On this website on Sept.10, I wrote an essay about how PR lessons learned from the Epstein files situation can be used on non-political accounts. This is a follow-up to the original article.
On Sept. 3, nine women who were sexually abused by Jeffrey Epstein gathered near the Capitol and described how Epstein abused them. Their testimony attracted major media coverage, which is certain to have legs for months. In essence, this was a political PR stunt, although a serious one.
Lesson to be learned: Too often, PR practitioners on corporate accounts (and their kin on product accounts) never think of using a stunt, because they believe doing so will trivialize the situation. But in actuality, stunts have a long history of successfully being used on “serious” accounts.
More Epstein Files Examples:
- On Sept. 10, the New York Times (NYT) reported that “Senate Republicans narrowly blocked an unexpected effort on Wednesday by Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, to force a vote on releasing the Epstein files and put Republican senators on record on an issue that has divided their party. Though it was doomed to fail, Mr. Schumer’s proposal brought the contentious debate over the Trump administration’s handling of the Epstein files, which has roiled the House, to the Senate that has largely avoided it. “Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota and the majority leader, told reporters that Mr. Schumer’s measure was a “stunt” and promised to dispense with it. The Senate voted 51 to 49 to table it.” It probably was a stunt because the measure had little chance of succeeding. But it showed how a well-conceived stunt can garner major media coverage.
- A more recent political stunt that secured national publicity was a statue of President Trump and Jeffrey Epstein holding hands and frolicking in the National Mall outside the Capitol. Even though a permit had been granted for its display for a week, the statue, with a plaque saying “Best Friends Forever,” was removed on Sept. 23 after one day by the National Park Service, because it was not compliant with the permit issued,” Interior Department spokesperson Elizabeth Peace said. There’s no doubt the statue would have received media coverage if it remained for a week. But the forced removal of it resulted in the stunt receiving major coverage.
- Lesson to be learned: Political stunts, unlike brand stunts, are almost guaranteed to attract media attention. But as the removal of the statue of President Trump and Jeffrey Epstein proves, as I’ve said in the past, sometimes the best strategy during a happening that upsets a client is to advise doing nothing.
Here are a few examples of successful non-Epstein political stunts:
- Earlier this year, on April 1-2, Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) delivered the longest floor speech in U.S. Senate history. He spoke for 25 hours and 5 minutes to protest President Donald Trump’s policies. The previous record was held by Strom Thurmond (R-SC) in 1957 for his opposition to the Civil Rights Act.
- In June 1992, before he was elected president, Bill Clinton wanted to do something unique to differentiate himself from his opponents in the general election, President George H. W. Bush and businessman Ross Perot. He accomplished that by playing the saxophone on “The Arsenio Hall Show.” He also allowed himself to be the first presidential candidate to be interviewed on a none-serious television show.
- And on Oct. 8, another obvious stunt was orchestrated by GOP Rep. Mike Lawler, who faces a difficult reelection next year in his Westchester, NY district. Mr. Lawler joined a bevy of reporters waiting to ask additional questions after a briefing by Democratic House leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, and in the presence of the media who attended the briefing accused Mr. Jeffries of doing a disservice to the American people for participating in the government shutdown.
- Lesson to be learned: In some cases, the effectiveness of a stunt will not be known for many months. Stunts are usually orchestrated to garner immediate media coverage, which the Booker, Clinton and Lawler stunts did. But if the stunt was to bolster Mr. Lawler’s reelection bid, which doesn’t take place until next November, the effectiveness of it will not be known until after the election. Mr. Jeffries accused Rep. Lawler of using the confrontation so it could be used in a TV commercial. If that was the objective it’s likely that the stunt was a failure because the government shutdown will be ancient history by next November and voters will have different problems that candidates will have to address.
I have always been a supporter of stunts if they are well thought out and help disseminate the client’s messages.
Here are three stunts (of many) that I created, one for a political account, one for a brand and one for a corporate account that garnered significant positive major media
- During his 1948 presidential campaign, President Truman reached voters using a whistle-stop strategy – touring the country by train and making speeches from the back of the train. I modified the strategy by having a New York City candidate do a subway campaign, by getting off at each station where he would introduce himself to potential voters.
- During the first year that I managed the fan balloting promotion for baseball’s All-Star Game, when Gillette was the sole sponsor, I created a new approach, featuring past All-Star Game participants, which I used as a template successfully for the next seven years, until Gillette decided to go in another direction. What I did to make the promotion newsworthy each year was add one new element.
- To demonstrate the versatility of a building product, I suggested that the client should build a playground in their mid-town Manhattan show room, which they did. Reporters were encouraged to bring their children to the site. Hot dogs, soft drinks and ice cream were made available. Also a few sports personalities. It resulted in major media coverage.
- Lesson to be learned: PR people should remember that sometimes only providing a new twist to an old idea is the best idea. They also should remember that spending thousands of dollars developing a campaign does not guarantee success. But they should also remember that PR stunts can back fire.
