SNL mocks Noem firing and Iran as Hegseth calls war a ‘situationship’

 

Elsewhere in the sketch, Colin Jost’s bro-ified Pete Hegseth performed a keg stand, or as he called it, a ‘Hegstand’ (Saturday Night Live)

Saturday Night Live brutally mocked the Trump administration’s handling of war with Iran, with star Colin Jost reprising his impression of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth as an amped-up frat boy.

The cold open began with Hegseth performing a keg stand — a “Hegstand” as he bragged from the podium — then chiding a reporter for labelling the U.S. conflict with Iran as a war.

“This isn’t a war, OK?” Jost said.

“It’s a situationship,” he added, a slang term for an ambiguous relationship.

The joke played on how Republican allies of the president have been reluctant to describe the ongoing conflict as a war, given that the White House bypassed Congress and started the conflict unilaterally, even though only lawmakers can formally declare a war.

As the cold open went on, Jost continued to roast the White House strategy, claiming the ambiguity around the mission — is it about regime change? Stopping state-sponsored terror? preempting a strike on the U.S.? — is all part of a secret Trump administration strategy.

“If we don’t know what we’re doing, then Iran definitely doesn’t know what we’re doing,” Jost said.

“You’re all playing chess — I’m playingGrand Theft Auto,” he added, a nod to the administration’s use of footage from the violent video game in recent Iran-related promotional videos.

The U.S. strategy, he insisted, was about going “wild,” just like actor Shia LaBeouf, who was recently arrested after a partying spree in New Orleans.

In the cold open, Hegseth then ceded the stage to recently-fired DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, played by Ashley Padilla, who Hegesth said had been reassigned to a new role, “under the bus.”

“I didn’t get fired,” Padilla insisted. “I self-deported.”

She then joked about some controversies that helped bring the real Noem down, including the aggressive immigration operation in Minneapolis, as well as allegations she was having an affair with her adviser Corey Lewandowski and that DHS spent government funds on luxury jets for top staff.

“I think I really nailed it, and by it, I mean my married coworker in a big, beautiful flying bedroom 30,000 feet over Minneapolis,” Padilla said.

The sketch also mocked Noem’s new post, serving as a special envoy to the Trump administration’s “Shield of the Americas” initiative.

“As I told my plastic surgeon, the work is never done,” Padilla said.

Back in the real world, Noem remains under scrutiny even as her tenure leading DHS is set to conclude at the end of March.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is demanding that the remaining funds spent by “Kosplay Kristi” Noem on a controversial $220 million “vanity” ad campaign be rerouted to help victims of last year’s devastating Los Angeles wildfires.

“While Kristi Noem poured $220 million of taxpayer money into a political ad campaign featuring herself on horseback, more than $500 million in FEMA funding for LA fire recovery sat stalled on her desk,” Newsom, a Democrat, wrote in a statement. “Families in Los Angeles shouldn’t have to wait while she and Donald Trump play politics. Release the funding now and redirect those dollars to help communities rebuild.”

During her time overseeing homeland security operations, Noem was widely mocked for dressing up in tactical gear for various photo ops and press conferences, leading to derisive nicknames like “Kosplay Kristi” and “ICE Barbie.”

SNL mocks Noem firing and Iran as Hegseth calls war a ‘situationship’

Story by Josh Marcus

UK spies in hunt for hidden nerve agents inside Iran which could kill thousands

 

Image of Iranian missiles

UK spies have allegedly been tasked to trace and find chemical weapons inside Iran which could potentially unleash horror on Middle East nations filled home to Brits.

Intelligence officers have reportedly been sent to Iran as part of a deep-cover operation to locate sites potentially used to hold deadly nerve agents.

Brit officers are working with French spies inside the nation after it launched retaliatory strikes on

 it's neighbours across the region, following joint US and Israeli attacks which killed supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Israel has reportedly pinpointed locations the Iranian regime is supposedly using to hide toxic substances.

The US and Israel has launched a series of brutal strikes and bombings of Iranian military locations but Israel's Mossad intelligence agency reportedly claims it has evidence deadly chemicals are supposedly being stored elsewhere.

A British source, according to the Daily Mail, said these alleged nerve agents could be used as part of Iran's retaliatory attacks, and even on Dubai.

They said: "If they [Iran] are pushed into a corner they may well opt to use chemicals – most likely against Israel, but who knows where else? They could kill and injure thousands in Dubai if they wanted to.

