Immunity for Ghislaine, Tariffs by Vibes, and Golf with a Side of Grift

While Trump hands a get-out-of-jail-free card to a convicted sex trafficker, rewrites trade deals on cocktail napkins, and charges taxpayers for a Scottish golf tour, the rest of the world moves on.

Good morning! In a week that saw the concept of justice gutted like a fish and left rotting in the Florida heat, Donald Trump’s Department of Justice handed convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell a velvet-lined escape hatch. That’s right, Maxwell, sentenced in 2022 for facilitating the abuse of underage girls for Jeffrey Epstein and his elite friends, has now been granted use immunity by the Trump DOJ. For ten hours over two days, she sat in a quiet federal courthouse in Tallahassee and spilled whatever beans she pleased, shielded from prosecution for anything she admitted, so long as no one else stumbles across corroborating evidence.

And who brokered this deal? Why, it’s Todd Blanche, Trump’s former criminal defense lawyer turned DOJ deputy, who also happened to bungle Trump’s New York felony case. Blanche now appears to be moonlighting as the royal fixer, coordinating immunity deals with Ghislaine’s lawyer David Oscar Marcus, yet another Trump-friendly legal pal once considered for Trump’s own defense team. It’s like watching the Justice League, if the Justice League were entirely comprised of fixers, creeps, and guys with Epstein connections.

Now, this sort of immunity deal is usually reserved for defendants who flip before trial, not after conviction and sentencing. But in Trumpworld, retroactive absolution for a remorseless predator is just another day at the office. And what does the sex trafficker herself plan to do with her newfound immunity? Apparently, go silent. Maxwell’s lawyer now says she’s “undecided” about testifying before Congress on August 11. She might plead the Fifth or suddenly develop a bad case of I-don’t-recall-itis, an affliction that runs rampant in MAGA circles.

Of course, the same DOJ that gifted her this legal force-field is the only agency that could prosecute her for contempt of Congress. Spoiler alert: they won’t. She’s already been so helpful, after all. And Trump? He’s dusted off the classics, blame Clinton, blame hedge fund guys, blame Obama, while dangling the old “I haven’t thought about it” line when asked about a pardon. As if we haven’t heard that setup before: Flynn, Stone, Manafort... Maxwell?

It’s a con within a con wrapped in a cover-up, served with a red “Q” stamped on the menu.

Meanwhile, Trumpworld influencers like “Free Ghislaine” grifter Jessica Reed Krauss are getting face time at the White House, helping craft Epstein messaging while victims like Maria Farmer are shoved aside and forced to relive their trauma on national television just to remind us who the real monsters are. That’s America 2025: Instagram influencers get consulted on sex trafficking cases. Survivors get ignored.

Let’s not forget the files. Over 300 gigabytes of sealed Epstein documents, names, transactions, flight logs, currently marinating inside the DOJ, never to see the light of day. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, they once said. But here in the Trump administration, we’ve opted for blackout curtains and industrial-strength Febreze.

And while that stench lingers, Emmanuel Macron is off doing actual diplomacy. France will become the first Western UN Security Council member to recognize a Palestinian state in September, a decision Macron made after witnessing Gaza’s humanitarian crisis firsthand. He tried to bring Canada and the UK on board. Canada politely declined. Britain blinked at the thought of American backlash. Macron? He went it alone.

Israel’s Netanyahu fumed. Trump pouted and told reporters the move “doesn’t carry any weight,” then assured us Macron is “a good guy,” which is Trumpian for I’m pretending not to be furious. But Macron isn’t playing for Fox News soundbites. He’s pressing the Palestinian Authority for reform, coaxing regional leaders into disarmament talks, and forcing the two-state conversation back onto the international stage. Symbolic? Maybe. But sometimes symbolism is how the dam cracks.

Back in the U.S., Trump’s trade doctrine continues to be guided by the ancient principle of “Just Send the Letters.” His brilliant economic maneuver? Mail every country a note saying they now owe 10%, or maybe 15%, tariffs. No numbers, no strategy, no rules, just vibes. The man is doing international trade policy like a chain email scam from 2003.

Trump crowed that the U.S. would now be selling “so much” beef to Australia—following Canberra’s decision to lift long-standing restrictions on American imports.

But here’s the catch: Australia has imported U.S. beef since 2019, though only in limited quantities due to strict biosecurity rules tied to mad cow disease. The new policy, based on a decade-long risk assessment, allows beef from cattle born in Canada or Mexico, provided they were legally imported and slaughtered in the U.S.

Analysts were quick to burst the bubble: Australia is a massive beef exporter with lower domestic prices, and U.S. beef is nearly double the price right now. Experts say the change is unlikely to lead to substantial U.S. exports, especially since Australia still doesn’t need American steak on its supermarket shelves.

One independent livestock trader summed it up bluntly: “We can’t get enough beef in the U.S., so we’re importing from Australia, and we’re not going to be selling anything significant to anyone.”

So yes, instead of a major trade breakthrough, the reality is more like a non-event dressed in red hats. Trump’s claim of a beef bonanza? Honestly, if any ton of U.S. beef gets sold in Australia over the next three years, it’d be nothing short of miraculous.

Former Aussie Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull summed it up: talking to Trump is a waste of time. He says Trump would scream “F--- you” and hang up the phone, a charm offensive unmatched in modern diplomacy. And in Japan? Trump’s sidekick Scott Bessent bungled a $550 billion trade deal so badly that Japanese news anchors had to diagram it on live TV with red arrows and confused faces. No one knows what was agreed to. Probably not even Trump.

Korea wasn’t spared either. Trump’s trade reps held late-night “talks” at a private residence that seemed to involve more soju than substance. Trump demanded Korea match Japan’s $550 billion investment, even though Korea is much smaller, with less GDP, and no magic money tree. It’s like asking Delaware to match China’s military budget.

Meanwhile, China and Vietnam are busy eating our economic lunch. China’s Luckin Coffee has opened in New York, and Vietnamese officials are luring talent from the U.S. while Trump’s America drives it away with walls, tariffs, and “freedom money” fantasies. Speaking of which, Senator Cynthia Lummis now claims Bitcoin is popular with Republican men because it’s “freedom money” that lets you bypass corrupt governments. That’s one way to say “offshore bribes without paper trails,” I guess.

And now, as if to put an exclamation point on this international farce, Trump has fled the country again, this time to Scotland.

Officially, it’s a “working trip.” Unofficially, it’s a five-day golf getaway to promote his resorts, cut some tartan-tinted ribbons, and dodge questions about Epstein. In Turnberry and Aberdeen, protesters greeted Trump with signs referencing his Epstein ties, Gaza policy, and immigration cruelty. Locals in Scotland have never forgotten his environmentally destructive golf developments, and they’re making it clear: he is not welcome here.

But what’s the price tag for this ego-tour? Try $10 million in taxpayer-funded security and logistics, prompting watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) to demand answers. How is it legal, or ethical, for a sitting president to use government funds to promote his private properties? (Spoiler: It’s not.)

So while France recognizes Palestine, while Vietnam recruits global talent, and while China out-coffees Starbucks, we’re over here subsidizing a con man’s golf trip and watching him hand immunity to a sex trafficker while pretending he’s not in the Epstein files.

What a time to be American.