THE GUARDIAN WEEKLY: The latest issue features ‘Epstein’ – The scandal that won’t go away.

The release last week of a tranche of Jeffrey Epstein’s private emails raised more questions about Donald Trump’s links to the disgraced financier.

The US president had spent much of this year trying to bat away questions about Epstein while rejecting pressure to release the bulk of the files. But in an abrupt reversal on Sunday – widely seen as an admission that he cannot control his Maga base on the issue – Trump urged House Republicans to back the release of the files after all.

That was duly passed this week and if the Senate also votes the same way, the justice department will be compelled to release all unclassified materials on Epstein, who died in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges.

So we may soon find out what Trump has tried for so long to keep buried. As David Smith writes for our big story, last week’s email release pointed less to a grand conspiracy and more to an elite world in which wealthy, powerful and privileged individuals operate above the law.

One thing’s for sure: despite Trump’s wishes, the Epstein scandal isn’t going away just yet.

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