September 22, 2025 – The USA Potato

Conservative writer Bill Kristol took to social media today to say: “So many coverups. Release the Epstein files. Release the Homan tapes. Release the Venezuelan fishing boats evidence.”

Kristol was referring to three stories about which members of the administration seem to be hiding things that don’t fit their narrative.

The Republican-dominated House Oversight Committee has been slow to release records related to the investigation of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein although interest in them is high—not least because reports that the records mention President Donald Trump seem confirmed by Federal Bureau of Investigation director Kash Patel’s refusal to answer questions from Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee about his appearance in them. Last week, Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee voted not to subpoena the chief executive officers of JPMorgan Chase, Bank of New York Mellon, Bank of America, and Deutsche Bank for testimony and records for about $1.5 billion in transactions related to Epstein’s crimes.

Today, Dan Ruetenik, Cara Tabachnick, and Graham Kates of CBS News reported that they have obtained documents about the events of July 23, 2019, 18 days before Epstein’s death, when he was found unresponsive in his cell. Those documents add detail to the story already reported, in which upon regaining consciousness, Epstein first suggested he had been attacked by his cellmate but later said he couldn’t remember what had happened. As is the case with Epstein’s death, because of either human error or the faulty video system, there is no recording of the incident.

In the United Kingdom, seven charities have cut ties with Sarah Ferguson, Prince Andrew’s ex-wife, after newspapers yesterday published an email Ferguson sent to Epstein in 2011, several years after he had pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitution with a minor, appearing to apologize for her public criticism of him.

In response to this weekend’s story that the FBI recorded a video in 2024 of Tom Homan, who is now Trump’s border czar, accepting $50,000 in exchange for promising to steer government contracts for border security toward the men offering the money, the White House now says that Homan didn’t take the cash. As Ken Dilanian and Carol Leonnig of MSNBC note, that’s not what they said when the reporters first asked them about it on Saturday. Dilanian and Leonnig add: “Multiple people familiar with the case say he did accept the money, as does an internal government document reviewed by MSNBC.”

National security analyst Juliette Kayyem noted that “ICE contracts are going to unknown construction companies and days old consulting firms.” Democracy Forward has filed a Freedom of Information Act request, asking the FBI and the Justice Department to release the recording of Homan accepting the $50,000.

Kristol’s reference to Venezuelan fishing boats relates to the administration’s deadly strikes against several Venezuelan boats the administration insists were smuggling drugs to the United States. The administration has shown no evidence supporting its claim to lawmakers or to the public, and legal experts warn that the strikes may be illegal.

The administration is using the power of the U.S. government to advance a right-wing project in other South American countries as well, using the economic power of the U.S. to support Trump’s allies in Brazil and Argentina. Trump has imposed a 50% tariff on goods from Brazil, claiming that Brazil engages in unfair trade practices and that the government is engaged in a “witch hunt” against Trump’s ally former president Jair Bolsonaro.

Bolsonaro was convicted this month of attempting a coup against Brazil’s government when voters turned him out of office. He has been sentenced to more than 27 years in prison. In addition to the heavy U.S. tariffs, the Treasury Department announced today that it was sanctioning the wife of the Brazilian Supreme Court justice who oversaw the prosecution of Bolsonaro. The Brazilian government called the U.S. move “a new attempt of undue interference in Brazilian internal affairs.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced on social media today, fifteen minutes before Argentina’s foreign-exchange markets opened, that the U.S. will consider “all options” for stabilizing the economy of Argentina, whose right-wing president, Javier Milei, is a Trump ally. Milei’s approach to slashing government was a model for Trump and billionaire Elon Musk, but with elections coming up next month, voters are souring on his austerity measures, inflation, and the weakening currency. Bessent wrote that “Argentina is a systemically important U.S. ally.” The Economist explained more bluntly: “Scott Bessent says Uncle Sam is underwriting Mr Milei’s laboratory.”

At home, Trump signed an executive order today designating “Antifa” as a “domestic terrorist organization.” Although the director of the FBI during Trump’s first term, Christopher Wray, explained that antifa, which is short for “antifascist,” is an ideology and not an organization, the executive order says antifa is “a militarist, anarchist enterprise that explicitly calls for the overthrow of the United States Government, law enforcement authorities, and our system of law. It uses illegal means to organize and execute a campaign of violence and terrorism nationwide to accomplish these goals.”

