{"id":15985,"date":"2025-09-23T22:54:55","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T20:54:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kaizen-blog.org\/?p=15985"},"modified":"2025-09-23T23:16:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T21:16:12","slug":"die-freundschaft-in-bronze-gegossen-ein-denkmal-das-trump-verfolgt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kaizen-blog.org\/en\/die-freundschaft-in-bronze-gegossen-ein-denkmal-das-trump-verfolgt\/","title":{"rendered":"Friendship Cast in Bronze - A Monument That Haunts Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"

Washington awoke this Tuesday morning with a grotesque surprise: In the middle of the National Mall since sunrise stands a twelve-foot-high monument showing Donald Trump and the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in intimate togetherness - hand in hand, smiling, as if they were about to stroll together toward the Washington Monument. The title: \u201cIn Honor of Friendship Month.\u201d Who is behind it? An anonymous artist group called The Secret Handshake, which apparently has no fear of symbolism. The Secret Handshake<\/em>, die offenbar keine Angst vor Symbolik hat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The statue is made of foam, resin, wood and wire, but what it truly carries is the weight of memory. Beneath the pedestal are three plaques, two of them with excerpts from an alleged birthday letter Trump is said to have written to Epstein for his 50th. In it: bawdy drawings, a naked stick figure, along with a signature imitating Trump\u2019s handwriting. The document was made public this summer by the House Oversight Committee. Trump responded with a ten-billion-dollar lawsuit and insisted, \u201cthere is no authentic letter and no drawing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In Honor of Friendship Month<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We celebrate the long-lasting bond between President Donald J. Trump and his \u201cclosest friend\u201d Jeffrey Epstein. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Voice Over:<\/strong> Voice Over: There must be more to life than simply having everything.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The White House fumed. A spokesperson called the installation \u201cliberal waste of money\u201d and tried to steer the narrative back onto familiar tracks: Trump had \u201cthrown Epstein out of his club because he was a creep.\u201d It was the Democrats and the media, he said, who had remained silent for years while Trump had long demanded \u201ctransparency.\u201d Only: transparency in this case means that the monument is visible to everyone - and it recalls a past that cannot be talked away. For the friendship between the two men is documented. Photos show them at parties in the 1990s, at Trump\u2019s wedding to Marla Maples, arm in arm with celebrities. Trump himself called Epstein \u201ca terrific guy\u201d in a 2002 interview with New York Magazine. And Epstein, shortly before his downfall, boasted in a recording that Trump was his \u201cclosest friend.\u201d The connection only broke in the mid-2000s. When Epstein was arrested for human trafficking in 2019, Trump declared that he had not had contact for 15 years. Later he promoted the version that Epstein had \u201cstolen young female employees from the club.\u201d New York Magazine<\/em> einen \u201efantastischen Kerl\u201c. Und Epstein wiederum prahlte noch kurz vor seinem Sturz in einem Mitschnitt damit, Trump sei sein \u201eengster Freund\u201c. Die Verbindung zerbrach erst Mitte der 2000er. Als Epstein 2019 wegen Menschenhandels verhaftet wurde, erkl\u00e4rte Trump, er habe seit 15 Jahren keinen Kontakt mehr gehabt. Sp\u00e4ter bem\u00fchte er die Version, Epstein habe ihm \u201ejunge Angestellte aus dem Club gestohlen\u201c.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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DONALD J. TRUMP<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes, there is. But I won\u2019t tell you what it is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have certain things in common, Jeffrey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enigmas never age, have you noticed that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A pal is a wonderful thing. Happy Birthday -
and may every day be another wonderful secret.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Signature: Donald)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Now a statue condenses all of this into one scene: two men, frozen in a pose that feels like mockery. \u201cCelebrate the long-lasting bond,\u201d reads one of the plaques. The artists wanted the work to remain until Saturday. Whether the Park Service or the White House will put an end to the spectacle earlier remains open.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Trump himself has been haunted in recent months by the \u201cEpstein Files.\u201d Since the Department of Justice officially declared in July that there was no \u201cclient list\u201d and no further revelations about the billionaire\u2019s death, the president has intensified his defensive stance. He now routinely calls Epstein a \u201ccreep\u201d and portrays himself as an opponent of the system that kept silent for so long. Yet every new release, every photo, every sentence, every memory pulls him back into this past - and the artist group has now cast this ambivalence in foam and wire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The National Mall is home to many monuments: presidents, wars, heroes. But rarely has a statue been as much a commentary as this work - a commentary on power, closeness, guilt and repression. It is art as indictment, satire as mirror. And so Trump now stands in Washington, immortalized in an embrace he never wanted to see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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