The Epstein files’ toxic mix of true crime and conspiracy theories
The mistaken belief that the sex offender’s vast network of connections explains all that is wrong or evil in the world fits easily into the way antisemitism is spread.
By Jonathan S. Tobin
JNS
Feb 5, 2026
The federal government’s release of the latest tranche of files related to the case of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein set off another surge in interest in a case that continues to possess a hold on the imaginations of growing numbers of people. The new batch of Epstein files this week consists of 3 million pages of documents, 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. Going through it is providing work for an army of journalists and a hobby for a horde of amateur sleuths and other obsessives.
Given the sheer volume of material, the files seem to provide something for everyone. But it’s not likely to satisfy most or really any of the people who are taking deep dives into the files and those who are mentioned in them. That’s not because it isn’t filled with juicy tidbits of information about a great many celebrities. It’s due to the fact that the case has become more than just an investigation into the horrible deeds of a wealthy hedonist and his clique. Ever since Epstein’s suicide in a New York City jail (an event which is itself a subject of controversy), it has morphed into something far more than a particularly vile example of true crime or a tale of sexual perversion.
A collection of theories
It’s now a conspiracy theory—or rather, a large collection of them all housed under the title “Epstein files.” And like all conspiracy theories, those who have embraced it are convinced that it will provide answers to all the questions about the world that trouble them and solutions to its problems.
In this way, a sex-trafficking ring isn’t just a shocking story of how lawbreakers sought to exploit and game the system. Instead, it has become the key to understanding what they are sure is an evil cabal running the world. They think it is the key that will enable them to unlock the deep-seated wrong at the heart of the national soul of America and discredit the people they already didn’t like.
As such, it has become something of a funhouse mirror in which those who latch onto it interpret the story through the lens of every other pathology of 21st-century life: paranoia about governments, hyper-partisanship, and inevitably, antisemitism.
Those who think the biggest problem in the world is President Donald Trump and his Republican supporters search the files in hopes of finding the silver bullet that will finish off their bête noire. The same is true for those who think of Democrats in the same way, especially about former President Bill Clinton, the commander-in-chief who was first coined with the phrase “derangement syndrome.” And for those who think that Israel and the Jews are the answer to every question they have about why things are bad, Epstein is, similarly, the entry point for a new round of crackpot blood libels.
No one is likely to be fully satisfied, even after every document, video and image is eventually unearthed and analyzed. And, as with other conspiracy theories, Epstein connoisseurs will claim that the real truth—the proof they’ve been searching for—was covered up or destroyed by the guilty parties, thus ensuring that the lunacy can go on forever.
That’s not to say that there won’t be some examples where the files will prove the undoing of some public figures, including perhaps a few that never met or had anything to do with Epstein.
Political fallout
For example, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, already mired in a political slump, as well as the focus of deep dissatisfaction from both opponents and fellow Labour Party members, could conceivably be toppled from his post because of the files. Starmer isn’t in the files, but he appointed one of Epstein’s many cronies, Peter Mandelson, as Britain’s ambassador to the United States. He claims that Mandelson lied to him about his ties to Epstein. Still, the investigation has led to resignations and a criminal investigation into the ambassador revealing government secrets, which raises the possibility that the entire mess could sink Starmer. The idea that he, as opposed to Trump, could be the main casualty of this scandal is both ironic and infuriating to those on the left who have seized on it as the answer to their prayers.
It’s hard to think of a precedent for the Epstein case. It’s far from the only example of large-scale sex trafficking, in addition to the exploitation of women and girls by powerful men and their enablers. But it is singular in that it was carried out by someone who was not merely wealthy (and Jewish), but who seemed to make it his business to know a vast cross-section of the rich and the famous—powerful persons among the governing classes, in addition to writers and artists.
Epstein was an Olympic-level networker. If you were anyone who was anyone in high society, politics or celebrity-hood during the period when he was flaunting his wealth, the files give the impression that the odds are that you were invited to some kind of function or sought a connection to the man.
Trump and Epstein were clearly friendly for a long time, but eventually, they quarreled. Those who hate Trump are counting on the unsavory, though not criminal, stories associated with that friendship—or some as of yet undiscovered tidbit discrediting the president.
