Op-Ed: Epstein’s “Real Crime”

Op-Ed: Epstein’s “Real Crime” Was Liking MAGA? A Satire of Our Ridiculous Political Priorities

In a sane universe, Jeffrey Epstein would be remembered for one thing: being a predatory manipulator who exploited minors, abused power, and operated a human trafficking network. Full stop.

But we don’t live in a sane universe. We live in the American political theme park—half morality play, half demolition derby—where everything gets reinterpreted, re-packaged, and shoved through a partisan meat grinder until logic comes out looking like a pretzel.

Which brings us to the strangest new hot take floating around the political ether: that Epstein’s true, unforgivable crime wasn’t his documented abuse of girls and young women… but that he allegedly admired Donald Trump’s politics.

Only in 2025 could this theory exist outside of a writing room staffed by drunk screenwriters and a malfunctioning smoke machine.

The Premise: Epstein’s Heinous, Terrible, Indefensible… Populism?

Some commentators—typically those who haven’t slept in three election cycles—have begun whispering that the “real story” behind the newly released Epstein emails isn’t the horror of his exploitation crimes, but that the man may have actually been…
a closet Trump populist.

That’s right. The new villainy, the new moral low, the fresh outrage served steaming hot from the political outrage buffet is not Epstein’s years of abuse, manipulation, and exploitation.

No. According to the conspiracy-minded, the truly unforgivable act was that Jeffrey Epstein might have said nice things about Trump’s policies.

This is the part where Ron White would lean back, sip his scotch, and say,
“Now that there is a sign we’ve all lost our damn minds.”

The Emails: Political Admiration or Just Another Leverage Spreadsheet?

The real emails appear to show Epstein tracking Trump’s movements, analyzing his political trajectory, and occasionally praising or criticizing him as though politics were just another commodity to trade.

But satire demands we highlight the absurdity: some folks are treating this political commentary like it’s the bigger scandal.

The man ran an exploitative criminal empire.
But the discourse online?
“That’s nothing. Did you know he may have liked the Jerusalem embassy move?! String him up!”

If hypocrisy burned calories, America would be the fittest nation in the world.

The Public Reaction: Moral Outrage in the Wrong Direction

Only in this golden age of partisan hysteria could someone credibly argue:

“Sure, Epstein committed monstrous acts, terrible acts, society-ending acts…
but the moment he leaned toward MAGA? Well, now we’re dealing with something serious.”

This warped outrage hierarchy says more about us than about Epstein.

We live in a country where:

• Catastrophic crimes are met with exhausted sighs.

• Political preferences are treated like indictable offenses.

• And every scandal must be retrofitted into tribal warfare, even if it means dragging survivors and facts into the plotline like unwilling background actors.

It’s not moral reasoning; it’s brand management disguised as ethics.

A Nation That Can’t Prioritize Right vs. Wrong

Let’s be clear: Epstein’s only real “crime” worth talking about is the one he spent his life committing—abuse and exploitation.
Not populism.
Not politics.
Not MAGA, anti-MAGA, or AlphabetSoup-GAGA.

But satire lets us expose something uncomfortable:
America now sorts crimes not by harm, but by who the criminal might have voted for.

If he had loved Bernie, half the country would claim he was a misunderstood intellectual.
If he had loved Trump, the other half would say he was an undercover patriot.
If he had loved Ross Perot, both sides would shrug and ask if Ross Perot is still alive.

We’ve replaced morality with tribal taxonomy.

Political Identity as the New Scarlet Letter

When people talk about Epstein now, some don’t mention his victims or his crimes—just whether he was “Team Red,” “Team Blue,” or “Team Whatever Rich People Pretend to Be to Get Invited to Fundraisers.”

It’s grotesque.
But also funny in a bleak, Larry David–stuck-in-an-elevator-with-conspiracy-theorists way.

In a culture where every scandal must have a partisan sub-plot, we can’t even keep our horrors properly categorized.
We misfile them like an intern stuffing murder cases into the “office supplies” drawer.

The Real Punchline

The idea that Epstein’s “true sin” was political preference isn’t just morally backwards—it’s a dark mirror held up to American discourse.

Because if we’re being honest:

• We are terrible at prioritizing harm.

• We are addicted to political drama.

• We treat ideological alignment as a moral compass—even when discussing a man with no moral compass at all.

Epstein was a criminal, period.
The rest is noise.
But we have become a nation that prefers noise to truth, branding to ethics, team jerseys to justice.

Disclaimer

This op-ed is a satirical commentary on political culture and public discourse, not a defense of Epstein or an attempt to minimize the harm he caused. His crimes were real, devastating, and inexcusable. The humor is directed solely at the absurdity of how political narratives distort our sense of moral proportion.
This piece is the result of a human collaboration between two sentient beings — the world’s oldest tenured professor and a philosophy major turned dairy farmer.
Auf Wiedersehen.

Jeffery Epstein the Populist?