory also lists current Trump administration officials, two US senators, six members of the “PayPal Mafia,” a former Middle Eastern intelligence chief, and a sitting US ambassador. These names appear alongside the founders and executives of some of the United States’ largest surveillance, data brokerage, and advertising data firms.
These industry executives appear in the directory alongside the very regulators and lawmakers who oversee their sectors.
For instance, Dialog’s chairman, Auren Hoffman, co-founded SafeGraph, a location data broker, and LiveRamp, an identity-resolution firm—two pivotal suppliers in the consumer data economy.
Hoffman is listed in the directory alongside Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who shapes financial data regulations, and Senator Ted Cruz, the Chairman of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, which oversees the Federal Trade Commission and data privacy authorities.
Similarly, Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale is listed in the same association directory as Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll and Representative Jim Himes, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, which oversees the intelligence agencies with which Palantir contracts.
None of the individuals named in the WIRED report responded to requests for comment. Raffi Grinberg, who identifies himself on LinkedIn as Dialog’s executive director and is the author of the self-help book How to Be a Grown-Up, also did not respond to inquiries.
The registry records appear to document not only who holds membership in Dialog, but also who has confirmed attendance for upcoming events.
Of the 222 individuals registered for the 2026 event, 87 are marked as first-time attendees, according to the leaked records.
Others have histories with the group spanning more than a decade, with a select few dating back to the society’s founding 20 years ago. None of the registrants, including Grynkewich, utilized official government email addresses to register.
Instead, all participants registered using personal or corporate email accounts, effectively keeping their correspondence and attendance outside the purview of public records laws that apply to government email systems.
According to WIRED, the primary thread uniting the attendee list—beyond titles and offices—is a shared interest in artificial intelligence, longevity, and the near future.
When prompted on the registration form to predict future trends, registrants repeatedly returned to a central theme: that artificial intelligence will thoroughly restructure commerce, warfare, education, and faith within a few years.
Several participants predicted mass unemployment and a subsequent return to labor unions and state-sponsored programs. Others anticipated an “AI winter,” domestic terrorism targeting data centers, defendants choosing AI-powered attorneys over public defenders, or a religious revival triggered by these technological shifts.
Another registrant predicted that “societal decay will continue to accelerate.”
Members also listed personal skills on their forms, ranging from “funhouse construction,” accent mimicry, backcountry skiing, and urban exploration to “meditative and psychedelic exploration into the nature of reality.”
One participant listed “compassion and existential dread” as personal talents, while another listed “dinner parties, keeping secrets, remembering birthdays.”
The book recommendations listed by participants are classic and optimization-oriented. Recommended texts include works by Marcus Aurelius and Milan Kundera, alongside Annie Duke’s Thinking in Bets, Peter Attia’s Outlive, and—recommended by at least one attendee—Thiel’s own book, Zero to One.
Dialog also facilitates personal matchmaking. The registration form asks participants, “Are you looking for love?” and offers options to opt into a “future matchmaking” database as a “Single Male,” “Single Female,” or “Other.”
A separate website, dating.dialog.org, hosts an application promoted with the slogan: “meaningful connections for extraordinary people.”
The form also collects sensitive personal data, including the “political leaning” of each participant. Dialog pledges on the form that this information “will never be shared on the app or with other attendees.” However, this data and the matchmaking responses were both compromised in the leak.
The records are maintained on Airtable, a commercial database platform. For each participant, Dialog records their membership status, a history of all retreats attended, a biography, their city of residence, and a personal access token.
The leaked registry contains high-profile names that do not appear in the group’s public-facing directory. Among them are Randy Kroszner, a former Federal Reserve Governor who currently serves on the Bank of England’s Financial Policy Committee; Hallie Hoffman, former general counsel and acting chief of staff for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA); Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL); Peter Goettler, President of the Cato Institute; Ryan Stowers, executive director of the Charles Koch Foundation; and Roger Myerson, a Nobel laureate economist from the University of Chicago.
The list also includes a contingent of Google and Google DeepMind executives, including Tom Lue, who manages global relations for the company’s pioneer AI division, as well as Washington Post national security correspondent Souad Mekhennet.