"I am pretty certain the Iranians used some level of chemical toxins against their own people earlier this year; the symptoms they describe indicate a nerve agent of some kind. We are inside the country now looking for them, across four sites narrowed down by Tel Aviv."

The World Health Organisation said medicines to help offset the damage of a chemical or nuclear attack were handed out across the Middle East before the deadly war was launched on February 28.

Israel also claimed it destroyed one of these alleged chemical sites during its 12-day war against Iran in June last year - where it bombed several Iranian military sites.

Iran reportedly supplied chemical weapons to Syria's ex-despot Bashar al-Assad - where the crazed dictator launched a deadly chemical attack in August 2013. The UN confirmed the nerve agent sarin was used in the Ghouta chemical attack, near Damascus.

Despite this, Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian surprisingly apologised to Iran's neighbours for the his countries attacks against them. He said: "I deem it necessary to apologise to neighbouring countries that were attacked. We do not intend to invade neighbouring countries."

Hours after this statement, Iran said their drones hit a US air combat centre, Al Dhafra Air Base, near Abu Dhabi but this has not been confirmed.

An Iranian radiation sterilisation plant was "severely damaged" in a US-Israeli attack on Saturday. The gamma irradiation facility in Isfahan province, central Iran, was struck in an air and missile attack by Israel and the US, Iranian state media said.

UK spies in hunt for hidden nerve agents inside Iran which could kill thousands

Story by Elizabeta Ranxburgaj

Inside Donald Trump's dangerous mind from 'mental decline to reality show warmongering'

 

Not too long ago, there were calls to award US President Donald Trump the Nobel Peace Prize for his part in the Gaza ceasefire. Now it seems the divisive POTUS is hellbent on stirring up global chaos on a scale that's almost impossible to keep up with.

With an alarming swiftness, President Trump has upturned world order in a way that has frightened more cautious onlookers, who were left shaken over the weekend following the US-Israel strikes against Iran, resulting in the death of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

And while people across the planet continue to hold their breath over the shifting situation in the Middle East, the 79-year-old President has now come out with a brash war of words against Cuba, declaring the country is "going to fall" thanks to the US incursion into Venezuela, which cut off oil supplies to Cuba. Appearing to show no sympathy for the millions of ordinary Cuban citizens left without power, boastful Trump remarked that this outcome was in fact the "icing on the cake".

But what could really be going on inside the mind of Trump, and should we be concerned about the power this unpredictable, tempestuous individual holds?

The Mirror heard from Blair Glaser, a therapist turned leadership coach, who knows all about varied leadership styles and the thinking that goes into such high-profile decisions. If her work has taught her anything, it's "that it's impossible to determine what is actually going on in anyone's mind". However, there are clues to be picked up on here.

Ms Glaser told us: "Many say the President is in the throes of mental decline, and given the many examples of him publicly struggling to make sense with his words, that seems plausible. Other experts maintain that Trump knows exactly what he is doing, or at least the people around him do, which is trying to create an authoritarian regime. Launching a war is one way to do that by claiming the country is in a state of emergency and shutting down elections.

"What is plain to anyone watching is chaos. There doesn't seem to be any clear reason for going to war with Iran. Trump has said there was an imminent threat, but that has been debunked. He has said the goal was to liberate the Iranian people, but there is no apparent plan in place to do that other than killing the Ayatollah and co. Rubio has basically said that Israel dragged the US into the war, and Pete Hegseth, Trump’s Secretary of War, has even called it a religious war."

In a truly startling turn of events, a shocking report claims a US military commander told officers that President Trump was "anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon" in the aftermath of 'Operation Epic Fury', making this assertion before indignant members of US troops.

This claim, reported by independent journalist Jonathan Larsen via Substack, was filed in a complaint to watchdog Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), and is one of hundreds expressing concern over combat unit commanders providing Christian reasoning for the war.

Such bombastic claims, which will no doubt dismay many Christians, are nothing new to Trump and his loyal supporters, and POTUS himself appears to be pushing this conflicting narrative of Peace on Earth, even as bombs explode across the Middle East, with ordinary families caught in the crossfire.

