Newsmax host: “The Epstein story was rebooted because they wanted to embarrass” Alex Acosta for the plea deal. Acosta is now a Newsmax board member.

Greg Kelly on Jeffrey Epstein: “So, yeah, he did get a light deal, right? He didn't go to that much prison for fooling around with 15-year-old girls. He didn't. But he's not the only one who gets a sweetheart deal.”

Written by Media Matters Staff

Published

From the July 14, 2025, edition of Newsmax's Greg Kelly Reports

GREG KELLY (HOST): The documents, the files on Jeffrey Epstein predate the Trump administration. It's all about others.

But they were looking to use this story against President Trump. And here's how - this is Alex Acosta, I think we have a picture of him. Who is this guy? Nice guy, actually. I ran — I crossed paths with him once. He is a big time lawyer. And President Trump made him his Labor secretary in the first term. And he was sworn in by Mike Pence.

Now, he was the U.S. Attorney who actually prosecuted Jeffrey Epstein. All right? And in her own telling, the Julie person that we were talking about, she didn't think that this was a story. She couldn't convince her bosses that this was a story until she convinced them there could be a Trump angle here. I think we can get Trump on this story. We can call attention to this Alex guy, this new Labor secretary of President Trump. And she says as much. When I began my research on Epstein in October of 2016, I was trying to find a new angle in order to convince my editor to take another look at the case. All right, hold on a second. So it happened in 2008. 2009, she doesn't pursue it. 2010, she doesn't pursue it. 2011, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16. And why does she think she has an opportunity? She has an opportunity in 2016 because Trump is on the scene.

Next paragraph please. There was a timely peg I pointed out involving the Republican nominee for president, Donald J. Trump, who had been accused by a number of women of inappropriate sexual contact. By the way, we already been through all that stuff, right? The story, it's all fake, all fake. And there's a big difference between — anyway, it's light years different. And so there's that.

And then there's this - that Alex guy I mentioned, the Epstein story never really left my mind. I have been looking into this Epstein case. I finally told Casey — that's her boss — you know, the guy who signed off on that plea deal was Acosta. This is all the way in 2016. It's an excuse — no, 2017 at this point, because Acosta is the incoming Labor secretary. Next, if you don't mind, Acosta was confirmed with little mention of the scandal when I suggested that we reach out to some of Epstein's victims, Casey agreed, somewhat reluctantly, that it was worth a try to see if they would talk after all these years.

The Epstein story was rebooted because they wanted to embarrass the Labor secretary. And, you know, you remember it was anything, anything you could get on Trump, anything. So, yeah, he did get a light deal, right? He didn't go to that much prison for fooling around with 15-year-old girls. He didn't. But he's not the only one who gets a sweetheart deal. Anyway, he actually summarized it right here.

In June, Newsmax announced that Alex Acosta is joining their board of directors, as Matt Gertz detailed just days ago: 

Newsmax revealed in a June 11 press release that “former U.S. Secretary of Labor Alex Acosta … was appointed to the Board upon the closing of the Company's initial public offering in March of this year.” Biographical information for Acosta included in the release notes that “from 2005 to 2009, Mr. Acosta served as the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida” and states that President Donald Trump nominated him for labor secretary in February 2017.

The Newsmax release does not detail the circumstances under which Acosta stepped down from that office. But Newsmax’s July 2019 report on his resignation notes that it followed “renewed scrutiny of his handling of a 2008 secret plea deal with wealthy financier Jeffrey Esptein, who is accused of sexually abusing dozens of underage girls.”

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The Miami Herald described what it called “the deal of a lifetime” that Acosta provided to Epstein, who otherwise “could have ended up in federal prison for the rest of his life”

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A Florida judge ruled in 2019 that the prosecutors, led by Acosta, had violated federal law by signing the Epstein plea agreement without notifying his victims, while a 2020 Justice Department report found that Acosta had exercised “poor judgement” in doing so. 

Acosta’s position in the first Trump administration is one of numerous connections between Epstein and the president and his associates — which are typically ignored in MAGA conspiracy theories.