Politics
Why won't Pennsylvania voters have results on Election Night?
Pennsylvania election officials – in a bid to avoid controversy in November – are telling voters ahead of time not to expect the results of the high-stakes presidential race to be ready by Election Night.
The battleground state is of such significant importance this election cycle that Vice President Harris visited Pennsylvania on Aug. 18, ahead of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, and former President Trump made back-to-back visits both on Aug. 17, when he returned to Wilkes Barre for the first time since facing an assassination attempt in that town, and again on Aug. 19 in York.
To avoid repeated controversy from four years ago, Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt – a Republican appointed by Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro in 2023 – is explaining to voters that state law prohibits county boards of elections from beginning to process mail-in ballots until 7 a.m. on Election Day.
“The terminology is normally called pre-canvasing,” Schmidt, a former Philadelphia city commissioner who clashed with Trump online after the 2020 election, explained to Fox News Digital. “Plenty of other states allow the county boards to begin that process in advance of Election Day, whether it’s three days or seven days or however long. But in Pennsylvania, counties can only begin that process at 7 a.m. on election morning.”
ATTEMPTED TRUMP ASSASSIN SEEN WALKING AROUND PENNSYLVANIA RALLY HOURS BEFORE OPENING FIRE
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro speaks on Day 3 of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) at the United Center, in Chicago on Aug. 21, 2024. (REUTERS/Mike Segar)
By contrast, states like Florida, with nearly double the population size of Pennsylvania’s approximately 13 million residents, report their preliminary election results on Election Night.
“It is bologna that Florida, which has more citizens, Texas, which has more citizens and more voters by millions, are able to have their elections counted all in one day. But Pennsylvania is not,” Scott Pressler, a conservative activist leading a grassroots effort to get Republicans to register and vote early in Pennsylvania this election cycle, told Fox News Digital.
Pennsylvania is among seven states, including the fellow battleground of Wisconsin, where pre-canvassing is prohibited under state law.
It never posed a major issue until 2020, Dr. Dan Mallinson, a political science professor at Pennsylvania State University, explained to Fox News Digital.
Mail-in ballots used to be granted only under special circumstances, such as when a voter is sick or traveling around the time of the election. But in October 2019, former Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf signed what he championed as a “historic election reform bill” known as Act 77 into law, allowing most voters to apply for a mail-in ballot and vote by mail without needing to provide a reason or excuse.
The coronavirus pandemic saw a drastic surge in mail-in ballot use, and four years later, Mallinson said voting still looks similar in the Keystone State.
“There was a huge inflow of mail-in ballots in both the primary and the general in 2020,” Mallinson said. “Mail-in balloting has kept up in the 2022 cycle. I mean, it doesn’t look like it’s going to really slow down.”
More than 1.2 million Pennsylvanians voted by mail in the 2022 governor’s election.
Shapiro’s administration announced in June that mail-in ballot applications would be available two months earlier than in 2020, allowing voters more than eight weeks of additional time to apply for their ballot.
For the commonwealth to begin processing mail-in ballots before 7 a.m. on Nov. 5, Schmidt said the state legislature would need to send pre-canvassing legislation to the governor’s desk.
PRE-CANVASSING BILL ‘IMPASSE’
Schmidt said he has testified in front of the Pennsylvania state House and state Senate advocating for mail-in ballot pre-canvassing, and it is frequently added to election reform bills. Most recently, the Democratic-controlled state House passed an election reform bill that includes a pre-canvassing measure, but the bill so far has not been taken up by the state’s Republican-controlled Senate.
“We knew this was an issue in 2020. It was on display for anyone paying attention to election results in Pennsylvania in 2020 and puts Pennsylvania at a unique disadvantage,” Schmidt told Fox News Digital. “It’s a technical problem with a technical solution that does not benefit any candidate. It does not benefit any party. It just allows counties to begin processing mail-in ballot envelopes prior to Election Day.”
“This is a fixable problem that we’ve just been unable to fix, you know, as a way to head off the rhetoric about, ‘there’s something shifty going on with these mail-in votes,’” Mallinson added. “The option is either the Republican-controlled Senate passes the clean bill and the governor signs it, or the Republican-controlled Senate does what has happened in the past, and they add things that they want to it, and then it probably gets rejected in the House. So we’re still kind of stuck in this impasse…. These, sort of, poison pills that get added, have got attached to the bill in the past, and that’s made it impossible to pass.”
