We mapped Jeffrey Epstein's social network. Here's what we found

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Data Journalism

We used custom tech tools to analyze the Epstein-Musk-Trump social network. We found little evidence of a broader conspiracy — but did find a real threat to Donald Trump.

We mapped Jeffrey Epstein's social network. Here's what we found.

When Elon Musk met Ghislaine Maxwell at a 2014 gala, she reportedly asked him if “there were a way to remove oneself from the internet,” and encouraged Mr. Musk to destroy the internet.

But the internet is forever, and combined with current technologies, it's now possible to conduct comprehensive network analysis quickly, accelerating a process that previously took months. Using custom tools developed by America 2.0, we performed such an analysis, focusing on five characters central to the current controversy: Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Rupert Murdoch.

We included Epstein's entire, unredacted “black book,” as well as the flight logs for his private jet, the Lolita Express. We also examined several other ancillary networks known to have at least some overlap, including figures adjacent to Iran-Contra, September 11, and Ghislaine Maxwell's father, Robert Maxwell. Drawing from a range of sources, we considered 908 potentially related people and organizations, with 2,194 connections between them. After reviewing for accuracy and relevance, we focused on 209 entities (with 642 relationships) as most pertinent.

Importantly, inclusion in our study does not imply guilt — indeed we have included a range of people relevant to the current power struggle that ranges from tech executives with no ties to Epstein, to victims. We aimed to reveal the networks currently in conflict, while also tempering speculation about the scope and nature of Epstein's activities. Here's what we learned.

The Epstein and Trump Networks Overlap Significantly

As expected, Epstein's long association with Donald Trump resulted in significant social and business overlap between their networks, a fact which is fast becoming an existential threat to Trump's presidency. Interestingly, Trump appears to have more confirmed affiliations with Israeli-connected interests than Epstein (Netanyahu, Boteach, Kushner family), though Epstein had a well-documented relationship with former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak.

Secondly, Epstein's network is (unsurprisingly) more focused on science, celebrity, and academia than Trump's. This may be a result of the fact that Epstein and Maxwell appeared to be following in the footsteps of Maxwell's father Robert, who famously had ties to Britain's MI6, the Soviet KGB, and most likely to Mossad, and consistently pursued relationships in the science world.

Beyond Epstein's alleged prurient sexual activities for blackmail purposes is his interest in eugenics. As The New York Times reported in 2019, Epstein “hoped to seed the human race with his DNA by impregnating women at his vast New Mexico ranch.”

Epstein used his scientific contacts to advance this interest, with the Times adding, “Interviews with more than a dozen of his acquaintances, as well as public documents, show that he used the same tactics to insinuate himself into an elite scientific community, thus allowing him to pursue his interests in eugenics and other fringe fields like cryonics.”

Musk's Network is a Rising, Rival Power Center

After playing a decisive role in helping to return Donald Trump to power, Elon Musk underwent an abrupt about-face when he denounced Trump's “Big Bill” spending package and declared that Trump's name appeared in the Epstein files. New reporting confirms that Attorney General Pam Bondi informed Trump in May that his name appeared in the FBI's Epstein records, shortly before Musk's bombshell accusation, suggesting that Musk had sufficient inside information to back up the charge. As he posted on X (before later deleting it), “Mark this post for the future. The truth will come out.”

Musk also has material ties to Epstein's network, though they are largely indirect and through shared relationships in the worlds of technology. Epstein notoriously set Kimbal Musk, Elon's brother, up on a date with a woman in an effort to get closer to Musk. Elon was also famously photographed with Ghislaine Maxwell, and a May 2016 email of disputed authenticity from Musk to Epstein asks whether Musk was able to “meet up with Ghislaine for Kung Fu practice,” which many presume to be a euphemism for sexual activity. Given Musk's own practice of spreading his DNA, that may be a possibility, but we found no direct overlap between Musk and Epstein's networks pertaining to shared sexual activity.

With Epstein already dead, Musk and Vice President J.D. Vance, who is aligned with his network, have the most to gain by undermining Trump, and Murdoch appears to be ready to help. James Murdoch, son of Rupert Murdoch, notably sits on the board of Tesla, which Musk controls with his brother Kimbal and other close associates. Trump also recently voiced a desire to cut Musk's firm xAI out of government contracts, as punishment for his disloyalty, but stopped short of calling for removal of all government subsidies to his companies.

Musk is also central to the so-called “PayPal Mafia,” his network of colleagues from that company that includes Peter Thiel and Reid Hoffman. But the even more extreme “Network State” movement led by Balaji Srinavasan and Neoreactionary blogger Curtis Yarvin, and endorsed by Andreessen-Horowitz cofounder Marc Andreessen is also embedded with the same network.

