Welcome to the beat. I'm Jason Johnson and for Ari Melburgh. We begin with new heat on Donald Trump

amend the Epstein Upwar, as his latest attempt to slide, slide, sliply slide away from any accountability

blows up in federal court. Today, in a scathing ruling, a judge essentially accusing Trump's

DOJ of trying to fool the public with, quote, the illusion

of transparency. Hours later, in a sign of how this is absolutely dogging Donald Trump,

reporters are pressing him about that ruling. It happened during his press conference at

the White House. Thank you all. Thank you, Overn.

Thank you. I Thank you, Overn. Did you hear that? Did you hear that?

Did you hear that?

Today's ruling concerned the DOJ's request to unseal grand jury material from probes into Epstein and his accomplice Glane Maxwell.

For weeks, legal experts have said this is a red herring, arguing most of the information is already known and likely to shed very little light on the situation.

Today, the federal judge who has seen the material echoing those criticisms

and going even further, calling out and rebuking the Trump DOJ. Quote, the DOJ's entire premise

that the Maxwell grand jury materials would bring to light meaningful new information about Epstein

and Maxwell's crimes or the government's investigation into them

is demonstrably false.

And in quote, a member of the public appreciating that the Maxwell grand jury materials

do not contribute anything to public knowledge might conclude that the government's motion

for their unsealing was aimed not at transparency,

but at diversion, and not at the full disclosure, but the illusion of such.

It's unclear whether the DOJ will appeal as time goes by. This is certainly getting weirder.

Trump veered from calling it a, quote, hoax to saying, now the

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