Mike Rogers Faces Scrutiny Over Epstein Comments and Campaign Donors (10/21/26)
Michigan Democrats resurfaced audio from a July 2025 interview in which Republican Michigan Senate candidate Mike Rogers argued that the government should be careful about releasing the names of people who appeared in Jeffrey Epstein’s flight records if there was no evidence they had participated in criminal activity. Rogers said someone could have flown with Epstein for a legitimate business reason and warned that simply publishing a name could destroy an innocent person’s reputation. He supported releasing information about what happened around Epstein’s island but opposed what he called a “big, big, ugly vote” in Congress to force disclosure, arguing that victims and uninvolved people both needed protection. Rogers also dismissed some of the pressure for disclosure as politically motivated, saying critics who wanted to go after Donald Trump would continue “beating this drum.” Michigan Democrats revived the comments just weeks before the 2026 election, portraying them as evidence that Rogers had been willing to limit Epstein transparency when the disclosures could affect Trump and others in Epstein’s orbit. The controversy was intensified by campaign-finance records showing that at least seven people whose names appeared somewhere in the released Epstein records had contributed nearly $4.7 million since 2023 to Rogers, committees associated with him or outside groups supporting his Senate campaigns. More than $4.5 million of that total came from Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman to a super PAC supporting Rogers, meaning the overwhelming majority was not money donated directly to Rogers’ campaign. Other donors included Ronald Lauder, John Catsimatidis, Joseph Baratta, Howard Lorber and John W. Childs. Appearing in Epstein records did not by itself establish criminal conduct or knowledge of Epstein’s crimes, and the nature of the references varied considerably. Politically, however, the combination gave Democrats an obvious line of attack: Rogers had argued for protecting some people named in the Epstein files from public exposure while his political operation was simultaneously benefiting from millions of dollars connected to donors whose names appeared in those same records. to contact me: [email protected] source: Mike Rogers wanted Epstein plane passengers like Trump kept secret in resurfaced audio - Raw Story Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-epstein-chronicles--5003294/support.