Encapsulating the threat posed to Trump by the Musk and Andreessen networks, a post on X from Andreessen-Horowitz yesterday read, “Trump was the bridge. What comes next is the pure form... future politicians won’t adapt to the internet. They’ll emerge from it. ‘At some point, I think they’ll completely disconnect from legacy media and just run a completely internet play.’ A new class of leaders, fluent in the feed, untethered from legacy press.”

There Are Victims, but Perpetrators Remain Largely Unknown

A clear network of victims appears in our analysis, attached primarily to Maxwell and Epstein. These names are largely known thanks to past reporting and Maxwell's court documents. However, beyond Epstein's well-documented insatiable appetite for sexual abuse and the accusations of victims, no clear network of additional perpetrators has been documented.

This may be because there are relatively few, or it may be that the government's substantial trove of evidence contains a list of accomplices to Epstein's crimes. Until or unless that information is publicly released (with proper redactions to protect victims), we may not discover who else may have participated in his alleged crimes.

Barry Levine, a journalist who has covered Epstein, wrote a July 23 opinion piece in The New York Times titled, “I Covered the Epstein Case for Decades. These Are 9 Questions We Actually Need Answered.” Our analysis aligns with Mr. Levine's list, though we would add that Mr. Epstein's interest in eugenics is missing and critically important.

Ghislaine Maxwell's Pardon Gambit Is a Hail Mary

Many are concerned that Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who has also served as a personal attorney to Donald Trump, is seeking testimony from Ghislaine Maxwell in order to implicate Bill Clinton, or other prominent figures connected to the Democratic Party. While that may in fact be their intent, our analysis suggests that this approach is likely to fall short. We could find no additional network ties that would suggest Bill Clinton (or anyone else) would make a particularly vulnerable target for Maxwell. However, she and Blanche may still be able to inject disinformation narratives that tie up public discourse and the courts long enough for Trump to decide she's worthy of a pardon — especially if it might help bury the matter for him. However, current reporting suggests that Trump has not considered a pardon for Maxwell, but has left the option open.

Other Networks of Note

Beyond the key clusters around Musk, Trump, Epstein, and Maxwell, we observe that Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick shares ties to both the Musk and Trump networks; Lutnick's sister Edie was connected to Ghislaine Maxwell's oceanic nonprofit Terramar as a “founding citizen,” but it's not clear this represents more than a casual social endorsement.

We also note the presence of networks connected to Google (Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Demis Hassabis) and Musk's PayPal network, as well as Satya Nadella and Bill Gates (Microsoft). Their position unsurprisingly suggests they are likely to be far more aligned with the Musk-Andreessen axis than Trump.

Rupert Murdoch also shared various linkages with Robert Maxwell and Trump, mostly as magnates of the same period, but largely as rivals. While Murdoch's network isn't yet deeply meshed with Musk's (besides for James Murdoch's connection to Tesla's board), recent Wall Street Journal stories suggest a desire to tip the scales against Trump.

The Public's Fever-Dream Isn't (Yet) Supported by Evidence

Despite our efforts to consider a wide range of adjacent networks, whispered affiliations, and the entirety of Epstein's black book and flight logs, we were unable to develop relevant documentation or even lines of inquiry beyond the network represented in our final result. It is certainly likely that a broad release of materials held by the government would add to our knowledge, and we will incorporate that information when it becomes available.

It is also not the government's job to document the perverted activities of sexual predators, but rather to prosecute specific crimes based on investigations rooted in probable cause.

Therefore, most of what we know about the Epstein affair has come from journalists who have pursued the case doggedly for decades. Indeed, there are huge incentives for journalists to find and report new details on this network. And the public desires that kind of journalistic reporting, first and foremost.

What the public is likely to get, if and when the government does decide to release case files (with victim-protecting redactions, as required by law), is a hodgepodge of documents that are likely to shed light on more arcane crimes like money-laundering and off-books financial dealings — especially ones where Epstein may have served as a confidential informant.

An investigation by Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) recently found $1.5 billion in over 4,700 transactions connected to Epstein's bank accounts, and we deserve answers about what these were for, and why this information was withheld for so long.

The public may wish to temper expectations about unmasking an earth-shattering blackmail scandal implicating a wide network of prominent perpetrators. All of the evidence available at this time suggests a relatively compact conspiracy combining money laundering, sexual crimes, and a fascination with eugenics — in roughly that order.

However, one person stands to lose the most from public outrage over the government's failure to fully disclose its records: Donald John Trump. ◼

America 2.0 is making our raw Epstein network graph data available to journalists in exchange for public attribution. Please contact us if you would like a copy.