The remainder of the roster consists of hedge fund and private equity billionaires, current and former foreign officials, television actors, bestselling authors, and religious leaders.
Among the internal documents left exposed on the database was a guide for event moderators.
The document instructs moderators to remind participants that all discussions are strictly “off-the-record” and that comments must be concise and “non-obvious.”
Moderators are also instructed to keep introductions brief to “avoid status signifiers” in rooms crowded with senators, high-ranking officials, and corporate leaders.
Since its inception, Dialog has operated with a minimal public footprint. It hosts at least one meeting per year where seating is pre-assigned, sessions are structured by moderators, and strict non-attribution rules apply to all remarks.
According to Axios, which first reported on the group’s plans to establish a physical campus in the Washington, DC area, past meetings have been held at the Ritz-Carlton Dove Mountain in Arizona and the San Clemente Palace in Venice, Italy.
The society has frequently been described as a technology-sector equivalent of the Bilderberg meetings, where Western political and business elites convene behind closed doors.
In 2022, statistician Andrew Gelman published one of Dialog’s invitation letters on his blog, revealing the event’s format and a registration fee exceeding $16,000.
The invitation list for the group’s 2014 meeting re-entered public scrutiny this year after the US Department of Justice released files showing Jeffrey Epstein was among approximately 150 invitees. Whether Epstein actually attended the meeting remains unclear.
America
US Senate rejects resolution to limit Trump’s military authority on Iran
The US Senate has rejected a resolution aimed at limiting President Donald Trump’s authority to conduct military operations against Iran.
According to a report by CBS, the motion to advance the resolution received 47 votes in favor and 48 against. Consequently, the measure designed to restrict Trump’s military powers regarding Iran failed to pass the Senate.
Four Republican senators—Susan Collins, Bill Cassidy, Lisa Murkowski, and Rand Paul—backed the resolution, voting in favor alongside the vast majority of Democrats. Senator John Fetterman was the sole Democrat to vote against the measure.
Republican Senators Mitch McConnell and Josh Hawley, as well as Democratic Senators Michael Bennet and Cory Booker, did not participate in the vote. Independent Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont was also absent from the vote.
In recent days, members of Congress have been demanding the disclosure of the contents of an agreement reached between the US and Iran, the details of which have been kept classified.
The resolution, introduced by Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock, directed the removal of the US Armed Forces from hostilities against Iran.
Under the terms of the resolution, the continuation of any such military activities would require a formal declaration of war or specific statutory authorization from Congress.
Under the US Constitution, the power to declare war belongs exclusively to Congress. However, many US leaders argue that this rule does not apply to short-term military operations or situations where the country faces an imminent threat.
In May, the Senate had supported the advancement of a similar resolution aimed at limiting the president’s military authority regarding Iran.
That vote marked the first time such a measure succeeded after seven prior attempts, with four Republican senators voting in favor of the resolution during that process as well. However, at the end of that month, Republicans in the House of Representatives withdrew the bill.
In March, another resolution aimed at limiting Trump’s war powers failed to secure majority support in the Senate and was blocked.
The US and Iran announced on June 15 that they had reached a peace agreement. While the agreement was concluded electronically, a formal signing ceremony is scheduled to take place on June 19 in Geneva.
America
Trump nominates federal prosecutor Jay Clayton to lead national intelligence agency
US President Donald Trump, following controversies over experience in Congress, has nominated Jay Clayton, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, to lead the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the nation’s most senior intelligence post.
The selection, which will fill the vacancy left by incumbent Director Tulsi Gabbard when she departs on June 30, comes after turbulent weeks following Trump’s appointment of Bill Pulte as acting director.
“There are very few people in the legal community who are as highly respected as Jay,” Trump said in a statement on his social media platform, Truth Social, calling on the US Senate to confirm Clayton’s nomination as quickly as possible.
A political independent, Clayton has served since August 2025 as the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York—a position legal experts describe as the most powerful post within the Department of Justice.
Trump had nominated Clayton to this post shortly after winning the 2024 presidential election, describing him as “a tough fighter for the facts.”
