When discussing the Trump administration’s promise to declassify various Jeffrey Epstein materials back in May, FBI deputy director Dan Bongino told Fox & Friends “there is video” that confirms the sex offender died by suicide — and the public would soon get to see it.
Bongino said his office was still “working on cleaning” up the surveillance footage taken inside the Metropolitan Correctional Center, which purportedly shows no one entering Epstein’s cell on the night of August 9, 2019 (but not Epstein’s death). The deputy director assured viewers, “We will give the original so you don’t think there were any shenanigans.”
The video was finally released on Monday, and as promised, the administration put out both “raw” and “enhanced” versions. But the videos only reinforced the idea that “shenanigans” are afoot as both are missing a full minute of footage.
If you skip through the two 11-hour videos, you’ll see the counter on the screen jumps from 11:58:58 p.m. to 12:00:00 a.m. Gizmodo put together a video highlighting that moment:
Links to the previously unreleased footage were included in a two-page memo released by the DOJ and FBI on Monday. It said a “systematic review” by the agencies concluded there is no Epstein “client list,” there is no incriminating evidence that warrants an investigation into the pedophile’s powerful associates, and there will be no further releases of Epstein-related materials. The memo concludes by citing the surveillance video as further evidence that Epstein did in fact kill himself:
The conclusion that Epstein died by suicide is further supported by video footage from the common area of the Special Housing Unit (SHU) where Epstein was housed at the time of his death. As DOJ’s Inspector General explained in 2023, anyone entering or attempting to enter the tier where Epstein’s cell was located from the SHU common area would have been captured by this footage. The FBI’s independent review of this footage confirmed that from the time Epstein was locked in his cell at around 10:40 pm on August 9, 2019, until around 6:30 am the next morning, nobody entered any of the tiers in the SHU.
The missing minute isn’t the only fishy aspect of the new footage. As Gizmodo explains, the door to Epstein’s cell appears to be just off-camera, and the video does not match previously released crime-scene photos:
It’s important to note that it doesn’t appear Epstein’s cell door is even visible in the video that was released. Epstein was escorted to his cell at 7:49 PM after meeting with his lawyers. And the video gives you a sense of where that cell is, out of sight from the view we have. Two cameras that were presumably closer and gave a better view of his cell door malfunctioned, according to a report from Reuters published Aug. 2019 …
Many people on social media have questioned why the doors in the video are different from the photos aired in 2019 by 60 Minutes that show police tape covering Epstein’s cell. A door with a window is seen, whereas the visible doors in the video that was released by the DOJ don’t feature any windows.
To be clear, none of these grainy or missing images proves the “Deep State” had Epstein murdered or any of the many other wild claims about his death.
What they do demonstrate is an almost impressive level of incompetence by Trump officials. The review’s primary goal was to show they are being fully transparent about the Epstein case. In recent months, FBI director Kash Patel and Bongino have also been trying to convince the public that all available evidence suggests Epstein committed suicide. Instead, they have provided new Epstein conspiracy-theory fodder and angered even many MAGA influencers.
Trump officials have seemed surprised that the public — which is incredibly skeptical about everything Epstein related — isn’t just accepting its inconsistent claims about the review. When asked why Attorney General Pam Bondi told Fox News the Epstein client list was “on my desk right now to review” back in February if it actually doesn’t exist, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed on Monday that she didn’t actually say that:
DOOCY: So what happened to the Epstein client list that the attorney general said she had on her desk?
LEAVITT: I think if you go back and look at what the attorney general said
DOOCY: I’ve got the quote. She said, it’s sitting on my desk right now to review. pic.twitter.com/RtsRuUrNwh
— Acyn (@Acyn) July 7, 2025
Pam Bondi repeated that interpretation of her Fox News remarks on Tuesday, and blamed the missing minute on old technology.
“There was a minute that was off the counter,” she said. “And what we learned from Bureau of Prisons was every … night they redo that video. It’s old from like 1999. So every night the video is reset and every night should have the same minute missing. So we’re looking for that video to release that as well showing that a minute is missing every night.”
Bondi on missing minute in the Epstein jailhouse tape: “The video was not conclusive, but the evidence prior to it was showing he committed suicide. And there was a minute that was off the counter, and what we learned from the Bureau of Prisons is every night they redo that… pic.twitter.com/sar9r9a17d
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 8, 2025
So why didn’t the agencies catch note this glitch during their thorough review of the footage and explain it in the memo? Don’t hold your breath for a clear and satisfying answer.
This post has been updated to include Bondi’s explanation for the missing minute.