Given the fact that Trump has been elected president twice, despite the public knowing about his decades of public and private indiscretions, anything in the files is unlikely to do him in. Yet his opponents hold onto the hope that it will, waiting with the same dogged determination that their counterparts on the right seek details about the friendship between Epstein and the Clintons. That power couple will be dragged before Congress to talk about Epstein with the same low likelihood that anything found or said will do more than compound the embarrassment the case has already caused them.
Epstein’s Israeli crony
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak is in the same boat as Bill and Hillary Clinton. He had business dealings with Epstein and even sought to involve him in Israeli politics. Some of the email messages in the Epstein files show how he sought to get his help in opposing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the 2019 elections. It also showed that Barak had made a sexist comment amid his usual rants trashing the prime minister, and Israel’s religious and Mizrachi population that support him, as well as revealing a sexist comment made by Barak.
Does that mean that Barak was involved in Epstein’s sexual crimes? No. And there’s no proof to hint at that. But that isn’t stopping Likud supporters, including his longtime foe Netanyahu, from exploiting it to his detriment and forcing Barak to make the sort of public denials that do more harm than good to those who have to utter them.
That’s the problem with the publicity given to the files. For example, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is under fire for two documented meetings with Epstein, though in both instances, he had his wife with him, and, again, there’s not even a suggestion of wrongdoing about them. But partisans are still saying with a straight face that anyone who had lunch with the financier, as Lutnick did, is “shamefully complicit” in his crimes.
It isn’t really fair. Then again, no one needs to mourn for the trouble Epstein is causing Trump, the Clintons, Barak or Lutnick, all of whom knew what they were getting into when they entered political life. Being in the spotlight and profiting from it in one way or another brings with it the possibility that someone you know is going to do things you will have to answer for, whether you are actually complicit in them or not.
The connection to Jew-hatred
What is of far greater concern is the conviction that what we know about Epstein’s crimes is just the tip of the iceberg, which plays into the grandfather of all conspiracy theories: antisemitism.
The willingness of a prominent Jew-hater like former Fox News host and current podcaster Tucker Carlson to use the Epstein case as fodder for his obsession with discrediting Israel and the Jews is bad enough. But that inspired fellow political commentator Megyn Kelly to unapologetically and repeatedly mimic the assertion that Epstein was a Mossad agent. Another conservative in the media, Ben Shapiro, who has clashed with Carlson for his antisemitism and Kelly for her stance of neutrality on that subject matter, pointed out that there is just as much evidence for a claim that Epstein was working for aliens from outer space. But that doesn’t stop people who should know better from associating Israel and the entire Jewish people with all things evil in the world.
The way the case is being used by antisemitic conspiracy mongers ought to be a warning to everyone else speculating on it and hoping that it will somehow further some political or policy agenda of their own. The crimes Epstein committed warrant scrutiny, and those about whom there is reasonable suspicion and even some proof that they were involved in his sexual misdeeds, such as Britain’s Prince Andrew, need to be held accountable. But the enthusiasm for the story ought to be tempered by a sober admission that the obsession with the case is primarily a sign of the declining health of our society.
Conspiracy theories have already taken over so much of national and even international discourse. As the coverage of Israel’s two-year war against Hamas in Gaza revealed, the belief that Jews are either running the world or committing “genocide,” even when they are the ones under attack from genocidal Islamist terrorists, is rooted in myths that date back to the Tsarist forgery, Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
Along with a bifurcated partisan press and the impact of social media, these theories turn every discussion toxic. They send people down rabbit holes with no exit ramp, rather than engaging in serious debate about the many issues that divide the country right now.
The Epstein scandal is a terrible story, but it is not the great puzzle at the heart of America’s national existence.
Each end of the political spectrum—first, the right wing, and now the left, since Trump returned to the White House—has seized on it as the secret formula by which they can unravel all that is wrong and vindicate their pre-existing prejudices and opinions about everything. That is itself a symptom of rot in contemporary culture. And those who fan these conspiratorial flames with smears based on guilt by association aren’t brave voices speaking up for truth. They are, like those who exploit it to point fingers against the Jews, regardless of where they sit on the political spectrum, irresponsible demagogues doing real harm.
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