It’s not often that stunts can gain international coverage, but on very rare occasions they can. Here are two that did, one recent and one from many years ago.
- On Sept. 16, an anti-Trump activist group in England projected a huge photo of President Trump and Jeffrey Epstein on the exterior walls of Windsor Castle, where the president was slated to be feted. Other projections included photos of the two joined by first lady Melania Trump with Epstein and his co-conspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell; and of a lewd birthday message Trump allegedly sent Epstein in 2003 for a 50th birthday book, according to NBC. It was no surprise that the stunt received worldwide media coverage.
- One that I was involved with many years ago was for a Salute to Israel featuring the Israeli soccer team’s visit to the U.S. We arranged for Robert Briscoe, the Lord Mayor of Dublin, to come to New York City to help promote the occasion. Because he was an Irish Jew his participation received international major media coverage.
- Lessons to be learned: It’s possible to gain international publicity for a client if the stunt is attached to international events. Easy targets are ambush marketing campaigns during an Olympics or the week before the Super Bowl, when reporters are looking for non template type stories.
Here are two stunts that didn’t work out:
- During the 2012 Presidential campaign, Clint Eastward gave a rambling speech to an empty chair during the Republican convention, attacking President Obama. The speech was widely successful with the GOP delegates, but was not well received outside of the convention hall by most of the media and GOP officials, who said that it took away valuable time that could have been used for better purposes. The stunt was widely described as a failure.
- Another failed stunt was Vice President Mike Pence leaving an Indianapolis Colts football game after several players on the opposing San Francisco 49ers kneeled in protest during the national anthem on Oct. 8, 2017. This stunt was considered a failure because the press covering the Vice President was told beforehand that Mr. Pence would leave the game early and news reports said it was premeditated.
- Lesson to be learned from theses stunts: In order to be successful and attain the wanted positive media coverage, stunts should be created by account handlers who have a proven background of being able to craft creative ideas, even if it means asking the help of a practitioner who normally does not work on the account.
Non-stunt lessons to be learned from the Epstein files saga:
- On Sept. 2, a second set of Epstein files was released. As with the first batch of papers, the new ones contained little information that wasn’t already in the public domain. Doing so again reignited the charges that the Republican led committee was engaging in a cover-up to protect friends of the administration and the president, whose name was said to be throughout the files.
- Lesson to be learned: Once you say you are going to do something, do it. Not doing so will hurt you, your agency and client with journalists who will no longer trust what you say.
- President Trump’s claims that the call for all the Epstein files to be released was a “Democratic hoax” broke a cardinal rule of crisis public relations:
- Lesson to be learned: During a crisis always express empathy. Calling it a hoax gave credence to those accusing the president of engaging in a cover-up. (On Sept. 5, Axios reported: Several Republicans who had backed Rep. Thomas Massie’s bill to release the files, quickly reversed course, saying the release undercut the need for a petition.)
- Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) told Axios she doesn’t plan on signing the petition, calling the fight “a personal rift between Rep.Massie and the president.”
- Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), who also won’t be signing the petition, dismissed Mr. Massie’s efforts as “a back handed slap to the president.”
- Reps. Eric Burlison (R-MO) and Tim Burchett (R-Tenn) also signaled they wouldn’t be supporting the measure. They were both cosponsors of the underlying bill.”
- Lesson to be learned: Always do what’s best for you because in our world of many brass rings but few gold ones, you can’t count on support from office friends when you need it, even if they previously said they would support you.
“On Epstein, the Fissures Are Starting to Show” was the headline in a Michelle Goldberg Sept. 7 commentary column.
- To quote: “The White House has said that any Republicans who join Massie and Khanna’s effort will be engaged in a “hostile act.” This is, of course, a complete reversal from where Trump and his allies were during the campaign. Back then, many conservatives treated the Epstein files as a skeleton key promising cataclysmic revelations about elite depravity and corruption. But the moment Trump decided that releasing the files would be inconvenient for him, most of his lackeys in Congress lost all interest in them.”
- Lesson to be learned: Reporters will always remember what you said previously about a situation. Once you make a remark consider it to be cast in stone.
In addition to the above, there are several other lessons to be learned from President Trump’s refusal to release the Epstein files:
- Once the media is on a story, it’s impossible to stop the bad coverage until they say it’s over.
- The best PR crisis minds can’t prevent negative media coverage.
- Most of the media is not swayed by a powerful client.
- PR practitioners should never let their client point fingers at others in an attempt to transfer the blame for a crisis. It just results in a “he said, she said” situation which leads to additional negative overage.
- When the media is on a story, not even the most powerful CEO’s or the president are immune from negative coverage, and
- Once the investigative reporters are on the trail of an important story, you never know where it will lead.
