Was the latest Epstein document dump just Trump’s 4D chess trap? Steve Deace answers.

After two major Epstein document dumps left the nation deeply disappointed — no bombshells, no convictions — America is once again holding her breath in anticipation of the “big one”: the full DOJ files mandated by the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which President Trump signed into law last week.

In the meantime, however, a separate batch of more than 50,000 pages of Epstein estate records released by the House Oversight Committee in September and November 2025 has already delivered some politically explosive material.

Steve Deace, BlazeTV host of the “Steve Deace Show,” says he has gotten the same question over and over again from his audience: Was this Trump’s 4D chess master plan all along: Let Democrats dig their own grave by demanding transparency, knowing these already-released House documents would drop and embarrass some of their biggest names?

While the question is undoubtedly warranted, Steve says the answer is no — this was not some premeditated plan. It’s just the age-old paradigm at work again.

“I know people very close to the president of the United States … the kind of people that would know if such a plan existed,” says Steve, “and they were quite dismayed this summer when the president just kind of suddenly changed his tune back in July and said … ‘It's not a story. Why do you care? Move on.”’

But the chain of events certainly has the optics of a big Democrat gotcha scheme, he says. The timing of the revelations that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) asked Epstein for campaign donations after Epstein's sex-crime convictions and U.S. Virgin Islands Delegate Stacey Plaskett (D) was taking real-time instructions from Epstein on what questions to ask during a congressional hearing seem almost too perfect to be accidental.

“And so I can see why people are wondering, ‘Was this just part of a very well-coordinated plan?’” says Steve. “It wasn't. I can promise you it wasn't.”

There’s an “undeniable truth in American politics” we all need to understand: “You can always count on Republicans to pre-emptively surrender,” and “you can always bank on Democrats then completely overreaching in response.”

This is true of our current administration, says Steve. The only difference is “their surrender line is not as pre-emptive as the previous people.”

“This dynamic plays out over and over and over and over and over again,” he says, citing the most recent cycle: Republicans folded early on Obamacare repeal and lost 40 House seats in 2018; Democrats then overreached with a stolen 2020 election, lawfare against opponents, and vaccine mandates, only to get crushed in the 2024 red wave that swept Trump and the GOP back into power.

The same cycle is repeating itself with Epstein right now, he says. The GOP promised that heads would roll, but nearly a year into President Trump’s second term, not a single arrest has been made. Then Democrats overreached by demanding full transparency on the Epstein files — pushing the bill through Congress themselves — only to watch their own members get scorched by the revelations. Enter Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) — a “total clown,” says Steve — trying to deflect by screaming "what is Trump hiding?" even though Democrats never touched the Epstein files during their four years in power.

So will this third release finally deliver?

Steve says most likely no. “I've already seen Tom Fitton at Judicial Watch going through the language of the legislation. He’s like, ‘I'm still going to have to sue these guys like a half a dozen times to get really everything we want.”’

But that doesn’t mean the drop will be all smoke like the first two. The fact that Larry Summers — Harvard president emeritus and Democrat heavyweight — has already resigned in anticipation of the release tells us there’s some real heat behind the smoke.

Steve reiterates his lesson: “You can always count on Republicans to pre-emptively surrender, and then you can always count on Democrats to way overreach in response to that, thus self-generating their own backlash.”

Add to that the fact that Donald Trump has this “providential anointing” that allows him to benefit greatly from his enemies, and it’s clear: This is no “seventh-dimensional chess that was nine months in the making,” says Steve.

“It’s just the paradigm.”

To hear more of Steve’s analysis, watch the episode above.

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