Michael Wolff
speaker
409 appearances
18 recordings
3 series
first heard Mar 2025
last heard 25 May
Michael Wolff’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 4 in all, peaking in May 2026 with 1.
Appearances
I think we have a snippet from one of the conversations that I recorded with Epstein, and I think this was in a restaurant in 2017.
You know, so this book came out, and this is my fourth book, and all of the other books, you know, they come out, and everybody invites you on to talk about Donald Trump because it's Donald Trump, and Donald Trump gets ratings, and my books, and I sell a lot of books, so therefore it seems unnatural for television. And then, so this book came out,
or we began planning for it, and it was crickets out there. Everybody was going, well, no, I know, you know, we'll get back to you. And MSNBC, which of course would book this, want me on to talk about this book, because what else do they talk about besides Donald Trump and disliking Donald Trump? And they had booked me for that first publication week, which was I guess two, three weeks ago.
But then just as the White House started to attack me, excerpts began to, leaks began to appear about the book. And then the White House attacked me and they canceled everything. And it was like, well, it's now with, it's with our standards committee or some strange thing, which I've never heard of.
And, you know, clearly and then actually somebody from the White House called up to threaten me and said, you know, it's a new climate and and then cited the ABC settlement, this ongoing negotiations with CBS News. to settle over the way they edited the Kamala Harris interview on 60 Minutes.
And then actually MSNBC, the people there were fairly straightforward in saying, well, you know, it's a new climate. So I thought it was time for someone to acknowledge that things had changed in this new Trump world order. And that included the media running incredibly scared.
Well, I mean, I might say that nothing about television ever surprises me. But I think at this moment in time is a very precarious moment. Virtually, Trump is out there threatening anybody he perceives as an enemy. And the media companies are very vulnerable here.
They all have – we're suddenly in this media environment where everybody is looking at some consolidation play, and they're all going to need – regulatory approval from the FCC. And Trump is holding this over their heads. I mean, very clearly and very, you know, this is not even a soft suggestion. It's an outright threat. we can block your business future.
Now, all of these media companies – I mean, there are the news channels and news divisions, which I'm talking to, but those are owned by these very large companies, Comcast, Warner Brothers Discovery, Disney, who have many – where the stakes are much higher than just their news division.
In 2014, Epstein, who I knew through some New York connections, asked me if I would be interested in writing a book about him. And I was like, well, you know, I don't know. I said I don't know, and I probably wasn't. But he was, there was something about Epstein that, you might even call it his charm.
I mean, there is a reason so many people were around him, so many well-regarded, powerful people were around him. And it was partly his expansiveness. And he said to me, well, you decide if you want to write a book about me, but you can come
my house at this dining room table where people came from morning till evening, incredibly famous people, and sat around and just discussed the state of the world, really. And while he fed them and his cooks brought out all kinds of food, I mean, a really kind of incredibly peculiar scene to witness, in which I witnessed over and over again, and ran the tape recorder.
And he sat for many, many hours of discussion with me. I mean, certainly 80, 90, probably a hundred hours I have of Epstein on tape. And one of the discussions, because this was occurring, Trump became the president in 2017. I began writing about Trump. And so we spent a lot of time talking about Donald Trump and Epstein's relationship with Trump, which went on for a good, certainly 15 years.
and was incredibly close. They were, you know, each other's closest friend for a very long time. And Epstein, you know, I think Epstein is one of those people who truly knew Donald Trump, knew many secrets about Donald Trump, and was threatening to Donald Trump.
So actually, so at this moment in the White House, you know, the whole MAGA people think, oh, Epstein, and this is a conspiracy and the, you know, pedophilias, all Democrats are pedophiles or whatever. But at the same time, Trump is totally freaked out about the Epstein thing. And, you know, I mean, they were very close friends.
There's a moment in my last book where I talk about Trump talking to his people about what Ghislaine Maxwell might have on him and what she might say and should he pardon her.
I mean, Trump weaved in and out of all conversations. And remember, and also there's a lot in these tapes of Steve Bannon, who became very friendly with Epstein. So it's Bannon and Trump, Bannon and Epstein also talking about Trump, which was their kind of bond.
I mean, they both they both they're both kind of incredulous about the character of Donald Trump and that this character became the president of the United States.
Yeah, you know, this is a funny thing because I have really tried to find venues for this material for quite a number of years now. And everybody kind of gets excited about it because it's kind of riveting stuff. And then everybody goes, oh, but, you know, it's Epstein. We can't do Epstein because he's – And in project after project kind of kind of meets it's it's an untimely end.
I mean, this is the campaign. I mean, I started writing this book in – in 2022. So it really is the campaign, the Trump campaign from the beginning right till the election. And, you know, and I think it's interesting, again, because this is just another window into who this guy is. This is the character of Donald Trump. I mean, you you know, and I often point out, I'm not a political reporter.
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