An example of the last sentence occurred on Sept. 8 when the NYT headlined a story, “How JPMorgan Enabled the Crimes of Jeffrey Epstein.” The lead paragraph said, “A Times investigation found that America’s leading bank spent years supporting—and profiting from—the notorious sex offender, ignoring red flags, suspicious activity and concerned executives.” (Three reporters started investigating Epstein more than six years ago, reviewing more than 13,000 pages of legal and financial records for the article.) Joseph Evangelisti, a spokesman for JPMorgan, said in a statement to the Times “that the bank’s relationship with Epstein was a mistake and in hindsight we regret it, but we did not help him commit his heinous crimes.” He added, “We would never have continued to do business with him if we believed he was engaged in an ongoing sex trafficking operation.” The bank has pinned blame for the scandal on Jes Staley, a trusted confidant to Dimon, said the article. “We now know that trust was misplaced,” Evangelisti was quoted. But the damage to the bank’s reputation was done.
Lesson to be learned: The importance of an entity or client doesn’t matter to the media. In fact, the more important the target of the media, the greater the investigative reporting.
“Epstein Birthday Letter With Trump’s Signature Revealed” was the headline of a Sept. 9 Wall Street Journal article. President Trump has denied writing the letter, calling it a “hoax.” and a “dead issue.” When the alleged Trump note was first reported by the WSJ in July, Mr. Trump said it was “a fake thing” and denied writing anything and sued the publication for $10-billion dollars. The shifting responses to the Epstein files by the president and Attorney General Pam Bondi fuels the charges that they are participating in a cover-up. There are several Lessons to be learned from Mr. Trump’s responses to the situation.
- His shifting responses to reporter’s questions only leads to additional negative media coverage.
- Ms. Bondi said of the Epstein files “It’s a new administration and everything is going to come out to the public.” And then changed her mind about releasing them when the president’s name appeared in the files. By doing so it gave credence to charges of a cover-up.
- Ms. Bondi’s actions have driven charges that she has politicized the Department of Justice, damaging her reputation.4) Just because the president says it’s a dead issue doesn’t mean the media and members of Congress agree. Extensive media coverage is certain to continue.
What the president should have done is say that he knows nothing about a birthday book and stood to that story. Then, when the book became public, he should have said, “It’s news to me that the book exists because as I previously said,” I didn’t know the book existed.” Even though saying so wouldn’t have ended the coverage, it would have lessened reporters from writing articles saying that the president keeps changing his story. (But the revelation that the birthday books also contains a photo of Epstein holding a large check bearing Donald Trump’s signature, along with a note suggesting Epstein “sold” him a woman for $22,500, makes any denials by the president from being taken seriously by the unbiased media.)
Major lessons to be learned
- That by calling the Epstein files a “Democratic hoax” the President’s reputation will be tarnished for the rest of his life and his “Democratic hoax” remark will be regurgitated by the media and opposition politicians during his life span.
- During a PR crisis or other embarrassing situation, always advise your client to act in a manner that cannot come back to bite him or her. Often that means to let the corporate attorney speak on behalf of the client. If the client insists on speaking, like President Trump does, make certain his remarks have been pre-prepared and cleared by the corporate attorney to the best of your ability. What I’ve done in similar situations is to tell reporters, “I have been instructed to issue the following statement by (name of person) so reporters know that it was not my opinion.
In September 2025, Bloomberg News published emails that were not previously reported publicly that they obtained from Epstein’s personal Yahoo account
Bloomberg reported in articles, “The emails revealed how an extensive network of academics, attorneys, and media specialists advised and supported Epstein, particularly during his legal troubles between 2005 and 2008”: “Crisis strategist Merrie Spaeth sent Epstein draft apology letters and coached him on how to respond to questions by using ‘good words’ like ‘smart’ and avoiding ‘bad words’ like ‘pervert’. Others who continued their relationship with Epstein after his 2006 indictment included, “Several Harvard academics, including former dean Stephen M. Kosslyn and professor Alan M. Dershowitz, and British politician, Peter Mandelson, [who] was fired from his position as UK ambassador to the US after emails showed he offered support to Epstein in 2008,” the Bloomberg articles said. Lesson to be learned: Sensitive information should never be put in writing or discussed via telephone. The best method to use in an attempt to keep information confidential is by having face-to-face discussions. And even that does not guarantee that the information will remain secretive, especially if the matter entails a legal matter.
But if there are only four lessons to be learned that you remember from the years of the Epstein files saga it is that:
- Changing stories during a PR crisis, as the president and his colleagues have done, always results in media distrust, resulting in negative coverage.
- Never lie to investigating law officials to protect a client, because doing so can include you as a target if criminal charges are made.
- Never lie to the media, and
- There is no way to guarantee that sensitive information will never become public.
The responses from the president and his cabinet officials deserve to be studied in public relations classes as an example of how not to handle a PR crisis.
“This may be the worst managed PR event in history,” said Ty Cobb, who led the Trump White House’s response to a special counsel probe into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia in 2017. “You’ve got multiple mouthpieces, and they’re all covering their own ass now, he was quoted in the Sept. 26 WSJ.” I agree.