Al Schmidt, then a former Philadelphia city commissioner, testified during the House Select Jan. 6 Committee on June 13, 2022, in Washington, DC. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
There was a brief period in September 2020 when it appeared the state legislature, controlled by Republicans in both chambers at the time, was going to be able to a pass a clean pre-canvassing bill before going out of session and lawmakers went home to campaign, but Mallinson said a measure to ban drop-boxes was tacked on, which the Democratic Wolf administration would not agree to, so the legislation failed.
“They were close in 2020 at a much later point than right now,” Mallinson said. “There’s time, but I don’t know if there’s the political will or push.”
A margin of tens of thousands of votes handed a win to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020 and Trump in 2016 in Pennsylvania. The Keystone State has 19 electoral votes, tied with Illinois for the fifth most.
FORMER VP SHORTLISTER JOSH SHAPIRO STOPS SHORT OF SAYING DEMS HAVE AN ANTISEMITISM PROBLEM
GOP STRATEGY SHIFT
Republicans, Mallinson noted, have shifted their strategy from emphasizing voter fraud concerns with mail-in ballots after the 2020 election to now encouraging their party to vote by mail.
Pressler, the founder of Early Vote Action, is leading those efforts in vying to get former President Trump elected in 2024.
Pressler told Fox News Digital he has been going county-to-county in Pennsylvania delivering letters asking board of election offices what officials are doing to ensure non-citizens are not registered to vote and that paper ballots do not run out on Nov. 5. Pike County officials have been responsive, he said, and Pressler wants to avoid a repeat of what happened in 2022 in Luzerne County, where they ran out of paper ballots during the midterm elections.
Ballots are dropped off at the Bureau of Elections in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on May 16, 2023. Primary elections were cast on write-in-paper ballots in Luzerne County after a paper shortage caused havoc during the elections in November. (Aimee Dilger/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
Since the 2020 election, the state has seen “significant turnover of election administrators,” Schmidt said when asked if paper ballots were stocked this time around.
“In Pennsylvania, we’ve lost more than 80 senior election directors or administrators since 2020. We only have 67 counties,” Schmidt told Fox News Digital. “But many counties, including Luzerne, have had the election director replaced election after election after election. That issue, with not having enough ballots ready in advance of Election Day, it was one that’s obviously a great cause for concern.”
“We work closely with our counties to make sure that they’re prepared for Election Day,” the secretary added. “We provide guidance to them. We provide directives to them to make sure that they have an ample supply of ballots, whether they’re mail-in ballots or ballots cast at the polling place on Election Day, so that anyone can make their voice heard if they’re a registered voter.”
In Pennsylvania, every county has three commissioners, two are the majority party, one is the minority.
Schmidt was the only Republican of three Philadelphia city commissioners overseeing the 2020 election.
In June 2022, Schmidt testified before the Jan. 6 House Committee that he investigated and found no evidence of claims brought by Trump’s former adviser Rudy Giuliani that more than 8,000 mail-in ballots were submitted on behalf of dead people in 2020 in Philadelphia. Schmidt also told the Democratic-controlled committee that death threats against him and his family worsened after Trump tweeted his name.
An election worker flattens ballots during the 2024 Pennsylvania primary election at the City of Philadelphia’s Election Warehouse on Tuesday, April 23, 2024. (Hannah Beier/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
NON-CITIZEN VOTER CONCERNS
Pressler has implored Shapiro, who was briefly considered as Vice President Harris’ running mate, to enact an election integrity executive order to ensure non-citizens aren’t on Pennsylvania’s voter rolls.
In Virginia, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin said his administration had uncovered more than 6,000 non-citizens on the state voter rolls since he took office.
In Ohio, Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose last week announced that nearly 600 non-citizens were found to be registered to vote, including about 100 who actually voted. He, therefore, ordered an annual audit of the state voter rolls to scan for and remove anyone found to be unlawfully registered to vote.
Mallinson, meanwhile, said officials are wary of cleaning the rolls during an election year to avoid disenfranchising eligible voters.