Following the initial attack, which resulted in an explosive retaliation, Trump vowed that "heavy and pinpoint bombing" would continue "uninterrupted throughout the week or, as long as necessary to achieve our objective of PEACE THROUGHOUT THE MIDDLE EAST AND, INDEED, THE WORLD!" While many would disagree, to say the least, that violence is by no means the answer to world peace, Trump's action movie-esque rhetoric, complete with cheesy Hollywood one-liners, certainly continues to appeal to his more ardent followers, even as his approval ratings slip.

Could this recent bloody onslaught, therefore, be some sort of last-gasp attempt to draw in fans? An all-singing, all-dancing season finale to a series viewers have begun to tire of? On this note, Ms Glaser reflected: "What we do know about how this president thinks is that he spent eleven years as a reality TV show star of The Apprentice. And this president has governed like a reality TV show star: always making inflammatory remarks and creating outrageous, chaotic situations; posing for photo ops to gain attention.

"His ratings as president are the lowest they've ever been, and I would surmise that the war is in part a response to that. Trump has always been more interested in what will get people talking about him, and at the same time, perhaps keep the focus off of his nefarious dealings and how much money he is illegally profiting from the presidency."

While the increasingly rambling rants of Trump certainly make for entertaining headlines, it's his actions, not words, that have those with knowledge of international affairs up at night, especially given the precarious global landscape we find ourselves in. So, should we be frightened, and does a mind like Trump's really have the power to destroy the world as we know it?

Ms Glaser said: "A huge portion of the American public has been deeply worried since he took office, and many are afraid for their lives. To have a reality-TV-show-style of governing is - and has been - deadly. We should be deeply concerned about his mental state and its impact: how it is destroying order and ruining lives both within the US (his ICE regime has killed innocent people and torn even legal immigrants from their lives) and abroad.

"I talk to many people who are deeply ashamed of what this country is becoming. To choose to go to war without a cohesive plan and be so reckless with human lives is evidence that the leader of this country is not actually interested in bettering the lives of its citizens and protecting them from harm."

Inside Donald Trump's dangerous mind from 'mental decline to reality show warmongering'

Story by Julia Banim

Evidence suggests the deadly blast at an Iranian school was likely a US airstrike

 

Pentagon US Iran© ASSOCIATED PRESS

Satellite images, expert analysis and information released by the U.S. and Israeli militaries suggest an explosion that killed scores of Iranian students at a school was likely caused by U.S. airstrikes that also hit an adjacent compound associated with the regime's

The Feb. 28 strike, which had the highest reported civilian death toll since the war began, has come under staunch criticism from the United Nations and human rights monitors. More than 165 people were killed, most of them of children, in the blast during school hours at Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary School, according to Iranian state media.

Satellite images taken Wednesday and reviewed by the The Associated Press show most of the school in the city of Minab, some 1,100 kilometers (680 miles) southeast of Tehran, reduced to rubble, a crescent shape punched into its roof. Experts say the tight pattern of the damage visible on the satellite photos is consistent with a targeted airstrike.

Iran has blamed Israel and the United States for the blast. Neither country has accepted responsibility. Asked about the strike at the school at a Pentagon press briefing Wednesday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, “All I can say is that we’re investigating that. We, of course, never target civilian targets. But we’re taking a look and investigating that.”

Several factors point to a U.S. strike. One is the launching of an assessment of the incident by the U.S. military. According to the Pentagon's instructions on processes for mitigating civilian harm, an assessment is launched after a group of investigators make an initial determination that the U.S. military may bear culpability.

Another is the location of the school — next to a base of the Revolutionary Guard in Hormozgan Province and close to a barracks for its naval brigade. The U.S. military has focused on naval targets and acknowledged strikes in the province, including one in the vicinity of the school.

Israel, which has denied conducting the strike, has focused on areas of Iran closer to Israel and hasn’t reported conducting any strikes south of Isfahan, 800 kilometers (500 miles) away. The U.S. is operating warships in the Arabian Sea, including the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, within range of the school.

When asked by the AP about its findings, the U.S. military’s Central Command said, “It would be inappropriate to comment given the incident is under investigation.”

“My assumption is that probably there were some activities recently there and they detected and tracked them, but ... they weren't aware or didn't have an up-to-date database that a girls' school was there and they bombed it," said Farzin Nadimi, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who studies Iran’s military.

Satellite images show damage

The school is adjacent to a walled compound labeled on maps as the Seyyed Al-Shohada Cultural Complex of the Guard, which included a pharmacy, gym and sports field.

