The Roll Up: August 19, 2025 

TL;DR:  Have the controversial moves in Los Angeles and Washington, DC and a meeting with Vladimir Putin distracted the public from its ongoing obsession with the relationship between Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein. Using Rolli IQ™, we analyzed millions of social media posts. The verdict? The Epstein scandal still hangs heavily over the Trump Administration. Here's how we know:

Donald Trump won his second term based in part on his promise to release federal government files on Jeffrey Epstein. Trump was quite specific in his answer when asked in June 2024 by a Fox News host, "Would you declassify the Epstein files?" Trump's answer was a simple, "Yeah, yeah I would."

New Term, Different Story

Since starting his second term, it's been a different story. Trump has not released the files and often bullies reporters who ask questions regarding Epstein. Public opinion runs heavily negative regarding the Trump-Epstein connection, as a Rolli IQ analysis from January 21 to August 18 shows. Positive sentiments are indicated by green lines, while negative sentiments are shown with red lines. 

Rolli IQ Emotion Mapping (clustered by sentiment)

Across Twitter, Bluesky, Reddit and YouTube, more than 14 million engagements are running 89% negative.

Policy Moves or Distractions?

Pundits have suggested that some of Trump's most controversial moves this summer have been attempts to distract the news media and the pubic from their focuses on Epstein. The first of these moves came with the deployment of the National Guard to Los Angeles in the wake of ICE protests there. That move certainly caught the interest of social media users--again running heavily negative--as Rolli IQ analysis shows for the period from June 7 to June 13:

When looking at Epstein posts during the same period, engagements for that scandal outpaced those for the National Guard deployment--and Epstein posts ran far more negative than comments on the National Guard use.

There is a difference in platforms, with videos on YouTube taking the fore for the National Guard stories, while comments on Twitter provided the most interactions regarding Epstein.

New Ploy, Same Pattern
In August, Trump decides to play the law and order card again, this time with a federal takeover of the District of Columbia police in an attempt to stop what he now characterizes as rampant crime--this after his administration claimed in the spring crime was down significantly in DC. Rolli IQ analysis shows a familiar pattern of mostly negative reactions across social media on this topic from August 9 to 16:

This time, the number of posts and engagements about the DC policing move is dwarfed by the ongoing Epstein content, running twice as negative and at four times the volume of interactions. 

Can an International Summit Make a Difference?

Just this past Friday, Trump reached out on the international stage with a meeting in Alaska with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Ending the war in Ukraine is another of Trump's campaign promises, so this meeting is right in line with his stated foreign policy objectives. Still, some feel it was yet another attempt at distracting the public from Epstein. Did it work? Rolli IQ analysis shows the Putin meeting got a huge amount of engagement across Twitter, Bluesky, Reddit and YouTube, though still largely negative.

There was enough engagement with the Putin visit that it actually surpassed Epstein engagement for the same period, with nearly a million more instances. There's also a decline in negative sentiments toward the Trump-Epstein story, though with no move toward the positive. A large jump in irrelevant posts seem to be from posters using keywords for Trump and Epstein for unrelated posts--perhaps a way to keep talk about the scandal alive on social media regardless of subject matter.

Eliminating the irrelevant posts with Rolli IQ Emotion Mapping, it's clear that the vast majority of posters are angry (red) and disgusted (pea green) with the Trump-Epstein situation, with almost none happy (forest green) about Trump's moves so far. 

The bottom line is that the analysis using Rolli IQ across a different time periods show a continuing interest in the Epstein story and an unwillingness to drop the subject, despite any move Trump makes to change the agenda.