Schmidt said that non-citizens on the voter rolls shouldn’t be a cause of concern in Pennsylvania, stressing that voter registration in the commonwealth requires a Social Security number.
Asked directly if he could guarantee there are no non-citizens currently on the voter rolls, Schmidt said it was “encouraging to see states like Virginia and Ohio catch up with Pennsylvania,” crediting himself for bringing the issue of non-citizens registering to vote in Philadelphia to the attention of then-Pensylvania Secretary of State Pedro Cortés in 2016, and the “Motor Voter” program loophole was “resolved a few years ago.”
City Commissioners Lisa Deeley and Al Schmidt speak to the media about the vote counting process on Nov. 4, 2020, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
“When you register to vote in Pennsylvania, you have to provide a Social Security number, and you have to prove or provide a driver’s license number along with your name and the address where you reside,” Schmidt said. “So, any vulnerability in the system that I’ve encountered as a Republican election commissioner in Philadelphia for ten years is not one where non-citizens would be able to register to vote, especially ones that are here in a sort of undocumented status.”
The Shapiro administration in December canceled a $10.7 million contract to update the Pennsylvania voter roll system to avoid making the change during a presidential election year. The current system, known as the Statewide Uniform Registry of Electors (SURE), is two decades old and described as outdated by election administrators who use it to check voter registration and track mail-in ballots.
More than a year ago, however, Schmidt said his department began providing new hardware and software upgrades to counties, insisting that the SURE system is reliable for getting through the presidential race.
“It’s very dangerous to change an election system in a presidential election cycle with heavy turnout and all the rest,” Schmidt said.
The state has an open request for bids out to build a replacement system, which Schmidt hopes will be “more user-friendly for our county partners.”
He stressed that the SURE system is essentially “the database of all registered voters in Pennsylvania” and is “unrelated to voter tabulation.”
“The Shapiro administration has taken many steps to prepare for this election – from setting up a training team to train new election directors to setting up an election threat task force in the event that we encounter any of the ugliness that we encountered in 2020 with threats of violence or intimidation targeting our election officials or our voters,” Schmidt said. “It’s important to be prepared for the coming election. It’s a presidential election. Everyone is going into it with eyes wide open and, working closely with our county partners, I’m confident that we will have a free and fair and safe and secure election in Pennsylvania in 2024.”
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Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner has emerged as one of the party’s fastest-rising political figures, drawing national attention for his populist message and outsider image.
But as his profile has grown, so has scrutiny of his past conduct, with controversies ranging from sexually explicit messages and offensive social media posts to a Nazi-linked tattoo and campaign staff upheaval.
PLATNER CONTROVERSIES FUEL SPECULATION ABOUT LITTLE-KNOWN MAINE BALLOT REPLACEMENT PROVISION
In continued clean-up of those scandals, Platner came to Washington, D.C. on Tuesday to huddle with party figures at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee headquarters just one week before his primary election.
The Marine veteran and oyster farmer has defended himself against the criticism and retained the support of prominent Democrats, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. Still, some have questioned whether the allegations could complicate Democrats’ efforts to unseat Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, in one of the nation’s most closely watched Senate races.
Here’s a look at the major controversies that have engulfed Platner’s campaign.
Explicit text messages and sexting allegations
Senate candidate Graham Platner is under fire, but it was his wife Amy Gertner coming out with a controversial five-minute social media post by the campaign to denounce the ‘attacks’ while she did not deny the allegations of infidelity in a new marriage. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
The most recent controversy surrounding Platner stems from reports that he exchanged sexually explicit messages with multiple women during his marriage, an issue that campaign aides were reportedly aware of as his Senate bid was taking shape.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Platner’s wife, Amy Gertner, informed a campaign aide about the text exchanges shortly after he launched his Senate bid as staffers were assessing potential political liabilities.
According to the report, Gertner discovered the messages months after the couple married in 2024 and disclosed their existence before her husband held a campaign rally alongside progressive Sen. Sanders. The campaign told Politico that the aide viewed the matter as a private issue between the couple and did not raise concerns about it publicly.
SENATE CANDIDATE GRAHAM PLATNER SENT EXPLICIT TEXTS TO MULTIPLE WOMEN WHILE MARRIED, WIFE SAYS: REPORT
Platner’s campaign later confirmed the existence of the text exchanges to Politico.
