Steve Bannon says it’s going to be “a long, hot summer” in a season of American political recriminations. And, he tells me, Australians have a vital interest at stake in ways that we hadn’t even realised.

Bannon, Donald Trump’s original White House strategist, is one of the generals of the MAGA army. His War Room podcast is a propaganda mainstay of the movement. And in recent weeks, he’d been leading his army in pressuring Trump to release all the files on arch-paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

Credit: Dionne Gain

This was occurring even as the US president was trying to dismiss the matter. It was “boring”, said Trump, a “hoax” that only “some stupid Republicans” cared about. There would be no files released, there had been no conspiracy. Case closed.

But Trump’s base was not about to be brushed off so easily. Trump and some of his top officials had coached the MAGA movement for years into the belief that Epstein was the heart of darkness, the paedophile pimp for the corrupt elites, including top Democrats.

Why was Trump suddenly so dismissive? Elon Musk claimed that Trump was on Epstein’s secret client list. Could it be so? The president’s followers confronted a crisis of faith.

US Attorney-General Pam Bondi said in February that she had Epstein’s client list “on my desk right now”. But this month, she said that there was no client list. Should they believe her then, or should they believe her now?

Trump and his future wife, Melania, with Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell in 2000.Credit: Getty Images

The army was confused and divided. Two weeks ago, Bannon said that it was so serious the Republicans would “lose 10........

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