It was Bongino’s first order of business, though, to address his critics. “Listen, that Jeffrey Epstein story is a big deal,” he said in 2023. “Please do not let that story go.” He took a less conspiratorial tone after joining the FBI, somberly acknowledging in a Fox News interview that the official account, no matter how unspectacular, was the one he now believed. Epstein really had killed himself, leaving no sprawling Democrat-orchestrated cover-up to speak of—and, along with Patel, disappointing a sprawling set of fellow right-wing media personalities.
“You sat in the front row with your popcorn, ankle biting,” Bongino said on Monday, “throwing this popcorn at the ring at two guys in there sparring away, fighting for this country while you did shit.”
“The Epstein case, the other things we had to deal with,” he said, without going into much more detail. “There is no decision you’re going to make that is going to make everybody happy, and you have to deal with it.” Just look at the release of the Epstein files, he argued: “almost all of it’s public now, thanks to President Trump and the team getting it all out there.”
The call from Trump, when it came, functioned as a kind of anointment of the show.
“I was very unhappy when you left the FBI,” the president said when his voice piped in after an hour and a half of Bongino’s monologue. “But I was very happy that you have your show … So I’m okay with this. Isn’t that neutral? I call it a net neutral.”
In Trump’s own, uninterrupted train of thought—about the unfairness of his press coverage, about the 2020 election that he won “by so much”—there was a clarifying unity between the two men, each ready and equipped to speak at such discursive length.
In the live chat of viewers following along, the commentary ranged from appreciative to vitriolic. One audience member, writing alongside a $20 tip they left for Bongino, wrote, “Welcome back Dan and team! Bongino Army always understands law enforcement takes time!”
“Much harder to drain the swamp,” said another, leaving a tip in the same amount, “from a podcast studio you big fraud.”
Bongino seemed at ease with both sides of the dynamic; he was, once again, at home. Most of all, he was in possession of what he described, ominously but convincingly, as “the greatest superpower in the world.”
“It’s the power to command attention,” Bongino said, “and I own yours.”