He also told Fox News Digital in a statement: “Amy and I went through something hard — because of me. We did the work, and I’m grateful for her every hour of every day.”
“I’ve learned throughout this campaign is that people don’t care about gossip or headlines, they care that you’re fighting for their hospitals, their paycheck, their kids… Our opponents want politics to be empty of content and empty of actual change — and beating that is exactly what our movement is about,” he added.
In a statement to the Journal, Gertner criticized the disclosure of the information, saying she had shared “deeply personal details” about her marriage with someone she considered a friend, only to see those details become public.
She revealed that the two attended couple’s counseling, worked through the issues in their marriage and have since emerged as a stronger couple.
“I know who Graham is. I know the man I married and the husband he has been to me on the best and the worst days of my life,” Gertner said. “That hasn’t changed, and it won’t.”
Nazi-linked tattoo
Graham Platner, a Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Maine, points to a covered tattoo that was previously recognized as a Nazi symbol during an interview in Portland, Maine, on Oct. 22, 2025. (WGME via AP)
Platner’s campaign also faced intense scrutiny after it was revealed he once had a skull-and-crossbones tattoo on his chest closely resembling the “Totenkopf” symbol used by Hitler’s SS paramilitary forces.
The Maine Democrat said he got the tattoo during a “night of drinking” while on leave in Croatia in 2007 as a Marine and claimed he was entirely unaware of its meaning at the time.
In an Instagram video posted in May, Platner elaborated on the tattoo’s origins. He explained that he merely selected the design from a flash tattoo wall while “carousing” with fellow Marines in Split, Croatia.
“We thought it looked cool,” he downplayed.
Platner said he was later “appalled” to learn the image resembled a Nazi symbol, arguing that his life and career have been defined by opposition to fascism, racism and Nazism. He also noted that he was never questioned about the tattoo during his military service.
MAINE DEM SENATE HOPEFUL BACKED BY BERNIE SANDERS APOLOGIZES FOR NAZI-STYLE TATTOO, VOWS TO STAY IN RACE
Rather than undergo removal, Platner said he chose to cover the tattoo because tattoo removal services were not readily available near his rural Maine home.
“Going to a tattoo removal place is going to take a while,” he told The Associated Press. “I wanted this thing off my body.”
The symbol was ultimately covered with a tattoo featuring a Celtic knot and images of dogs, which Platner said were meant to honor his family pets.
Deleted Reddit posts reveal offensive comments
U.S. Senate candidate from Maine Graham Platner speaks during a campaign event on May 17, 2026, in Portland, Maine. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
The keystone scrutiny Platner has faced during his bid stemmed from thousands of now-deleted Reddit posts that resurfaced after he launched his Senate campaign.
In posts first reported by CNN and Politico, Platner referred to himself as a “communist” and “socialist” and endorsed the slogan “all cops are b—–ds.”
In other posts, he argued that those who “expect to fight fascism without a good semi-automatic rifle, they ought to do some reading of history” and said that “an armed working class is a requirement for economic justice.”
DELETED POSTS URGING VIOLENCE HAUNT DEMOCRATIC SENATE HOPEFUL IN MAINE RACE
The posts under his since-retired username “P-hustle” were deleted before Platner announced his Democratic Senate bid in August.
The candidate has since addressed the posts multiple times, telling CNN and Politico that he was “f—ing around on the internet” during a period when he felt “lost and very disillusioned with our government who sent me overseas to watch my friends die.”
“I made dumb jokes and picked fights,” Platner said. “But of course I’m not a socialist. I’m a small business owner, a Marine Corps veteran, and a retired s—poster.”
In the posts Platner made crude comments about masturbating in port-a-potties and claimed a U.S. service member who took enemy fire in Afghanistan “didn’t deserve to live.”
GRAHAM PLATNER VOWS TO ‘COME AFTER’ BEZOS AS SENATE HOPEFUL ESCALATES BILLIONAIRE TAX FIGHT
The controversies have done little to erode Platner’s standing within the Democratic Party as he has continued to attract national attention and grassroots support in the Democratic primary bid to challenge Sen. Collins for her seat.
