In an unprecedented move, Mike Johnson - the Speaker of the House has just shut Congress for the summer and sent legislators home early to stop them passing a bipartisan bill calling for the release of files on Jeffrey Epstein. Mike Johnson is scared of Donald Trump. But what is Donald Trump so scared of? And why can’t he make this Epstein story go away? We’re joined by the reporter that’s followed all the twists and turns of the Epstein saga, scandal and conspiracy - The Bulwark's Will Sommer. And we ask why the late night Steve Colbert show has been cancelled.

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Does the Democratic Party need fresh blood? New ideas? Perhaps a whole new populist approach to politics? That’s the interview you’ll be hearing with Saikat Chakrabarti - the young tech millionaire hoping to unseat Nancy Pelosi next year who believes that the Dems are dead unless they seriously reinvent.

But we begin with the problem that simply won’t go away for Trump. The Epstein files and how it’s splitting the MAGA base. What happens when you unleash a conspiracy theory on the world you just can’t shut down?

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Donald Trump's cheerleaders and media outriders are apoplectic with his administration. After months of anticipation that the attorney general Pam Bondi would release an Epstein 'client list' - the names of wealthy individuals that the disgraced paedophile billionaire had blackmailed for influence - a joint DOJ and FBI memo this week dismissed the idea that any such list even existed.

Not normally shy to answer questions, the President appeared apoplectic too, with a journalist who asked about his handling of the Epstein affair - all lending to the feeling that Trump is reeling from the wave of anger coming his way from him own base. How has a conspiracy become the breaking point between Trump and his cheerleaders? We discuss with Anna Merlan, senior reporter at Mother Jones and author of 'Republic of Lies'.

Later, as armed officers swept through a park in LA in scenes that have been described as "disgraceful" and "dystopian" - is ICE now acting like a lawless militia?

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