What Comes After the Epstein Files: A Q&A with Atossa Araxia Abrahamian

The recent release of the “Epstein files” has sparked a global conversation about power, privilege, and their outsized influence on our institutions. Journalist and New America Fellow Atossa Araxia Abrahamian has long documented how the wealthy elite bend the rules to their advantage. With evidence now in the public’s hands, we sat down with Abrahamian to ask what these revelations might mean for justice, and whether exposure alone is enough to challenge the systems that shield the powerful.

Last time you spoke with The Thread, we chatted about the growing influence of the ultrawealthy in American politics. Recent drops from the Epstein files laid that truth bare. Do you think repeated revelations of elite misconduct will deepen cynicism? Or can they carve a path to improving public trust? 

Well, I’m not sure how much more cynical we can get, but certainly, we’re seeing a lot of anger not just from the usual suspects (liberals, leftists, people in tinfoil hats) but from the ordinarily pro-Trump wing of the Republican party. It’s something to behold. You couldn’t have reverse-engineered a scenario to make quite so many people quite so upset in quite such a way that plays into their unique and particular anxieties about the world and who’s running it. I don’t even think that proving UFOs are aliens would validate so many different kinds of people’s fears as the Epstein files have (although I hear we’re about to get some files about those).

Even as more and more crimes are unearthed, much of the public has been frustrated about why these files have been hidden for so long and why the current administration has yet to hold those responsible to account. Are regulatory systems designed with loopholes by default, or do they evolve that way through influence?

In this case, I’m not sure it’s legal or regulatory systems so much as the cravenness with which seemingly wealthy and powerful people grovel at the feet of someone they perceive to be wealthier and more powerful. Status anxiety is a potent force among the super-rich—there’s always someone richer, hotter, slicker, and better-connected than you. Epstein was just really good at convincing people he was that guy. 

America today is a society where no one feels secure, where even literal millionaires feel they’re falling behind. Not to exculpate them or even sympathize with the monsters who enabled Epstein, but is it so surprising that when people feel this way, even someone in this moneyed social circle is trying to get ahead and turning a blind eye to his appalling behavior? I happen to believe that in a more equal society with robust safety nets and greater solidarity and social trust, this sort of behavior would be less prevalent. (I’m talking about America in particular here, but looking at Epstein’s web, it’s clear these attitudes extend far beyond our borders.) But maybe I’m being too optimistic!

Of course, there are structural problems at play, too. The courts were easy on Epstein when he was charged with sex crimes. His sentence was relatively short, and the cases didn’t even scratch the surface of what we now know he got up to. There was just a report that he courted U.S. customs authorities to do as he pleased on his island, for example. That speaks to what money can buy: if not complete impunity, then at least really good lawyers who know how to play the game to get you off the hook.

Given the interconnected web that the mega-rich have spun across our political institutions, can the justice system fairly prosecute extreme wealth without reforming campaign finance, lobbying, or regulatory capture?

Absolutely not. We really need reforms and a complete overhaul of how justice is meted out, starting with the smallest nonsense sentences handed out to keep poor people down and culminating in actual consequences for wealthy people and their money when they misbehave. 

But it’s really tricky at the level of the ultrarich, because a truly level playing field with no favor-trading would require either nobody to be friends (unrealistic); all cases to be tried anonymously (unrealistic); lawyers to fundamentally change their ways (forget about it!); and for people to stop moving to countries that will protect them (also not going to happen). I don’t mean to be negative, but this is the bed we’ve made and now we have to lie in it. 

This reminds me of the saying—I think it was the charity Oxfam that put it in a report—that every billionaire is a policy failure. Nobody should have that amount of power over supposedly democratic institutions. 

Based on today’s political landscape and the investigative work you’ve done in your books The Cosmopolites and The Hidden Globe, do you believe we are entering an era of greater transparency or greater normalization of elite impunity?

There’s no question that impunity is winning. Just look at some of Donald Trump’s moves—his appointees, the pardons he’s made, his gutting of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. This literally makes it easier to pay bribes in other countries. You have to wonder who asked for this!

At the same time, we live in an era of leaks and disclosures: The Epstein files are the latest, but I’m also thinking about the troves of data about tax havens in the Panama and Paradise Papers, as well as country-specific ones like Swiss Leaks and LuxLeaks. You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist anymore to believe all this stuff is happening out there. But, for now, there seems to be a bit of a disconnect between the revelations and what we’re going to do about them. It’s clear that measured, technocratic responses—small tweaks to disclosure laws and so on—aren’t going to cut it. It’s time to build a politics around this kind of injustice.