Jeffrey Epstein, Donald Trump, and the Powerful Men Who Get Away With It
If we’ve learned anything from the presidency of Donald Trump, it’s that more often than not rich men get away with it—whatever it is.
For all the overdue justice that #MeToo secured, the last 20 or so months have seen countless men scrutinized and then…exonerated. From Trump to Brett Kavanaugh, the process tends to follow a familiar script: Justice is invoked, press conferences are held, social media is ablaze, and then the outrage fades or—worse—it never quite materializes in the first place.
When the dust settles, the man tends to retain his position (or, in the case of Brett Kavanaugh, is rewarded with a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court). From time to time he’s forced to slink off for a little like Louis C.K. (whose eventual comeback seems inevitable) or Charlie Rose. But a lot of the powerful men are able to ride it out. There’s some fallout, the word allegations is sprinkled into 10,000 news stories, and then people like Eric Bolling or Bill O’Reilly recover, as popular in conservative circles as ever. It’s been hard to see #MeToo as a triumph or as all it was supposed to be, especially when people like Donald Trump Jr. use it as a punch line.
But on Saturday the Daily Beast broke the news that Jeffery Epstein had been arrested as soon as he stepped off his private jet at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey. He was taken directly to a prison cell. When his indictment was unsealed, it revealed that Epstein had been charged with “one count of sex trafficking of minors” and “one count of conspiracy to engage in sex trafficking of minors.” It feels like a strange victory. In a time when rich men seem to have a separate justice system all their own, what does it mean for a powerful person to be treated like what he really is—a man who’s been accused of sex-trafficking children for over a decade?
But it’s not so simple. I wish the fact that Epstein could face an actual sentence commensurate with his crimes means the dawn of a new era. The bad guys get caught! They suffer for it. Instead, Epstein feels not even like an aberration, but like proof: The system is broken and unfair. He isn’t just some guy who made one mistake; the charges against him paint him as a serial sexual predator. When prosecutors made their case that Epstein should be denied bail, Bloomberg reports, the team pointed to the “vast trove of lewd photographs” it uncovered in a search of Epstein’s New York City mansion (once valued at $77 million) over the weekend. The images, the government said, show he is a danger to the public. But if you’ve read the Miami Herald investigation that revived the allegations against Epstein, you already knew that. And so did all the other powerful men who decided for years not to do anything about it.
In 2008, Alex Acosta, who is now the secretary of labor and was then a district attorney in Miami, secured for Epstein a nonprosecution agreement that allowed him to plead guilty to a fraction of what he was accused of; he ultimately served 13 months, most of it in a private wing of a county jail that permitted him to leave for work almost every day. This week Acosta addressed the new charges on Twitter, writing, “The crimes committed by Epstein are horrific, and I am pleased that NY prosecutors are moving forward with a case based on new evidence.”
It’s precisely the kind of Trumpian gaslighting that makes a person feel insane. If convicted, Epstein will be held accountable for the same kinds of crimes that Acosta let him off the hook for. As CNN summarized, “According to the [most recent] indictment, between 2002 and 2005, Epstein ran a trafficking enterprise in which he paid hundreds of dollars in cash to girls as young as 14 to have sex with him at his Upper East Side home and his estate in Palm Beach, worked with employees and associates to lure the girls to his residences, and paid some of his victims to recruit other girls for him to abuse.”
Someone should explain to Secretary Acosta that 2002 and 2005 came before he handed Epstein his sweetheart deal in 2008.
In an interview with the Daily Beast, attorney Paul Cassell, who represents some of Epstein’s alleged victims, said, “If today’s report is true, it only proves that Epstein should have been charged by federal prosecutors 12 years ago in Florida. With his money, Epstein was able to buy more than a decade of delay in facing justice—but fortunately he wasn’t able to postpone justice forever.”
Given the sheer number of men who haven’t been held accountable for their actions, there is a temptation to frame the prosecution of Epstein as a great success. But if anything, it’s a sad reminder of how far we have to go, how unfair the legal system is, and how, for the most part, rich, well-connected men evade justice.
Remember that Epstein sits in jail now because one woman wouldn’t let him walk. At the Miami Herald, investigative journalist Julie K. Brown has continued to tell the stories of Epstein’s victims. Yes, even after her blockbuster investigation came out and lesser reporters might have washed their hands of it. We live in a world where victims of sexual assault are ignored, where a woman can accuse the president of the United States of rape on the cover of a magazine, and the media can shrug. The occasional triumph should not be celebrated (especially not prematurely). The latest developments in the Epstein case are a reminder that a fairer world is possible. But if we want to secure it, a few more men will have to be dealt with first.
Molly Jong-Fast is the author of three novels. Follow her on Twitter @mollyjongfast.
Originally Appeared on Glamour