From Wall Street lawyer to federal prosecutor
Born in West Virginia, Clayton began his legal career from 1993 to 1995 as a law clerk to Judge Marvin Katz of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
He then worked at the Sullivan & Cromwell law firm from 1995 to 2017, first as an associate and later as a partner. During this period, Clayton represented major financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs, building a multi-million dollar fortune during his time as a Wall Street lawyer.
In 2017, at the beginning of his first presidential term, Trump nominated Clayton to chair the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). During his confirmation process, Clayton pledged to fully sever ties with his law firm and his Wall Street clients, which included Barclays Bank, Royal Bank of Canada, and Deutsche Bank AG.
After the Office of Government Ethics determined that there was no conflict of interest, Clayton was confirmed by the Senate in May 2017 by a 61-37 vote and assumed office.
Then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican, praised the nomination and said he looked forward to Clayton’s leadership, while Democrats, including Senator Elizabeth Warren, voted against him due to his Wall Street ties.
During his tenure as SEC chairman, Clayton frequently testified before Congress on issues such as market integrity, digital asset regulation, cybersecurity, and US-China economic interdependence. After leaving office, he returned to Sullivan & Cromwell while also taking on executive roles at Apollo Global Management and American Express.
He also continued his academic work, serving as an adjunct professor at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School since 2009 and at the Wharton School since 2021.
Between 2022 and 2025, he co-chaired the university’s Institute for Law and Economics.
New York prosecution
In June 2020, Trump announced he would appoint Clayton to the post of US Attorney for the Southern District of New York after dismissing then-US Attorney Geoffrey Berman.
Clayton expressed interest in the position but did not comment on whether he was aware that Berman would be dismissed.
The appointment did not materialize at the time, and Audrey Strauss was appointed to the role.
Clayton was nominated again for the US Attorney post for the Southern District of New York in 2025, at the beginning of Trump’s second term.
Clayton sought the office to replace an interim judge who had refused to assist the Department of Justice in dropping charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams.
Clayton’s appointment, which was not directly confirmed by the Senate, was finalized by the court’s own approval. At the time, The Wall Street Journal commented that Clayton, who typically avoided political controversies, found himself in the midst of a “partisan battle” with this move.
The most notable process conducted by Clayton’s prosecution office was the indictment and litigation process initiated in January against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on charges of “narco-terrorism” and other offenses.
Clayton’s team also played critical roles in reviewing documents related to Jeffrey Epstein and in the case of an Iraqi citizen accused of plotting attacks on US soil on behalf of Iran.
Recently, The New York Times claimed that Clayton spent frequent time with Trump, played golf, and was “often absent” from his office.
Like Bill Pulte, Jay Clayton has no prior experience in the intelligence world. Trump’s previous choice, Bill Pulte, had been accused of targeting Trump’s political opponents by filing criminal complaints over mortgage fraud allegations during his tenure as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA).
While none of these cases resulted in convictions, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) launched an investigation into how the FHFA conducted its investigative processes.
Pulte’s lack of intelligence-gathering experience and the politically charged investigations he initiated drew intense criticism in Congress.
In this new phase, however, members of Congress have reacted more positively to Clayton’s nomination. Republican Senator John Thune said of Clayton, “I think he is a highly qualified professional with great skills to manage complex problems.”
Senator Mark Warner, the ranking Democrat on the committee that will vote on the nomination, also described Clayton as “very qualified.” According to The New York Times, CIA Director John Ratcliffe also supported Clayton’s appointment to the post.
Statements on election security
Days before being nominated as Director of National Intelligence, Clayton appeared as a guest on CNBC, where he addressed the possibility of irregularities in California’s elections.
Speaking about election security during the June 8 broadcast, Clayton said, “We are doing an absolutely terrible job, and the American people are right to question it.”
Arguing that the state’s laws—which allow mail-in ballots to be sent to all voters and allow votes to arrive after Election Day—”create opportunities for irregularities,” Clayton’s claims came at a time when Trump was asserting, without providing any evidence, that the elections were “rigged.”
Jay Clayton, who holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering from the University of Pennsylvania, completed his graduate studies at King’s College, Cambridge. He received his law degree in 1993, also from the University of Pennsylvania.
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