Bongino’s Epstein Ultimatum

This week, the MAGA movement turned on itself, quickly escalating from a simmering tension to a full boil.

On Friday morning, far-right extremist Laura Loomer first posted the startling claim that Dan Bongino, the deputy director of the FBI, had refused to report to work, furious over how Attorney General Pam Bondi had handled the Justice Department’s investigation into Jeffrey Epstein. Loomer called for Bondi’s immediate firing, and behind the scenes, Bongino has reportedly delivered an ultimatum of his own: either Donald Trump fires Bondi, or he resigns.

The move marked a dramatic escalation in the ongoing Epstein backlash within the Trump administration after coming under heavy pressure from MAGA Media influencers. For weeks, right-wing personalities have been ramping up pressure on the Justice Department, fuming that Trump’s team hasn’t delivered on one of its most sensational promises: to finally expose the so-called Epstein “client list” and the shadowy elites supposedly protected by past cover-ups.

“Folks, you're going to see a lot of names on that,” Bongino, the former Fox News host and podcaster said last year. “The Epstein client list, I believe, based on what I've heard from sources and the story I just told you, basically, is going to rock the political world. There's a reason they're hiding it.”

Instead, Bondi’s Justice Department released a memo this week stating that its “exhaustive review” found no client list, no evidence of blackmail, and no signs Epstein was murdered. The findings blew an embarrassing hole in the long-running MAGA talking points and unleashed a firestorm from inside the tent.

Bondi had stoked the expectations herself, teasing in Fox News interviews that there was a “truckload” of unreleased information and even claimed the list was “sitting on my desk right now to review.” But when the DOJ memo came out, right-wing media figures felt duped by the announcement. The result was a full-blown MAGA revolt.

“In the history of following this stuff, I have never seen anything more ham handed or botched or destructive in the way they released this memo, in the dark of night,” Benny Johnson said.

Other MAGA Media stars including Steve Bannon, Elon Musk, Megyn Kelly, Tim Pool, and Tucker Carlson all turned their fire inward, publicly assailing Bondi, the DOJ, and the administration for what they saw as a betrayal. But perhaps no one was hit harder by the news than conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who broke down in tears on camera as he turned his aim on the administration, blasting it as “part of the coverup.”

The fury is notable not just for its volume—we have long grown used to near-constant controversies and outrages under Trump—but for its origin. This time, it's not the mainstream press or Democrats taking Trump to task over a lie, it's his own base of MAGA influencers accusing the administration of a cover-up.

And even Trump seems rattled by it. Pressed by a reporter this week about the Epstein memo, the president lashed out, calling the question “a desecration” and refusing to engage. But his attempt to shut down the conversation only added to the sense of outrage on the right.

“I think this threatens to blow up the whole thing,” Carlson remarked on his show. “How can people be expected to have faith in Trump if he won’t release the Epstein files?”

It’s a crisis entirely of the administration’s own making. In speeches, posts, and interviews, Trump, Bondi, and Bongino leaned into Epstein inuendo, painting themselves as the truth-tellers who would finally expose decades of elite depravity—a narrative that closely mirrored the QAnon delusion. Now that the evidence doesn’t bear it out, they’re stuck with promises they can’t keep and an angry movement unwilling to let it go.

With Bongino threatening to quit and Bondi under sustained fire, the debacle threatens to implode the Trump administration from within. And for Trump, both options come with consequences. If he fires Bondi, he feeds the conspiracies and validates the fury and risks chasing a narrative that even his own DOJ has already walked away from. But if he stands by her, he opens himself up to more questions about why the promises of an Epstein bombshell turned up empty.

What’s clear is that the Epstein debacle has cracked open a fissure in Trump’s base. For years, the MAGA movement thrived on fueling distrust in the media, the so-called “deep state,” and the political elite. But now, that same energy is being turned inward against Trump’s own appointees, and possibly, against Trump himself.

The conspiracy theory that once bound the movement together is now testing its limits. And Trump, for once, is losing control of the story.