In addition to the school, satellite photos show that blasts struck at least five buildings in the Guard compound, leaving the area pocked with craters, charred holes in roofs and piles of rubble. Historical satellite imagery shows the school building was not separated from the Guard compound until about a decade ago when a wall was built between them.

Iranian online map applications show a living quarters for the Assef Brigades about 150 meters (165 yards) from the school, inside the Revolutionary Guard compound. The 16th Assef Coastal Missile Group is part of the Guard's navy, Nadimi said. The 1st Naval District, which the Assef Brigades belong to, is responsible for the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded passes. The strait has been a particular point of conflict in the war.

In the aftermath of the strike, video from Iran's state broadcaster verified by the AP using satellite imagery showed dozens of fresh graves dug at a nearby cemetery. Nadimi said it is likely the school taught daughters of Guard personnel.

The strike has drawn wide condemnation from the secretary-general of the United Nations and international human rights groups. The criticism comes amid reports that airstrikes have also hit other schools in Iran.

The London-based conflict monitoring organization Airwars is reviewing three other school strikes that caused casualties. In addition to those, in the last 48 hours the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reported at least two more schools were struck.

Targeting schools would be a clear violation of international laws governing armed conflict, said Elise Baker, a senior staff lawyer at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based nonprofit think tank.

“Strikes can only legally target military objectives and combatants, but the school was a civilian object and the students and teachers were civilians,” Baker said. “The school’s proximity to (Guard) facilities and the attendance of children of (Guard) members at the school does not change that conclusion: It was a civilian object.”

Pattern of damage suggests targeted strike

Three experts told the AP the satellite imagery and videos from the scene strongly suggested multiple munitions hit the compound. Complicating any assessment is the lack of images of bomb fragments from the blast. No independent agency has reached the site during the war to investigate, either.

There are no craters or evidence of bombs hitting in the surrounding neighborhood, suggesting a great degree of accuracy, said Corey Scher, a researcher who uses satellite imagery and radar data to study landscape changes in armed conflict zones.

“All the strikes are clustered within the walled-off compound," Scher said. "That’s one level of precision at the block level. And then most of the strikes are basically leading to direct hits on buildings. That’s another level of precision.”

Scher said the school and the other buildings struck in the compound showed damage consistent with the use of air-to-surface munitions.

“They didn’t explode in the air above the building," he said. “It looks like the explosion happened at the time they hit the surface, whether it was the building or the ground."

Sean Moorhouse, a former British Army officer and explosive ordnance disposal expert, said the available satellite imagery was insufficient to determine exactly what type of munitions were used in the strike, but he said the visible damage was consistent with what would be expected with impacts from multiple 2,000-pound (900-kilogram) high-explosive warheads. He said the multiple precise impacts would undercut any suggestion that a malfunctioning Iranian missile hit the school.

N.R. Jenzen-Jones, the director of Armament Research Services, said the school and Guard compound were targeted with “multiple simultaneous or near-simultaneous strikes." He said in videos of the school taken immediately after the strike, smoke can be seen rising from the Guard compound. There were also impacts on multiple buildings visible in satellite images and media reports citing witnesses who said they heard multiple explosions.

“If indeed it is confirmed that an American or Israeli strike hit the school, there are several potential points of failure in the targeting cycle," Jenzen-Jones said. “We might be seeing an intelligence failure, likely rather early in the process, which misidentified the target or failed to update a targeting list following the building’s change in use.”

___

Biesecker reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Konstantin Toropin in Washington contributed to this report.

Evidence suggests the deadly blast at an Iranian school was likely a US airstrike

Story by Julia Frankel and Michael Biesecker

Iran’s plot to turn Trump’s glory war into his worst nightmare

 

Iran wants to turn Donald Trump‘s war into a global and domestic nightmare by inflicting such huge military, political and economic pain that it forces the President to abandon his campaign.

The conflict, now in its second week, is becoming a battle of wills and pain thresholds as missiles and drones rain down across the Middle East and beyond.

The Islamic Republic, facing an existential threat, is focused on endurance and survival – banking on Trump’s fear of a forever war and a rising backlash from his own supporters.

Iran knows it cannot defeat the combined military might of the US and Israel. However, the regime is using every lever at its disposal to expand and extend the conflict in the hope of making the cost too high for its enemies.