The order goes on to say that this “campaign involves coordinated efforts to obstruct enforcement of Federal laws through armed standoffs with law enforcement, organized riots, violent assaults on Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other law enforcement officers, and routine doxing of and other threats against political figures and activists.”

The order calls for all government agencies to “investigate, disrupt, and dismantle any and all illegal operations…conducted by Antifa.” Constitutional law scholar Evan Bernick noted that the point of the order was “to assert that something exists which does not exist and to make people think it (1) exists and (2) is bad.” Immigration expert Aaron Reichlin-Melnick added: “It’s a directive to the Executive Branch about what to focus…resources on.”

Today, Trump announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration will be notifying doctors that if pregnant women take acetaminophen, a brand name of which is Tylenol, their baby faces a “very increased risk of autism.” This statement flies in the face of decades of evidence that, used according to directions, acetaminophen is safe during pregnancy and can be important for relieving fever and pain.

In his remarks, Trump appeared to have difficulty pronouncing the word “acetaminophen,” so used the brand name “Tylenol.” Although he is not a doctor, the president offered a range of medical advice. He echoed the opinions of Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of the dangers of vaccines, although vaccines save lives and extensive research has shown no link between vaccines and autism. Trump said: “We understood a lot more than a lot of people who studied it.”

But there seemed to be a new tone coming from media outlets covering the president today. The Associated Press posted on social media: “BREAKING: President Trump promotes unproven ties between Tylenol, vaccines and autism without new evidence.” The New York Times posted: “Unproven Medical Advice[:] In a rambling news briefing, president Trump promoted unproven ties between vaccines, autism and Tylenol use by pregnant women and babies.”

There is another sign today that Trump and his loyalists have outkicked their coverage as they try to consolidate power.

In Strength in Numbers, G. Elliott Morris noted that as measured by internet searches for “Cancel Disney+,” the boycott against Disney, the parent company of ABC, is now four times as large as any similar search of a boycott over the past five years. Since ABC suspended comedian Jimmy Kimmel’s show—allegedly for his comments about MAGA Republicans’ search for someone to blame, although he frequently skewers Trump and the administration—Disney’s stock has dropped 2% although the market in general is up nearly 1%.

Morris observes that “a lot of powerful people just don’t realize how unpopular Trump is.” He explains that while polls show Trump is deeply unpopular, many people confuse voters with consumers. That is, while polls frequently measure how voters feel about the president, only about 64.1% of American adults eligible to vote went to the polls in 2024. Figuring that number into Trump’s popularity shows that only about 32% of American adults voted for Trump in 2024, while 53% of adults currently disapprove of his performance in the White House, with 48% strongly opposed. So businesses that decide to try to appease Trump voters are making poor business decisions.

That has shown in the backlash over the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel’s show, which is widely seen as an attack on the freedom of speech protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution. As Robert Reich noted in his Substack publication, “the blowback against Disney” for Kimmel’s suspension “has been hurricane level.” It was so intense that Federal Communications Commission chair Brendan Carr, who had threatened that ABC must suspend Kimmel or lose its broadcast license, began to deny he had had anything to do with the suspension and say that ABC had removed Kimmel for business reasons.

Today Disney issued a statement saying, “Last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country. It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive.” It went on: “We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday.”

So, after public outcry, Kimmel’s show is back on the air. But right-wing media company Sinclair, which operates more than 35 ABC stations across the country, says it will not restore Kimmel’s show to the airwaves it controls. It announced it will preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! with news programming.

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Notes:

https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/jeffrey-epstein-found-injured-in-nyc-jail-cell-after-possible-suicide-attempt-or-assault-sources/1521943/

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jeffrey-epstein-claimed-cellmate-tried-to-kill-him/

https://www.npr.org/2025/07/25/nx-s1-5478620/jeffrey-epstein-crimes-timeline-legal-case

https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/white-house-now-denies-tom-homan-took-50000-cash-rcna233008

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cddmr6v0jpzo

https://time.com/7316695/how-brazil-convicted-jair-bolsonaro/

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/brazil-starts-formal-process-assess-us-tariff-retaliation-2025-08-28/

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/09/22/bolsonaro-prosecution-us-sanctions-00575122

https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2025/09/22/argentinas-finances-just-got-even-more-surreal

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-treasury-chief-us-ready-support-argentina-leaders-meet-tuesday-2025-09-22/