Former Attorney General Pam Bondi distributed Jeffrey Epstein files containing President Trump’s name to conservative influencers without White House approval, triggering panic among administration officials and forcing emergency damage control during a British Prime Minister’s state visit, according to a forthcoming book by New York Times reporters.

Unvetted Materials Distributed to Influencers

On February 27, the White House Communications Office organized a briefing for prominent conservative social media figures including Mike Cernovich, Liz Wheeler, Collin Rugg, and DC Draino in the Roosevelt Room. Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio walked the influencers through administration priorities. President Trump presented them with custom challenge coins in the Oval Office. One attendee called it the best day of his life.

Bondi and her team then entered carrying boxes of binders her aides claimed contained FBI-prepared revelatory details about the Epstein case. One staffer predicted the release would be epic. No White House officials had reviewed the materials beforehand. When distributed, officials scrambled through pages searching for references to Trump. Within a few pages, they found his name prominently displayed in the middle of a page.

Emergency Response During State Visit

The timing created a diplomatic crisis. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer was at the White House for an official visit and scheduled press conference with Trump. If news broke about the Epstein files release, reporters would dominate the joint appearance with questions about the documents rather than bilateral relations. Trump himself remained unaware of the distribution. Administration officials moved quickly to contain the situation, rushing influencers out of the building.

Staff instructed the influencers to embargo the binder content until after the Starmer press conference, promising the communications office would provide guidance afterward. The containment effort failed immediately. As influencers departed, they photographed themselves holding the binders in front of the White House and posted images across social media platforms, creating the exact publicity wave officials desperately sought to prevent.

What This Means

The incident reveals significant coordination failures between the Justice Department and White House communications operations. The unauthorized release of sensitive documents to social media personalities without proper vetting represents a breakdown in standard protocols for managing potentially damaging information. The episode appears in the upcoming book “Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump” by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, scheduled for publication. The book promises additional revelations about internal administration conflicts and decision-making processes during Trump’s presidency.