There are plenty of serious questions to be asked about Jeffrey Epstein.

Where did he get his money?

Why did so many major figures hobnob with him long after his plea agreement on sex charges with minors?

But when it comes to the ongoing Epstein fallout, there's something else going on: an enormous amount of cynical politicking.

Let's begin with the figures who are supposedly deeply concerned with the Epstein scandal — and who have been promoting evidence-free conspiracy theories. Take, for example, Steve Bannon. Bannon, who has spent his adult life as a political parasite finding new and larger hosts, glommed onto Epstein in the middle of 2018, by text records. As The Guardian reports, "the pair were devising responses to the gathering storm of public outrage about Epstein's criminal history, his favorable treatment by the justice system, and his friendships with powerful figures in business, politics and academia." The two "frequently spoke on the phone." Bannon even spent "months in the financier's homes in Manhattan and Paris," according to the The Insider; he still has over a dozen hours of footage with Epstein he has never released.

And yet earlier this year, Bannon appeared at a Turning Point USA conference at which he spewed conspiracy theories about Epstein: "Epstein is a key that picks the lock on so many things ... intelligence institutions, foreign governments and who was working with him on our intelligence apparatus and in our government."

This is, to put it mildly, suspicious.

Bannon should know the answers to those questions — he was a close confidant of the sex trafficker. But instead, he has decided to promote conspiracy theories regarding Epstein — theories that seem to implicate President Donald Trump in a coverup.

And Bannon isn't alone.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene adopted the Epstein case as a club with which to beat the Trump administration. She made no push to release the Epstein files while Joe Biden was president; instead, she waited until political differences on foreign policy emerged, particularly over Trump's bombing of the Iranian nuclear facility at Fordow, and then signed onto the Epstein Files Transparency Act. The same holds true of Rep. Thomas Massie, another opponent of Trump's foreign policy.

It's no surprise that these anti-Trump personalities are finding allies on the political left, all of whom despise Trump. That's because these figures are attempting to undermine Trump's policy by attacking him collaterally on Epstein. Their goal is to seize control of the "Make America Great Again" movement from Trump, driving it in a far more alt-right-aligned direction. Their true target, of course, is Vice President JD Vance, whom they hope to rope into their ideological maneuver.

We'll see if it works for them. But as they split the GOP for their own ends, implying that Trump is himself involved in a coverup of a sex trafficking scheme — all in order to push the GOP to adopt a far less popular or morally palatable platform — it's clear that the hubbub surrounding Epstein is far less about Epstein than about targeting Trump. And Trump ought to take note.

Ben Shapiro is a graduate of UCLA and Harvard Law School, host of "The Ben Shapiro Show," and co-founder of Daily Wire+. He is a three-time New York Times bestselling author. To find out more about Ben Shapiro and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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