Bombshell FBI Report: Trump Tower Was an Epstein Recruiting Ground

Trump's cabinet officials almost suspended your right to a trial, Trump's DOJ is trying to get a lawsuit against Elon Musk thrown out, and deaths in ICE detention have more than doubled

Good afternoon. I’m Ryan Rose, and this is AlterNet America.

A woman told the FBI that two men at Trump Tower asked if she wanted to meet Trump and handed her a party invitation with Jeffrey Epstein’s address on it. Stephen Miller seriously pushed to unilaterally suspend habeas corpus, and only a White House lawyer stopped him. Trump’s Justice Department is trying to throw out a pollution lawsuit against Elon Musk’s xAI. And the death rate among ICE detainees has more than doubled as the administration jails the medically vulnerable.

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Now, let’s dive in.

FBI Report Reveals Trump Tower Was an Epstein Recruiting Ground

Turns out the Trump Tower atrium was actually a hunting ground.

In an FBI interview conducted on June 19, 2020 and buried in the DOJ’s Epstein files, a woman described being approached in the early 1990s while she studied during lunch breaks in the public atrium at Trump Tower.

She worked at a luxury shoe store nearby. A colleague pointed out two men who lurked in the atrium and “constantly picked up” women. One struck up a conversation.

He asked if she knew who Donald Trump was. He asked if she wanted to meet him. He told her she didn’t need to work so hard to go to school, winked, and said he could do whatever she liked. She felt sex was on the table, even though no one said the word.

When she declined, he offered a party instead. She could bring a friend, as long as the friend looked like her and was not a man. The invitation listed Jeffrey Epstein’s address.

After she said no, she said the death threats started. The men told her they knew where she worked. She never went to the police because she didn’t think they’d believe her. Over the next six months, she watched the same two men escort girls she estimated at 15 or 16 years old onto an escalator.

Trump Admin. Almost Suspended Your Right to a Trial

The good news is that someone in the Trump administration still knows the difference between a law and a suggestion.

That someone is White House Staff Secretary Will Scharf, a conservative attorney, and he spent 2025 talking colleagues out of the worst ideas in the building. According to New York Times reporting, Stephen Miller’s proposal to suspend the writ of habeas corpus was the subject of a serious internal debate, not just an offhand riff.

Miller’s logic was straightforward. Illegal immigration is an “invasion.” The Constitution lets the writ be suspended during an invasion. Therefore, he reasoned, Trump could simply switch off the right of detained people to challenge their detention in court.

There were two problems. Unauthorized immigration is not an “invasion,” a point that became clear in litigation over the Alien Enemies Act. And the power to suspend habeas corpus belongs to Congress, not the president.

Scharf laid this out in an April 2025 memo to Chief of Staff Susie Wiles. He noted the courts have “almost uniformly” required congressional action, and that every previous suspension followed a war or armed rebellion. He traced the right back to “the very dawn of English common law” and called its denial a key grievance of the American Revolution.

For good measure, Scharf also threw cold water on Miller’s pitch to invoke the Insurrection Act against immigration protesters, calling it “a break-the-glass exception.”

A conservative lawyer had to write a memo explaining that the president cannot eliminate your right to a trial. That memo is now being treated as a victory for the rule of law. If you think that’s worth paying attention to, we could use your support. A paid subscription keeps AlterNet America running.

DOJ Demands Lawsuit Against Elon Musk Be Dropped

The DOJ would like you to know that Elon Musk’s pollution is a national security matter.

In a highly unusual move, the DOJ has urged a federal court to throw out the NAACP’s Clean Air Act lawsuit against Elon Musk’s xAI, citing national security considerations. The NAACP sued in April, alleging xAI runs dozens of gas turbines without air permits or pollution controls in Southaven, Mississippi, to power its “Colossus 2” data center in Memphis.

Those methane turbines produce nitrogen oxides, a key ingredient of smog that has been linked to asthma attacks, decreased lung function, and premature death. The DOJ is not disputing the allegations. It is arguing that citizen suits themselves are unconstitutional.

Legal experts noticed. Columbia’s Michael Gerrard called it “highly unusual.” A Harvard analysis noted it is the first time the U.S. has intervened in a citizen suit against a private defendant to demand dismissal. The Clean Air Act has long let communities sue polluters; the NAACP’s Abre’ Conner called it “a bedrock insurance policy.”

So to recap: the DOJ is arguing that children in Mississippi should breathe smog so that Grok can make Nazi Mickey Mouse images and child sexual abuse material.

ICE’s Death Rate Has More Than Doubled Under Trump

Fifty people have died in U.S. immigration detention since Trump launched his mass deportation campaign in January 2025, according to ICE data analyzed by Reuters.

From 2009 to 2024, immigration facilities saw one death a year for every 3,848 detainees. Under Trump, that rate has more than doubled, to roughly one death for every 1,630 people. Ten were suicides. Heart attacks and cardiovascular issues accounted for 16, which experts said points to failures in basic health screening and chronic-disease care.

Tuan Van Bui, a 55-year-old Vietnamese man who had suffered a stroke, collapsed at the Indiana facility nicknamed the “Speedway Slammer.” Fellow detainees screamed for a guard, who took about 15 minutes to arrive. Federal standards call for a four-minute response.

Chaofeng Ge, who had attempted suicide by hanging the year before, was found hanging in a Pennsylvania shower stall less than a week after his transfer. Mohammad Paktiawal, a former Afghan special forces soldier evacuated by the U.S. military in 2021, was detained while taking his children to school and died the next morning.

The Department of Homeland Security says it provides “comprehensive medical care” from the moment people arrive. Fifty families have a different account.

If you or someone you know is struggling, please reach out to the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988.

The Part the Billionaires Hate

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