Since former Democratic Maine Gov. Janet Mills halted her campaign in April, much of the party establishment has consolidated behind Platner, and national Democrats have continued to support his candidacy despite the flurry of scandals.
The steady stream of allegations and past controversies has also drawn attention to a little-known provision in Maine election law that allows political parties to replace a nominee under certain circumstances after a primary election.
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Under state law, a candidate who wins a primary and subsequently withdraws by 5 p.m. on July 13 can be replaced by a nominee selected by party officials. Any replacement candidate must then be chosen by 5 p.m. on July 27.
There is currently no indication that Platner plans to withdraw from the race, and the Democratic hopeful has repeatedly vowed to continue his campaign. Still, the provision has drawn renewed interest as questions persist about whether additional revelations could complicate his candidacy.
Platner’s campaign did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
Politics
Commentary: Bass clears first hurdle, but if Pratt holds off Raman, the mayoral race could be a holy war
L.A. Mayor Karen Bass made what sounded like a victory speech Tuesday night.
Councilmember Nithya Raman made what sounded almost like a concession speech.
And former reality TV star Spencer Pratt relayed a message from the heavens.
“Well, obviously God wanted five more months of me exposing all the failures of our mayor, so it’s gonna be a fun ride,” Pratt said. “I hope she’s ready.”
Assuming Pratt holds on to one of the two spots in the Nov. 3 general election as the final votes are tallied in the next few days, the smart money will be on Bass, for reasons I’ll get into in a moment.
But the supreme being and patron of all pontiffs has to be considered a wild card. This is the first time, to my knowledge, that an incumbent mayor in the City of Angels would be running against a challenger whose campaign manager is God Almighty.
So here we go. We could be in for one of the more remarkable electoral adventures in city history, with a complete novice and MAGA conservative going up against a liberal career politician in a deep-blue city and state full of people who are tired of hearing excuses from Democrats. (If Raman ends up ousting Pratt, my apologies for jumping to conclusions. But it’s not my fault. The devil made me do it.)
If you intend to follow closely, as of course you should, maybe you can help me count the number of times Pratt plays the faith card. I went to St. Peter Martyr School and attended the church by the same name, and I don’t recall ever hearing a nun or a priest drop God’s name as often as Pratt does.
In fact, I just watched a clip of Pratt talking to Fox News TV host and Donald Trump disciple Kayleigh McEnany, and over the course of 1 minute and 52 seconds, he mentioned God or Jesus 10 times.
“Thankfully, I married an angel who was very connected with Jesus and has brought me to the light,” Pratt said of his wife and former reality TV co-star Heidi Montag. “It’s been very empowering to just pray and just be on his path and just say, ‘God, if you want me to save these animals, save these humans and protect my city, just keep putting me in the place where I can do that.’”
Is he running for mayor or cardinal?
Look, I totally respect your average true believer. But I’m not entirely comfortable with a mayor who might be sitting around City Hall waiting for signs and smoke signals rather than knowing what to do on his own.
God has a lot on his plate. He might be busy multiplying fishes and loaves so people don’t go hungry thanks to the president’s tariffs and warmongering. Is he going to rush to answer a prayer for guidance about underfunded parks or broken sidewalks in Los Angeles?
How did we get here, you ask?
Well, Pratt is an AI creation, in a way. A composite of sorts. You combine the forces of social media, political rebellion, second-rate celebrity obsession and the Peter Principle, and here’s a little Trump puppet walking around L.A. like he’s the chosen one.
Add to that the very real essence of his appeal to some voters:
Los Angeles has problems. Big problems that don’t get fixed quickly enough or at all, and Pratt represents the angry voter who wants to know why City Hall can’t do better and where all the money went. He’s absolutely right when he says we shouldn’t have people living on the streets, using drugs on the streets and dying on the streets.
But if Pratt is in the general election rather than Raman, we’re in for a national media circus rather than a summit on solutions. Raman is well-versed on matters of relevance and could have pushed back against Bass in substantive, detailed ways. On the other hand, as Pratt has fairly argued, Raman headed City Council’s homelessness committee, so isn’t she partly to blame for the failures she tried to pin on Bass?