Israel has said the war is entering a more intense “next phase”, and the bellicose US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth promised “firepower over Iran and over Tehran is about to surge dramatically”.

Trump has demanded “unconditional surrender”.

But that follows days of changing messages from the administration that suggest the US has no coherent war plan. And as speculation builds that ground troops could be sent into Iran, the shadows of Iraq and Afghanistan will loom large in Trump’s mind.

Iran will use Trump’s domestic weakness

Iran understands that Trump fears another forever war.

After railing against foreign wars and campaigning on a pledge to be a “peace president”, his Iran campaign looks like a betrayal to many of his “America First” supporters.

Already, Iran has denied Trump the shock-and-awe victory picture he craves and achieved with the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro earlier this year.

Iran has expanded the conflict to America’s Gulf allies and even further afield: in Turkey, Cyprus and Azerbaijan. At least six US soldiers have been killed, and the White House is struggling to land on a convincing case for the attack.

Some 59 per cent of Americans disapprove of the decision to strike Iran and 60 per cent oppose sending US ground troops – compared with just 12 per cent who approve, according to a CNN poll.

“This is already a domestic problem,” Lewis Galvin, lead Americas analyst at the intelligence consultancy Sibylline, told The i Paper. “It hasn’t really been popular at any point… There’s an already large narrative circulating that the US was pushed into this by Israel, and to an extent Saudi.”

If Iran can make the conflict another deadly quagmire, Trump could be forced to retreat, leaving the regime intact.

“Tehran wants to extend and expand this conflict because it knows that Trump may not have the patience for a long conflict. Nor does the President’s domestic constituency, which opposes open-ended American interventions abroad,” said Bilal Saab, associate fellow of the Middle East and North Africa programme at Chatham House.

Iran’s plot to turn Trump’s glory war into his worst nightmare

Story by Isabella Bengoechea

Kim Jong Un hits out at 'shameless' Trump for Iran war as expert warns 'he's rattled

 

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un has launched a scathing attack on the US and Israeli attack on Iran, calling the missile and drone bombardment of the Middle Eastern country "shameless"

The attack was termed "a shameless rogue act of the US and Israel” and "an illegal act of aggression", in a statement released by Kim's government earlier this week.

The North Korean leader has been hesitant at times to criticise the US President, especially when compared to his attitudes towards previous regimes.

Many are now speculating that this change in tone suggests Kim has been angered by Trump's aggressive manoeuvres to kill Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and arrest Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

The despot is unsettled, experts say, and worries that he could be next on Trump's list.

Speaking to the Korea Herald, political academic Lim Eul-chul warned that Kim is furious about the killing of the Iranian leader, specifically, with whom the US had reportedly been pursuing "nuclear negotiations" similar to the "unconditional dialogue" promised to North Korea.

North Korea may focus on the fact that Iran was ultimately attacked despite pursuing nuclear negotiations and attempting to reach certain agreements,” said the professor at Kyungnam University’s Institute for Far Eastern Studies.

“There is virtually zero chance that Pyongyang trusts the sincerity of Washington’s offer of ‘unconditional dialogue.’”

Lim also revealed that Kim is likely to be extremely concerned by the level of intelligence the US had on both Maduro and Khamenei, worrying that he may be being surveilled in a similar fashion.

“The years of precise intelligence accumulation that enabled the US to eliminate Iran’s supreme leader, along with the swift execution demonstrated in ‘Operation Epic Fury,’ represent more than a simple warning to Kim Jong-un — they amount to an existential threat,” he said

According to Lim, North Korea is “fully aware that the US intelligence-gathering capabilities and strike patterns displayed in Iran could be applied to North Korea in the same way, or even more precisely.”

He warns that, far from pushing the dictator towards the negotiation table, these fears may push Kim to isolate North Korea further.

Kim Jong Un hits out at 'shameless' Trump for Iran war as expert warns 'he's rattled'

Story by Edward Easton

Epstein was named in major DOJ probe — until Trump shut it down:

 

Jeffrey Epstein was the target of a sprawling federal investigation into alleged money laundering, drug smuggling and sex trafficking operation by a specialized unit shut down last year by the Trump administration.

The Federal Drug Enforcement Administration opened the investigation into Epstein and a dozen other individuals in 2015, according to five sources close to the case, as part of a longstanding probe into organized crime, although none of the targets were charged with any crimes and it's not clear how long the case remained open, reported Bloomberg.

