President Donald Trump departs after signing an executive order in the White House on November 13, 2025. Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post/Getty Images

The Jeffrey Epstein files saga is far from over, even after President Donald Trump suddenly reversed himself Sunday night and told Republicans to vote for releasing them.

But regardless of how it shakes out, the drama around the files has punctured Trump’s aura of invincibility within the MAGA movement in a way few, if any, things have before. And it has proved a massive unforced political error by Trump.

The man who has for a decade dominated his base and told it what to care about has backed down when that base decided its priorities didn’t align with his own.

That’s a remarkable political moment — and an unfortuitous one fo

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