David Mastio: Democrats will regret their Epstein Files glee

Bring in the clowns is a great motto for a circus but a bad one for a political party I know because I was there when the Republican Party and conservative journalists started inviting in the Trumpy clowns in at the conservative Washington Times We all know the consequence is they took over the Republican Party Now that the MAGA wing of the Republican Party is tearing itself apart over Attorney General Pam Bondi s decision not to release the Epstein sex trafficking files Democrats are jumping into the debate with both feet hoping to divide Republicans and put themselves on the right side of the conspiracy theorists who think there are earthshaking revelations hidden in the FBI archives So far The Democratic National Committee launched a bot to spread the word Democratic Sen Jon Ossoff launched an attack from the campaign trail calling the Trump administration decision a broken promise Rep Ro Khanna a California Democrat posted Why are the Epstein files still hidden Who are the rich powerful being protected On Tuesday I m introducing an amendment to force a vote demanding the FULL Epstein files be distributed to the society Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez a New York Democrat wrote Wow who would have thought that electing a rapist would have complicated the release of the Epstein Files The Democrats are fueling the fires of conspiracy in an attempt to undermine the Trump administration s decision to tell the apparent truth about the Epstein files Now that the Trump administration is angering its wackiest fringe Democrats are welcoming the red-nosed fools with open arms It is the same dangerous move that conservatives and Republicans made when they embraced Donald Trump s false claims that Barack Obama was born in Kenya and thus ineligible to be president At The Washington Times where I was a senior editor in the opinion section I watched as my news colleagues covered every factual rise that raised any question about the issue no matter how preposterous quoting the largest part extreme Republican conspiracy theorists with a straight face In the opinion section we used any excuse to mention Kenya and Obama in the same sentence no matter how ridiculous while telling ourselves that by staying just barely on the side of factual accuracy we were just having fun with the issue to torture our political opponents In the copy I was responsible for mostly outside commentary I never did it but I didn t make an issue of it when others played along I maybe wouldn t have won a fight over it but I didn t try I regret my role no matter how minor in fueling Trump s early rise to Republican dominance I didn t invite the clowns but I didn t try to push them out either If Democrats keep going down this road lending their credibility and amplification to wacko conspiracy theorists on the right they ll regret building the forces who are destroying our political custom This won t be the last opportunity for Democrats and their progressive media allies to count political points by doing the wrong thing when hard realities force the Trump administration to abandon its endorsement of fringe thinking Trump and his administration have made common cause with the purveyors of a number of dubious conspiracy theories including that Ukraine invited the war with Russia that the balloting was stolen and that vaccines cause syndrome As the Trump administration unfolds reality is going to force Trump to begin to reckon with the facts and in chosen cases he might choose to tell the truth as Bondi did on Epstein It is already happening with Ukraine as Trump is allowing more American weapons to get to Ukraine s defenders It might not be too long before Russia s behavior forces Trump to abandon his embrace of Russia s Vladimir Putin altogether Just this past weekend Trump tried to use the administration s review of the poll as a shield against its Epstein detractors saying that uncovering wrongdoing was a much bigger deal than sex trafficking Since there was no such corruption the Trump Justice Department is going to have a hard time coming up with indictments to make their development Eventually the true believers will notice Vitality and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr is going to have to make his situation that vaccines are a medical threat and take action to end their use Reality is likely to intervene forcing the Trump administration to back off that stance Democrats should cheer Trump administration efforts to move closer to reality and tell Americans the truth not embrace the clowns to points political points Given how conservatives and Republicans have acted in the past I don t have high hopes that the left will do any better David Mastio writes for The Kansas City Star A former deputy editorial page editor for the liberal USA IN CURRENT TIMES and the conservative Washington Times he has worked in opinion journalism as a commentary editor editorial writer and columnist for years He was also a speechwriter for the George W Bush administration