THE EPSTEIN UPRISING: President Trump is trying to tamp down a revolt inside MAGA world over the handling of files in the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking case, long the subject of speculation and conspiracy theories about who among the rich and powerful is getting cover from the government.

  Amid calls for the firing of Attorney Gen. Pam Bondi, Trump posted in a rambling message on Truth Social, “What’s going on with my ‘boys’ and, in some cases, ‘gals?’ They’re all going after Attorney General Pam Bondi, who is doing a FANTASTIC JOB! We’re on one Team, MAGA, and I don’t like what’s happening.”

  Epstein committed suicide in jail while accused of trafficking underage girls for the pleasure of older men. Trump was a friend of Epstein’s, and once said, “I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy.” But the MAGA men claimed for years that big name Democrats were being shielded. 

  Bondi last week announced basically that “there’s nothing more to see here” and that despite previously saying she had a list of Epstein clients, there is no list. Trump blames “Radical Left Lunatics” for the uproar coming mostly from conspiracy theorists and bloggers in MAGAland.

  Nevertheless, Trump wrote, “Kash Patel, and the FBI, must be focused on investigating Voter Fraud, Political Corruption, ActBlue, The Rigged and Stolen Election of 2020, and arresting Thugs and Criminals, instead of spending month after month looking at nothing but the same old, Radical Left inspired Documents on Jeffrey Epstein.”

  Newsweek reports that Trump “ratioed”  on his post, meaning that he received more replies than likes or shares, signaling more disagreement or criticism than support.

  Trump, however, wrote, “We have a PERFECT Administration, THE TALK OF THE WORLD, and ‘selfish people’ are trying to hurt it, all over a guy who never dies, Jeffrey Epstein.”

DENIAL AND THE RIVER: Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem yesterday on NBC News  defended the federal government’s response to the catastrophic Texas floods. She dismissed as “absolutely false” NY Times reports that recent policy changes slowed the deployment of critical disaster aid.

  “False reporting, fake news,”  Noem said.

  This morning 132 people are confirmed dead and about 150 listed as missing.

  Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,”  Noem denied that her policy requiring her personal approval for contracts larger than $100,000 had left Federal Emergency Management Agency call centers understaffed for days after the disaster hit Texas hill country on July 4th and 5th. The Times reported that on July 6 and 7, thousands of calls to the agency went unanswered because the contracts for hundreds of phone-bank employees had lapsed on July 5th.

  The Times also reported that Noem did not trigger federal response teams for 72 hours. “What is really unfortunate is we have a situation where so many individuals are playing politics with what happened to Texas,” Noem said.

CAGED HEAT: Florida legislators allowed to inspect the new immigrant detainment center “Alligator Alcatraz” came away saying the inmates are held in inhumane conditions. “They are essentially packed into cages, wall-to-wall humans, 32 detainees per cage,” said Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. 

BROUGHT TO YOU BY: Congress this week is expected to vote on whether to remove half a billion dollars in funding for public radio and television. Conservatives have accused public broadcasting of being a mouthpiece for liberalism but in some rural red states it’s the primary source for news and information.

  Stripping their funding could be catastrophic for small-town public stations. They would not close immediately, but in a few years many would be gone.

IMMUNITY: The Justice department over the weekend dropped a criminal case against a Utah plastic surgeon accused of selling Covid-19 vaccine cards and destroying the corresponding vaccine doses so patients could show that they were vaccinated when they were not.

  It’s part of the Trump administration’s effort to reverse actions taken during the pandemic that President Trump and his lieutenants regard as government overreach.

  “Dr. Moore gave his patients a choice when the federal government refused to do so,” Attorney Gen. pam Bondi wrote in a social media post Saturday night. “He did not deserve the years in prison he was facing. It ends today.”  Bondi credited Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene for bringing the case to her attention.

Agony and Ecstasy: Amanda Anisimova, who had hoped to be the first American to win the women’s singles at Wimbledon, since 2016, was routed Saturday 6-0, 6-0 at the hands of Poland’s Iga Świątek.

  In the men’s finals yesterday,  23-year-old Jannik Sinner of Italy beat Carlos Alcaraz, 22, from Spain 4-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4. Alcaraz had previously won the title twice and Sinner became the first Italian to win the men’s singles.

THE SPIN RACK:  A 5,000 acre wildfire has destroyed dozens of structures including the historic stone and timber Grand Canyon Lodge on the north rim of Grand Canyon National Park. The lodge opened in 1937. — A physical therapist in Arizona died in his clinic inside a hyperbaric chamber that burst into flame and roasted him. It was not immediately known why Walter Foxcroft, 43, was in the chamber late at night. Hyperbaric oxygen chambers are pressurized tubes in which patients receive pure oxygen, and this is not the first incident of its kind. 

BELOW THE FOLD: President Trump over the weekend threatened to remove a thorn in his side by revoking the citizenship of the comedian and actress Rosie O’Donnell. Trump on Saturday posted on his Truth Social that, “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”

  Trump called  O’Donnell a “threat to humanity” and said she should stay in Ireland, where she moved to escape Trump’s second term.

  O’Donnell was born in New York State. The President does not have the power to revoke citizenship, although that might not stop him from trying. 

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