"It began after an informant told authorities that Epstein was involved in the illicit funding and distribution of so-called club drugs, including ecstasy, ketamine and methamphetamines," Bloomberg reported, based on the sources who asked not to be named so they could discuss sensitive law enforcement matters.

"Initial information about the 2015 investigation surfaced in January in a heavily redacted document that was released by the DOJ," the report added. "These new details about the investigation deepen the mystery surrounding the serial sex abuser, and reveal a striking level of scrutiny into him that extended beyond the federal sex-crimes probe that has captured international attention for years. They also reflect a pattern: As Epstein famously cultivated high-profile connections with Wall Street executives, politicians and royalty, federal authorities secretly kept their eyes on him."

At least eight U.S. government agencies – including the FBI, DEA and the Treasury Department – were investigating Epstein at the time of his 2009 release from custody in Florida after pleading guilty to soliciting a minor for prostitution, according to documents released in January by the Department of Justice.

"The documents show that law enforcement agencies kept tabs on Epstein by tracking his movements, building dossiers on his connections and following his money as it moved through offshore accounts," Bloomberg reported. "Foreign governments did likewise. The U.S. Secret Service’s White House division and Harvard University’s campus police conducted background checks on Epstein years after he was released from custody in Florida."

The DEA investigation, which was conducted by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces, or OCDETF, was launched in December 2010, long before Epstein or anyone in his circle were targeted, as part of a drug trafficking probe into nightclubs in New York, Mexico and elsewhere.

"The lead DEA agent on Operation Chain Reaction wrote in a status update [around January 2015] that he expected the case to wrap up in a few months after all the defendants [in separate cases] were sentenced," Bloomberg reported, according to the sources. "But in a twist, one suspected drug trafficker became an informant and told federal agents that Epstein had been involved in the funding and distribution of ecstasy, ketamine and methamphetamines, the people familiar with the matter said. The informant also said that Epstein ran a prostitution ring."

The DEA asked OCDETF’s fusion center to prepare a “target profile” on Epstein and 12 others in April 2015, saying the agency needed that information as part of its investigation into money laundering, drug trafficking and the procurement of Eastern European prostitutes for high profile clientele, the sources told Bloomberg.

"An analyst at the fusion center wrote in the 69-page [target profile] that the DEA’s investigation involved 'illegitimate wire transfers which are tied to illicit drug and/or prostitution activities occurring in the U.S. Virgin Islands and New York City,'" Bloomberg reported, citing a heavily redacted copy released by the DOJ.

CBS News first reported on that redacted document last week, and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) asked the DEA last month to provide an unredacted copy of that target profile and additional details about its “mystery investigation" into Epstein, 12 associates and two businesses.

"Bloomberg has learned their identities from the people familiar with the matter," the outlet reported. "They include Epstein’s lawyer, Darren Indyke; his brother, Mark; and his accountants, Bella Klein, Harry Beller and Richard Kahn. Indyke and Kahn are co-executors of Epstein’s estate. Epstein died while in federal custody in August 2019."

"The two businesses are Wagging Tail Entertainment and Ossa Properties Inc. Peggy Siegal, an entertainment publicist and friend of Epstein’s, did business under Wagging Tail, according to multiple emails in the DOJ’s Epstein documents," the report added. "Ossa is a real estate company owned by Mark Epstein. Anthony Barrett, who was an executive at Ossa Properties, was also named in the target profile. Some of Epstein's victims have said in civil lawsuits that they were sexually abused in a building managed by Ossa Properties."

A representative for Siegal said she was never questioned in the case or even aware of it and is no longer affiliated with Wagging Tail, while Mark Epstein also said he was not aware of the probe or questioned as part of it, and an attorney for Indyke and Kahn said they were not aware of its existence.

Klein, Beller and Barrett did not respond to requests for comment, Bloomberg reported, and six women named as targets were not identified because publicly available information indicates that they could be considered Epstein victims.

Operation Chain Reaction was officially closed on June 16, 2023, and OCDETF was defunded and shut down in May 2025 as part of the Trump administration's sweeping government cuts in the early days of his second administration.

Epstein was found dead in prison in August 2019 while awaiting trial for sex trafficking charges.

Epstein was named in major DOJ probe — until Trump shut it down: report

Story by Travis Gettys