This summer, the Revolutionary Communist Party is running a recruitment drive, under the banner of ‘Wipe out the Epstein class!’
What does this slogan mean? Who are the ‘Epstein class’? And what does this all have to do with communism?
Unfolding scandal
The term ‘Epstein class’ is not one invented by any revolutionary or left-winger, but one that has emerged organically in the minds of millions of ordinary people, in the USA and worldwide, off the back of perhaps the biggest scandal in the history of capitalism.
The full extent of this scandal is still not known. Only a fraction of the Epstein files have been released. Millions of pages of documents remain in the hands of the (ironically named) US Department of Justice. And even then, amongst the hefty tranche that is available to the public, many key names and details have been redacted.
Furthermore, there is of course much of this horrific scandal that will never be known; all manner of sordid secrets that were not recorded in writing, in picture, or on video. What is documented and visible could well be just the tip of the iceberg.
The Epstein scandal has far from run its course. As Keir Starmer’s ongoing trouble shows, it has the potential to accelerate the downfall of further important figures yet.
We may never find out how far this shameful story goes. Nevertheless, we already know enough. It is clear that the international elites are completely embroiled and implicated in Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes. Almost no part of the capitalist establishment – in America, in Britain, and globally – remains untouched or untainted by these atrocities.
The correspondence and images released so far are already damning. The trafficking of vulnerable young women and girls. The dodgy dealings between the rich and powerful. The exchange of insider information for the benefit of Wall Street bankers.
All this, and more, is now out in the open – sullying the reputation not only of Epstein, but of many supposedly respectable representatives of the capitalist class also. And more disgusting details and incriminating evidence could still be revealed in the months and years ahead.
View this post on Instagram
Them and us
For most people shocked and outraged by this scandal, however, the details are secondary.
It is what this sickening saga exposes and demonstrates that is important: that a shadowy cabal of plutocrats, princes, and politicians are running amok, committing heinous acts of abuse and corruption, while the rest of us suffer and struggle to get by.
Ordinary folk can see that this degenerate clique at the head of society is responsible for all the ills and injustices inflicted upon us; for conflict, austerity, and oppression.
The warmongers blitzing Iran, driving up prices, and carrying out a genocide in Gaza are part of the same billionaire mob that has organised the world’s most powerful grooming gang.
And to top it all off: when they are not committing war crimes or depraved sexual offences, these ladies and gentlemen are attacking our living standards through cuts to jobs, wages, and services; slashing benefits for the elderly and disabled to pay for bombs and bloodshed.
This is what the Epstein scandal represents for the vast majority; for the most downtrodden in society: a sense that it is ‘them’ versus ‘us’.
As Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna noted, speaking to the New York Times about this phrase that he increasingly began to hear on the doorstep in working-class communities: “They said, well, are you on the side of the forgotten Americans or on the side of the Epstein class?”
This is the most striking consequence of the Epstein scandal: its impact on consciousness.
By revealing the nefarious network of financiers, royals, and statesmen that rules over us, and spotlighting the one-thousand-and-one ties between the capitalists and their servants in government, the Epstein files have brought out the class divide – the gaping class chasm – that exists in society.
This, in turn, is cutting across the establishment’s culture war: showing workers that ‘them’ and ‘us’ is not immigrants versus native citizens, as reactionary demagogues suggest, but the 1% versus the 99%; the global elite versus the exploited masses.
Catalysing consciousness
For years and decades now, across the world, there has been a growing malaise and questioning; an accumulation of frustration, discontent, and even rage.
Most of the time, this molten mood of seething indignation remains unspoken and out of sight, building imperceptibly beneath the ground. But occasionally it finds a crack through which to surge and burst to the surface.
The pandemic provided such a fissure. So did the killing of George Floyd and the subsequent BLM movement. More recently, meanwhile, it is Israel’s murderous onslaught against the Palestinians that has acted as a lighting rod for the anger amongst workers and youth.
And now the Epstein scandal is playing a similar role in catalysing consciousness, but on a higher level, coming atop all of these previous radicalising events and experiences.
This can be seen from the initial response to our ‘Wipe out the Epstein class’ campaign, online and on the streets.
A video of one of our posters going up, showing Epstein’s face, for example, has garnered millions of views, tens of thousands of likes, and thousands of comments on social media.
View this post on Instagram
Our comrades in Birmingham, meanwhile, reported that these posters received a fantastic reception as they were being put up around the city. This included one Uber driver, who exclaimed from his car: “Is that about Epstein? Yeah, wipe them out, those bastards!”
