This is Trump’s dead giveaway that he was in over his head with Epstein

Every time he sees trouble brewing, Donald Trump exhibits a telltale panic response.

When he’s cornered, when the walls close in and facts start to make the hair left on his head stand straight up — although a stiff wind will do that too — Trump doesn’t simply deny. He lies by preemptively distancing himself.

It’s the first clue he’s in real trouble, and it’s turned into one of his most revealing traits.

He muddies timelines. He feigns ignorance. He never knew the person or persons in question. He suddenly remembers “falling out,” years earlier. He insists everyone else knew more than he did.

We know the routine: Trump is lying through his teeth.

He tries to get ahead of the story by pretending he was never really in it. Panic kicks in, and he does something so over-the-top it screams “Guilty, guilty, guilty!” He goes on the offensive by reinserting himself as a supposedly credible source.

This is exactly what makes newly surfaced FBI records from a 2019 interview with a retired Palm Beach police chief so damning — not because they accuse Trump of a crime, but because they expose his reflexive damage control in real time.

It’s the kind of response you only deploy when the truth is biting your bulbous ass. A maneuver only Trump has perfected — or imperfected.

According to those records, first reported by the indefatigable Julie K. Brown of the Miami Herald, in July 2006, shortly after Jeffrey Epstein’s first criminal investigation became public, Trump called Palm Beach police chief Michael Reiter.

Trump didn’t call to express shock or support. He didn’t call to ask questions. And he didn’t call because he had just learned something stunning.

No, he called to say, in essence: “Everyone already knew, and I had nothing to do with it. Nothing.”

He wanted it known he was nowhere near Epstein, had barely known him, and definitely didn’t need looking into as well.

Here’s what Trump reportedly said, but you can read between the lines: “Thank goodness you’re stopping him. Everyone has known he’s been doing this.”

Trump allegedly described Epstein’s behavior with teenage girls as “disgusting,” warned that Epstein partner Ghislaine Maxwell was his “operative,” and urged police to focus on her, calling her “evil.”

Then came the magnum opus: Trump claimed he had once been around Epstein when teenagers were present, and had “got the hell out of there.”

OMG, Donald, slow down. Take a breath. Methinks thou dost protest too much.

This wasn’t a man discovering a predator. This was a man carefully placing himself just far enough away from one while making sure law enforcement heard, loud and clear, that he shouldn’t be counted among the naïve.

And yes, I know what you’re thinking. If he knew, if he saw Epstein with teenage girls, why didn’t he say something? Why didn’t he go to the authorities? Why didn’t he blow the whistle?

Because, of course, Trump was likely fibbing. You can bet he didn’t get “the hell out of there.” He stayed. And he played. You can make that assumption because of Trump’s overreaction.

For years afterward, Trump told a very different story.

• He minimized his relationship with Epstein, saying, “Well, I knew him like everybody in Palm Beach knew him.”
• He claimed he banned Epstein from Mar-a-Lago two decades ago because the sex offender was stealing young spa workers.
• He insisted they hadn’t spoken in 15 years. Twenty, 15, who’s counting?
• His lawyers said he had “no knowledge whatsoever” of Epstein’s conduct.
• When Maxwell was arrested, Trump didn’t condemn her. He famously said he “wished her well.”

Those statements are irreconcilable with the 2006 call in which Trump claimed everyone knew Epstein abused minors.

Everyone knew, but Trump didn’t? All of Palm Beach knew, but Trump, a fixture of Palm Beach society, didn’t? Sure. I guess when the gossip started at Mar-a-Lago, Trump ran to the DJ and blasted “YMCA” so he couldn’t hear the sordid scuttlebutt.

While Trump’s linguistic gymnastics are laughable, what he’s lying about is not. Nearly every man tied to Epstein lied about his relationship with him, until the drip, drip, drip of documents exposed the deceit. The same holds true for Trump.

The FBI records don’t accuse Trump of criminal wrongdoing. But they do something arguably more damaging. They show he understood exactly how bad Epstein was when it mattered, and then spent two decades pretending otherwise.

It’s Trump’s pattern.

He didn’t know about the hush money paid to Stormy Daniels, didn’t know her either, until investigators produced the canceled checks. He had “nothing to do” with Project 2025, until he staffed his administration with its authors.

He denied knowing Paul Manafort, his campaign manager, shared data with a Russian associate.

He claimed he took no classified documents from the White House, until his own voice contradicted him.

Now this gem. The irony is that Trump followed his playbook with (now former) Prince Andrew, flatly denying he knew him, only to have photos and his own past praise prove the relationship he rushed to disown was real.

There are too many examples to list, because Trump’s diversions happen daily.

Every time, the same routine: distance first, details later. Denials until evidence forces revision. By then the truth is a muddle.

The 2006 call isn’t vindicating. Trump wasn’t confessing. He was positioning. He was laying down a narrative designed to frame himself as an outsider to Epstein’s crimes rather than someone entangled in Epstein’s orbit and behavior.

It’s as if Trump believed that by calling police and loudly declaring “everyone knows,” he could immunize himself from scrutiny.

The FBI files show Trump knew. Trump lied about knowing. And Trump did what he always does. He tried to talk his way out before anyone asked the right questions.

That’s the dead giveaway.

Trump was in deep. Way deep. In over his head. Now the question is, why isn’t Trump’s head rolling like so many others?

• John Casey was most recently Senior Editor, The Advocate, and is a freelance opinion and feature story writer. Previously, he was a Capitol Hill press secretary, and spent 25 years in media and public relations in NYC. He is the co-author of LOVE: The Heroic Stories of Marriage Equality (Rizzoli, 2025), named by Oprah in her "Best 25 of 2025.”