(Crossposted from the Blue Wave substack)
SF Chronicle’s Raheem Hosseini has covered Katie Johnson since she filed her lawsuits against Trump in 2016, alleging he raped her at Epstein’s New York apartment when she was only 13.
And he discovered the Epstein emails that were published last week prove Epstein himself was well aware of her lawsuits.
Thanks to emails released last week by Republicans on the House Oversight Committee, we now know that Epstein was at least aware of her accusations.
In April 2016, Epstein forwarded a Reuters reporter’s request for comment about Katie Johnson’s lawsuit to several people, including attorney Alan Dershowitz and former White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler. To Tom Barrack, a Trump campaign adviser who is now the president’s ambassador to Turkey, Epstein wrote, “nuts but i thought you guys should know.” To journalist Michael Wolff, Epstein wrote, “here we go.”
In November 2016, two days after Trump’s election, Epstein forwarded a Daily Mail story about the lawsuit being withdrawn in New York federal court to several friends and associates.
New York Times financial reporter Landon Thomas Jr. responded, “You called it,” and asked Epstein about his stock portfolio. Melanie Walker, a neurosurgeon and Gates Foundation alum, offered her condolences and asked if Epstein “even” knew the “troubled” plaintiff. Epstein replied, “nope.” To another sympathizing confidant — Virgin Islands tax attorney Erika A. Kellerhals, who would receive Epstein’s final will — Epstein wrote, “its funny, dont lose your sense of humor.”
And when Epstein told Deepak Chopra the lawsuit had been dropped, the New Age guru replied, “Good.”
Epstein told Melanie Walker he didn’t know “Katie Johnson,” but that was a pseudonym so he might have known her by her real name - which has never been revealed.
Hosseini offers more detail about Johnson’s panicked cancellation of her publicized press conference two days before the 2016 election.
“The morning of the presser, Katie found out that her phone had been hacked,” Evan L. Goldman, a New Jersey civil litigator who represented Katie Johnson, said via email. “This freaked her out, (she) did not go through with the presser and shortly thereafter instructed me to dismiss the law suit. There have been a few attempts (several years ago) to get her to go to the press, but she wants nothing to do with this any more.”
Goldman said he never actually met or spoke to Katie Johnson. He said he communicated with her through his co-counsels — Thomas F. Meagher, a New Jersey patent lawyer who introduced Goldman to the case, and Bloom, daughter of feminist icon Gloria Allred. Goldman said Meagher and Bloom were the ones to inform him that Katie Johnson wanted to drop the lawsuit in November 2016.
“I did not communicate with her directly,” Goldman said in an email.
Goldman also named a journalist he said had interviewed Katie Johnson in California and found her “credible.”
“To me that was enough for me to be all in on it,” Goldman said.
While Goldman never spoke directly to Johnson, attorney Cheney Mason did according to Tara Palmeri, who has provided heroic coverage of the Epstein scandal for years.
“We met with her personally over several days. We flew her from California. Several of us interviewed and questioned her before we went through the process of filing the suit.”
And Mason was fully convinced she was telling the truth.
“I sent private investigators to verify her story. I sincerely wish I had the ability to reveal everything, to find the client, confirm her true identity, and try to convince her to back it up. There’s no doubt in my mind that she told the truth of everything that’s in her lawsuit. Period.”
But Mason has no idea what happened to her afterwards.
[Mason] has no current contact with his former client. He suggested it would be an ethics violation to reveal too much
“I don’t know if my client is still alive,” Mason told me. “I would have been the happiest I’ve ever been if she could come forward, because I’ve seen women on television in the category of victim who tell such a similar story to what happened to her, it’s almost like they’re quoting the affidavit I filed nine years ago.
”“We never have known why our client insisted on dropping the lawsuit,” Mason said. “We don’t know where she is. We hope she is alive.”
Substacker Kate Manne adds more corroborations from Johnson’s lawyers
Katie’s subsequent competent, perfectly respectable legal representation—including Bloom, Thomas Meagher, Evan Goldman, and Cheney Mason—looked into her story deeply. (Bloom has written before about finding Johnson’s allegations credible before taking her on as a client, something she doubtless did advisedly; Meagher has spoken to journalists about video-conferencing with Katie after reaching out to her. Goldman also insisted in 2019 that she was a real person who retreated because she was threatened
Manne also interviewed director Jonathann Launer who recorded Johnson’s bombshell video testimony, which remains unreported by the mainstream media.
I can’t reveal everything about what he was able to tell me. But he was willing to go on the record to reiterate his original comment on the video: he completely believed what Katie told him. He’s not, he said, a political person: he had no beef with Trump. He’s not a Republican or a Democrat. But, as a director in Hollywood, he has seen a lot of acting in his time, and he felt certain that Katie had not been hired or coached. She was, is, real.
Manne offered more details about Launer in her interview with comedian Andy Borowitz.
So Katie Johnson clearly existed, contrary to skeptical journalists like Hosseini.
And Johnson’s multiple appearances in the latest Epstein emails has drawn considerable attention.
According to Hollywood Unlocked,
Rep. [Melanie] Stansbury, who is on the House Oversight Committee, has repeatedly claimed that President Trump’s name appears over 1,000 times in the Epstein files. She’s also continuously accused Trump of a cover-up.
Now, Stansbury is claiming that a 2016 lawsuit, accusing Epstein and Trump of repeatedly raping a 13-year-old girl in 1994, is mentioned in the files. As she’s mentioned, an April 2016 email exchange between Michael Wolff and Epstein has surfaced.
In the exchange, Epstein forwards an email chain began by Reuters News’ David Ingram. Ingram emailed Martin G. Weinberg, giving a heads up about the outlet preparing to report on the newly-filed lawsuit accusing Trump and Epstein of raping a minor. Ingram told Weinberg the outlet requested to speak with Epstein or a comment on his behalf.
Weinberg then warned Epstein that the federal court case was going to press in a few hours. Forwarding the chain to Wolff, Epstein said, “Here we go.” Wolff replied, “Well, I guess if there’s anybody who can wave thus [sic] away, it’s Donald. Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”
Ingram reached out to Weinberg because he was an attorney representing Jeffrey Epstein. It’s not clear if Weinberg replied to Ingram, but he did warn Epstein about Johnson’s lawsuit against Trump.
(After Epstein’s death, Weinberg urged Judge Richard Berman to investigate Epstein’s suicide as a possible murder, citing the medical examiner’s report and missing prision video.)
AG Pam Bondi has 28 more days to release the Epstein Files, including all of the information they have about Katie Johnson.
Was she known to the FBI before her 2016 lawsuit? Did they interview her before or after 2016? Did they interview her corroborating witness Tiffany Doe? Did they interview 12-year-old Maria whom Johnson says was raped by Trump along with her?
Katie Johnson’s story is detailed and devastating. If it’s true, the 38% of Americans who still support him would be horrified, and his polls would drop towards 0%.
And with the powerful advocacy of 1,000 Epstein survivors - perhaps including Katie Johnson herself, if she decided to step forward - the 427 Representatives who voted to release the Epstein Files would be forced to seriously consider his impeachment.