Comrades in Woolwich, London, found a similarly enthusiastic response to the slogan of ‘Down with the Epstein regime’, which was printed on the frontpage of the latest issue of The Communist, next to an image of Donald Trump.
One buyer, they reported, when asked what sparked his interest in our paper, simply pointed at the cover and said: “I hate him [Epstein] and I hate him [Trump]!”
View this post on Instagram
Those writing in to join the RCP have expressed similar sentiments.
One such sign up from Brighton, for example, said they wanted to get organised as a communist because they are “appalled at the state of the world, specifically with the release of the Epstein files, the exposure of the vileness that lies within the capitalistic elite, and the destruction of my homeland, Iran.”
Another prospective member from St Helens wrote to us saying:
“I want to join the RCP for a number of reasons: 1) I believe in communism, I believe it can work, and I’m prepared to do whatever it takes to make it work; 2) I’m sick of capitalism; 3) I’m sick to my stomach of the Epstein class; 4) I’m sick of the USA and Israel trying to control the world.”
All of this demonstrates the real mood of anger and radicalisation that is developing in society.
And scandalously, nobody on the left – other than the revolutionary communists – is giving a political expression to this mood, using the revelations of the Epstein files to attack the entire capitalist establishment and their system.
Connecting the dots
This scandal is helping to connect all these dots in the minds of the masses.
In Britain, for example, 62 percent of respondents in one Ipsos survey said that they closely follow news around the Epstein files, including stories related to Peter Mandelson and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, which have brought Downing Street and Buckingham Palace into disrepute.
At the beginning of Trump’s latest war on Iran, meanwhile, another poll found that the majority of Americans – including a quarter of Republican voters – believe the US President started this catastrophic conflict in order to divert public attention away from the Epstein scandal.
The great historic irony is that it was Trump who pushed for these files to be released in the first place, thinking that they could be used as a stick with which to bash his political opponents.
On social media, similarly, hundreds of thousands of posts have mockingly referred to Trump’s reckless war (officially called ‘Operation Epic Fury’) as ‘Operation Epstein Fury’.
Even MAGA supporters are drawing such conclusions.
They voted for Trump because of his promises to ‘drain the swamp’, ‘end forever wars’, and ‘bring back jobs’ by putting ‘America First’. But instead, they are coming to realise that ‘their man’ in the White House is part of the swamp, along with the rest of the Epstein class. And he is more intent on protecting his capitalist chums and putting Israel first than on looking out for the average Joe.
This has profound implications. Sharp swings and leaps in consciousness are being prepared. This heralds the beginning of the end for Donald J. Trump – and the early signs of the coming American Revolution.
“They had it coming”
In the absence of a revolutionary leadership, however, capable of giving such thoughts and feelings a clear class expression and explanation, this process of radicalisation is necessarily reflected in a distorted, confused, and partial way.
The recent spate of arson attacks against big business warehouses in the USA – first in California, but later imitated in other parts of the country – are an example of this.
“All you had to do was pay us enough to live.” These are the words that Chamel Abdulkarim uttered, as he recorded himself setting fire to the Kimberly Clark distribution centre where he worked.
Moments later, as his super-exploitative workplace went up in flames, Abdulkarim called his girlfriend, telling her that: “A lot of people are going to understand.”
This is undoubtedly true. As with Luigi Mangione and his alleged killing of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, other American workers will sympathise with Abdulkarim’s actions – as evidenced by the copycat cases of corporate arson that have occurred in the wake of his original protest, and by the support this has garnered online
“They had it coming,” the exasperated warehouse worker asserted, echoing Mangione, in response to his girlfriend’s question as to why he had started the blaze. “Fucking eight hours, six days, stuck paying rent on a bullshit ass apartment that I can’t afford to fucking live in.”
And notably, he drew the link between his plight – and that of others like him – and the real criminals in society: the Epstein class; those “paedophiles out here fucking children, profiting off fucking wars”.
Potent propaganda
AI-generated videos put out by Iran, as a propaganda weapon in their defensive battle against US imperialism, have struck a chord by touching upon these same attitudes.
In these viral videos (viewed up to 900 million times), the Iranians explicitly connect the dots that many – in America and worldwide – are unconsciously or semi-consciously connecting for themselves.
The Vengeance – Latest Iranian Lego Animation movie trolling Trump & Epstein Class pic.twitter.com/cys6hsjw64
— Iranian Times (@Iranian_Times) March 29, 2026
The same ‘Epstein regime’ is shown as being responsible for both the bombing of school children in the Middle East, and for abusing young girls on their private islands.
