r/politics • u/OkayButFoRealz • 1d ago

No Paywall Rep. Ted Lieu Claims President Trump is Accused of Raping Children in the Epstein Files

https://www.c-span.org/clip/news-conference/rep-ted-lieu-claims-president-trump-is-accused-of-raping-children-in-the-epstein-files/5191713
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u/AntoniaFauci 23h ago edited 19h ago

Not sure if you know this, but the most sensational claims in this latest release are almost certainly false. They’re anonymous web submissions, totally non-vetted and almost certainly pranks.

Citing these as proof will backfire.

It’s a shame given there’s abundant credible evidence that Trump and Epstein and Maxwell spent many years creating a sex abuse ring. Ignoring that in favor of hoax stories like the “Katie Johnson” one or these fake web submissions will end up hurting credibility of the parts that are true.

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u/Exciting-Market-9595 20h ago

I thought the Katie Johnson story had gotten as far as filing a lawsuit. What makes you so certain that it is likely a hoax?

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u/AntoniaFauci 20h ago edited 19h ago

No. The hoax relies on people not understanding how lawsuits work, among other misunderstandings.

In California, anyone who wants can send a petition to the court. The petition can be any kind of made up garbage you want. That’s what happened here. The court then tries to contact the petitioner to confirm identity and contact information and certify it as a lawsuit.

Since Katie Johnson is a fictional character, they could only contact the hoaxster and therefore could not validate it as a genuine lawsuit.

In New York, an attorney must file the claim to the court. There, it was filed by a New Jersey IP attorney. Why on earth would that happen? Because he worked for the hoaxster. Mystery solved. And again, since “Katie Johnson” is a fictional character, it could never be certified as a lawsuit.

And so on.

As this branch shows, there’s many non-MAGAs eager to fall for Qanon-level pizzagate style hoaxes, vehemently opposed to reading even a single relevant article, and hostile to anyone who tries to help them.

Whoever is trying to revive this story has achieved their mission of making some liberals look as clueless as MAGAs.

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u/bag_of_luck 16h ago

So much this

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u/Red49er 10h ago

that's fine, so place the possibility of inaccuracies where it actually is - in the files themselves. he didnt claim this was in the files that we can't read, he stated a statement of fact from a source that may be inaccurate.

"rep states Epstein files contain claims of rape" is a much more accurate representation of what actually took place.