'Pump the brakes': GOP strategist says new Epstein audio is what Trump 'wants you to hear'

MSNBC host Katy Tur and Republican strategist Mark McKinnon on MSNBC on August 22, 2025

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is releasing new materials from the 2019 investigation into convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein to the House Oversight Committee in response to a congressional subpoena. But one longtime Republican strategist is urging Americans to take it all with a grain of salt.

On Friday, Mark McKinnon — who was an advisor to former President George W. Bush and the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) — joined MSNBC host Katy Tur's show to weigh in on the newly released audio of Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell testifying to Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche last month. McKinnon attempted to get cooler heads to prevail, opining that the DOJ was releasing these specific audio files in an attempt to influence public opinion.

"People should just pump the brakes here," McKinnon said. "Because all this ... out there right now publicly is what the Trump administration wants you to see and wants you to hear."

"Ghislaine Maxwell, she could hardly be a less credible witness," he continued. "She's already gotten more favorable treatment ... she has everything to gain by being [as] favorable as she can. And does anybody really think that she's interested in telling the truth? She's interested in reducing her sentence and getting out. And she does that by fawning over Donald Trump and by testifying that there was no relationship there."

As McKinnon noted, Maxwell and her attorneys have been openly angling for a presidential pardon. And after her two-day interview with Blanche, Maxwell was transferred from her Gainesville, Florida prison to a minimum security federal prison camp in Bryan, Texas. The Bryan facility is known for housing high-profile, non-violent female offenders like former Theranos executive Elizabeth Holmes and former reality TV star Jen Shah.

McKinnon stressed that Maxwell's testimony should not be viewed as "credible" given her motivations, and observed that the person with the most to gain from the newly released audio clips was President Donald Trump himself.

"For a lot of people out there, the first blush is, you know, nothing to see here. There's no there there. Yeah. [Trump] knew [Epstein], but that was it. It was a casual acquaintance. No big deal," he said. "And i'm not one to subscribe to conspiracy theories, but I do think that the way that this has been handled and how difficult it's been to get out information just in the way that Ghislaine Maxwell has been treated. I mean, why else was she transferred to a minimum security facility unless she were offering up something favorable to the president?"

Watch McKinnon's segment below, or by clicking this link.

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