Since his arrest for orchestrating a child sexual abuse network and his death in custody on August 10, 2019, Jeffrey Epstein’s name has been continuously associated with various conspiracy theories. As soon as news of his death broke, the idea that “Epstein didn’t kill himself” went viral within far-right online communities.

Behind this phrase lies the theory that justice was prevented from completing its work, stopped by powerful and secret forces intent on protecting their own unspeakable interests. The suicide narrative, according to this belief, was merely a convenient – perhaps too convenient – smokescreen to cover up the truth: surveillance cameras (conveniently?) failed, his cell was (deliberately?) left unmonitored, medical reports (intentionally?) contradicted each other, and so on. In this version, everything is connected, nothing happens by chance, and everything is a matter of lies and manipulation.

Epstein’s supposed list of clients guilty of sexual violence remains fantastical. But it is true that the parties organized by the financier were attended by well-known figures from politics, tech, film, and music, such as Bill Clinton, Prince Andrew, Bill Gates, Woody Allen, Michael Jackson – and even Donald Trump. What better fuel for the most lurid speculation about a network of elite child abusers orchestrating their own impunity? The Epstein case thus encapsulated a worldview and rhetoric typical of binary conspiratorial and populist discourses: them against us, the threatening other (elites, minorities, foreigners) against the good and virtuous people.

Read more Subscribers only Trump counterattacks, seeking to extinguish Epstein fire

From 2019 on, for conspiracy-minded circles of the alt-right, for QAnon supporters, and for fans of commentator Alex Jones, Epstein became a new version of the classic plot against authentic America, involving a satanic network, Hollywood, the deep state, the liberal left, or the Democratic Party. In this narrative, Trump was cast as the would-be champion of the real America, supposedly set to restore true values: “Make America Great Again!”

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