As for Pratt’s policy chops, he has not responded to my offers of a get-together. Absent that, and given his careful avoidance of local reporters who know their stuff, I read his platform on his campaign website and I can tell you that while he touches on many of the right issues — public safety, fiscal integrity, homelessness — attention to detail and depth of knowledge are not God-given strengths.
Maybe Pratt can actually deliver on his promise of a “treatment-led recovery model that addresses mental illness and addiction as the primary drivers of chronic homelessness.” But that would require an act of God (which I suppose is possible given their relationship), because those matters are primarily under the direction of the county, not the city.
This is the main problem here. Bass was beatable, and could have been pushed by a serious challenger to do better.
In the last election, Rick Caruso gave her a scare. That was partly because he had some depth on the issues, he was a successful businessman and philanthropist, he had served on the police commission and the water and power board, he had built relationships across the city and, along with his family, he had poured time and millions of dollars into underserved communities.
In this election, it looks as though Bass could get lucky and face off against a guy who lost his house in the Palisades fire, saw a few homeless encampments through his car window, and decided he wanted to be mayor. Some might have questioned his hubris, but only before learning that he was on a mission from God.
If you’re keeping count, that’s nine mentions of God so far in this column.
One more for the tie, with an eye toward five more months of campaign fodder.
Thank you, God.
steve.lopez@latimes.com
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Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., suddenly found himself on the defensive at a budget hearing on Wednesday when, amid levying accusations of the Trump administration’s “corrupt” dealings, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent fired back by bringing Wyden’s son’s investments into the exchange.
“We would like to hear what Adam Wyden and Jeffrey Epstein talked about,” Bessent said, referring to unearthed emails drawing a connection between the senator’s son and the disgraced financier.
“Did your son and Jeffrey Epstein talk about pole dancing as he begged him for money?”
The moment continues the political fallout for the many names associated with Epstein that — despite not amounting to proof of wrongdoing — continue to prompt embarrassment and scandal at even the smallest mention.
TOP FIERY MOMENTS AS DEMOCRATS CLASH WITH TREASURY SECRETARY BESSENT IN CHAOTIC HILL HEARINGS
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, left, pictured along Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore, right. (Aaron Schwartz/Bloomberg via Getty Images; Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
Epstein, a former financier, died while in prison on charges of sex trafficking minors in 2019, leaving behind questions of whether he facilitated illegal sexual encounters for his vast network of rich and powerful figures.
Amid public demands for transparency on the matter, the Department of Justice released troves of documents on Epstein late last year, unveiling a slew of new names with all manner of ties to the infamous figure ranging from purely innocuous to alarming.
Among them, emails surfaced indicating that Adam Wyden, Ron Wyden’s son, went to Epstein, hoping to gain his support for a business venture.
UNEARTHED EMAILS REVEAL DEM SENATOR’S SON WANTED EPSTEIN TO JOIN HIS FUND: ‘ENJOYED OUR CONVERSATION’
Sen. Ron Wyden leaves a Senate Democratic meeting at the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 3, 2025, as the federal government shuts down after Congress and the White House failed to reach a funding deal. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
“Jeffrey, I wanted to thank you for taking the time to meet with me. I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation and hope my passion and dedication for my business came through in the meeting. I live and breathe this business and take my returns, integrity and reputation quite seriously,” the younger Wyden said in an email in April 2016.
“I intensely appreciate like-minded individuals and would very much look forward to having you join us at the fund.”
The emails came after Epstein pleaded guilty to soliciting a minor for prostitution in Florida in 2008.
It’s unclear what the business venture discussed by Adam Wyden and Epstein may have been or what, specifically, had been discussed in their conversations.
Even so, Bessent reminded viewers that the younger Wyden had a history of investing in off-color markets at Wednesday’s hearing.
DEMOCRATS ARE HAMMERING REPUBLICANS ON EPSTEIN, BUT ONE SENATOR BRUSHED OFF THE ISSUE YEARS AGO
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent addresses a press conference in Rosenbad after trade talks between the U.S. and China concluded in Stockholm, Sweden, on July 29, 2025. (Magnus Lejhall/TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images)
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“Your son’s largest investment position was Rick’s Cabaret,” Bessent said, referring to a series of strip clubs.
Wyden, who has widely panned the Trump administration and its many officials for their own connections to Epstein, didn’t respond to Bessent’s jabs.
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