What the Epstein files reveal about US power

In this conversation, Robert Scheer and Nolan Higdon dig into the contradictions at the heart of America’s elite class — the philanthropists, technocrats, and political leaders who publicly preach democracy, equality, and women’s rights while privately orbiting Jeffrey Epstein long after his crimes were known. Higdon walks through the documents, the lies, the intelligence connections, and the cultural implications of a scandal that refuses to fade. What emerges is a portrait of a society where wealth shields wrongdoing, institutions collapse under their own corruption, and the public is left to pick up the pieces.

Highlights

• “Who are these people?” Scheer asks — the same question societies fail to ask before they collapse.
• The Epstein files show one thing clearly: we never really knew the people running our world.
• Gates, Clinton, Summers — the public masks don’t match the private behavior. Wealth corrodes the soul.
• What the files reveal is “as ugly as it gets”: exploitation of the vulnerable by the powerful, wrapped in philanthropy and PR.
• These same elites still show up at conferences to “save humanity.” The hypocrisy is grotesque.
• Higdon: Accountability can’t be partisan. It must be a class reckoning.
• Summers is already shamed out of public life. The Clintons are being forced to testify. But that’s just the start.
• Higdon: “Reform is a dirty word.” Some institutions — including the CIA — need to be broken up and rebuilt.
• The real danger is staying stuck in partisan finger‑pointing while the system that enabled Epstein stays intact.
• Scheer: Access journalism helped create this mess. Journalists got seduced by proximity to power.
• Independent reporting — not PR‑driven access — is the only way out.