It was early July when a noted change in the energy behind the Jeffrey Epstein files and/or client list was to be made public. After anticipation built up on Donald Trump’s campaign promises, there was a discernible shift as things altered and stories changed. Now, the list was not coming out, some said it was not even around, and the video of the jailhouse suicide of Epstein became a contested issue.

And just that quickly, journalism instincts suddenly kicked in. The Wall Street Journal “found” a letter Trump wrote to Epstein for his 50th birthday (over 20 years ago, prior to his illegalities coming to light). CNN “uncovered” a photo of Epstein attending Trump’s wedding (which was not a mystery, as it was from three decades ago and long made public). There was even an attempt to pull Fox News into the fray with a claim of a “60 Minutes” style interview editing scandal over clipping Trump’s response on releasing the files. (Except, unlike CBS, Fox had released the full video and it was always available.)

Of course, feeding into this was the upheaval seen within the Justice community. There has been far more than an uptick in media coverage of the Jeffrey Epstein files as a result, all due to the administration changing course on the hotly anticipated release. After Pam Bondi declared she had the files on her desk, and long-time promises by the president of making the files public, suddenly there was a pullback on the desire to do so. 

White House Issues Statement Following Pam Bondi, Dan Bongino Rumors Over Epstein Files

Intelligence Operative on Epstein Files: ‘This Is a Total F**king Disaster’

We were made to care about these supposedly incriminating details as the press was standing on the throttle with two feet to deliver all manner of Epstein coverage. Politico was in a fury of interest, at times averaging about half a dozen pieces a day. The New York Times has been particularly mired in Epstein OCD – In July alone, the outlet clocked around 200 pieces concerning the late sexual predator.

Of course, this defied one central truth behind this energy: All of this motivation was purely done from the standpoint of wounding Donald Trump’s character and impacting the Republican power base. The Epstein files are an old story and we saw not much in the way of delivering coverage during the Biden years. But that connective tissue with the current president now means the press is digging for nuggets like a porcine truffle hunter.

More than damaging Trump’s favorability, the intent is to divide his base, possibly with an eye on the upcoming midterms. In the eyes of the press, there is a zeal among the Trump ardents for the revealing of the Epstein files, and this sudden coyness towards the release was thought to drive that wedge deep through MAGA Nation. Oh, but that has not become their hoped-for reality.

Nate Silver decided to take a look at the results of the passionate forecheck in the press on the administration, and see what public polling has to say about their efforts. What he found reveals it has all been met with a collective shrug.

As the noted polling guru is known for, he did not cherry-pick a select poll but instead used a lengthy list to draw up averages to measure the public opinion on Trump’s favorability, from before the dam break of the current coverage and after. The results are tellingly underwhelming. 

His overall favorability dipped all of a couple of percentage points; hardly a crash of support. Among Democrats, there was barely any movement, largely due to the fact that he began with a massive unfavorable number and that is likely to always hold steady, near 90 percent. But what became of this effort in the press to cleave away Trump support? Silver wrote:

Among Republicans, Trump’s approval has actually ticked up a point since Epstein became a focal point, while his disapproval rating has declined by one point.

And then, just to underscore the failure of this media push for the past month, even Independents showed little movement of the needle. Trump’s favorability with those political squishes remained unchanged (at 34%), and his unfavorability ticked up by one point to 60 perfect. 

All of this apathy for the supposed scandal might be explained by another metric that Silver came up with, regarding national interest in topics. Tariffs have generated far more interest in search engine activity, exceeding the highest spike in Epstein interest three different times already.

While the press has been obsessed with Epstein in a borderline unhealthy fashion, it has had no measurable effect on the approval ratings for Trump.
That is because there has been over 3x more interest in tariffs and the economy. pic.twitter.com/jZ7cXk3DVI

— Lie-Able Sources (@LieAbleSources) August 4, 2025

This would indicate a press complex in the country refusing to measure the national temperature. They continue to operate as if they still drive narratives and create an upswell in interest and reactions to stories as they see fit. That has been a sliding influence for years and, in 2024, saw a mass migration away from the media by the public after Joe Biden’s meltdown exposed their partisan hackery.

What we see with this attempted Epstein influence is the press saying, “You WILL be made to care!’ all while the general public has responded with an apathetic, “Nah, we’re good.”