Trump’s war on Iran, meanwhile, is shown as being only the latest in a long line of horrific, criminal acts on the part of US imperialism – from Vietnam, to Afghanistan, to Iraq, and beyond.
And burning domestic questions facing ordinary Americans are also highlighted: from soaring living costs alongside the enrichment of the 1%, to the racism and state violence faced by black communities, minorities, and migrants.
The fact that all of this is laden with satirical humour, in the form of LEGO-style animations, only adds to their political potency. Nothing shows how much of a ridiculous loser Trump is more than depicting him as a crying cartoon figurine.
Issue 46 of The Communist is out now!! 🔥 pic.twitter.com/7KBEtfjWwk
— Ravi Mistry (@RaVz94) April 22, 2026
On this basis, by turning US citizens against their own ruling class, these videos have been extremely effective.
If and when Trump finally accepts defeat in this disastrous adventure for American imperialism, his humiliating backdown will not only be thanks to the war’s impact on the economy, but also on consciousness – on the views and outlook of US voters, which the Iranians are cleverly influencing with their propaganda.
Conspiracy or capitalism?
These videos do, of course, have their political limitations. They show Trump, for example, above all, in thrall to billionaire sex offenders and Zionists.
“Your government is run by paedophiles,” we hear in the lyrics accompanying one sequence. “They’re making you die for Israel.”
But Trump’s war on Iran cannot be explained or understood as simply a distraction from the Epstein scandal, nor as a result of Netanyahu being a manipulative puppet-master, able to pull the strings of those in Washington.
Rather, this chaotic conflict is a reflection of the relative decline of US imperialism, and the hubris of a deluded ruling class that cannot accept the diminished status of the United States, which can no longer play the role of world hegemon.
Similarly, the Epstein class is not just well-heeled abusers, as these Iranian videos suggest. Nor is it a Jewish conspiracy. Rather, it is all the capitalists and their lackeys – bound together not by shady networks and secret handshakes, but by their common class interests and social outlook.
But Iranian weapons – whether they be drones, blockades, or propaganda – will not be enough to bring down the Epstein class. This victory can only be achieved by class struggle and revolution in the ‘belly of the beast’: in the United States, and in the western countries that bow down to Washington.
“MRI of the establishment”
The liberals also talk about the ‘Epstein class’. But for them, this label simply refers to the most morally bankrupt sections of the elites; to the most corrupt, venal, and unprincipled parts of politics and high society.
Similarly, for the left reformists, the ‘Epstein class’ is synonymous with ‘neoliberalism’ – falsely implying that a ‘nicer’, ‘kinder’, ‘fairer’ version of capitalism is possible; that the bankers and their profit system can be regulated.
For these reformists, social ills – such as austerity and privatisation – are not the product of the inherently crisis-ridden capitalist system and its laws, but are merely the result of nasty, greedy capitalists. And the Epstein files seem to provide proof for this view, showing clearly the malignancy of the billionaires and their flunkeys.
Ro Khanna, for example, the aforementioned Democratic representative, helped to popularise the ‘Epstein class’ term as a means of political point-scoring against Trump and the Republicans.
This is pure hypocrisy, however. For starters, the Epstein files show that parties and politicians on both sides of the aisle are implicated in this scandal: Democrats like the Clintons and Republicans like Trump; New Labour grandees and Tory MPs; liberals and conservatives.
As Financial Times writer Edward Luce aptly summarises:
“[The files’] most damning feature is the breadth of Epstein’s network. This includes the sitting US president and a previous one, big Wall Street figures, a network of Ivy League luminaries, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, foreign government officials, Democrats, Republicans, a Maga influencer, a far-left scholar, British and Norwegian royals, wives and girlfriends of powerful men, government lawyers, heads of law firms, movie directors and endless celebrities.”
“Epstein’s network,” Luce astutely concludes, “is an MRI of the establishment.”
That is the point. The Epstein scandal transcends party affiliations or national borders. It is a damning indictment on the whole capitalist class.
Capitalist cesspit
Jeffrey Epstein was no doubt a deplorable individual. But his rancid character was shaped by the toxic environment that he inhabited.
By all accounts, he was quite a mediocre man from a bland background – not an evil genius.
He was able to commit his crimes because of the nature of the system he served: a system that rewards self-interest, greed, and backscratching; a system that breeds a sense of callousness, omnipotence, and impunity amongst those at the top.
Above all, Epstein himself was a product of this system. If it had not been him, then it would have been someone else, due to the objective needs of the capitalist class – the need for a grifter or fixer who can grease the cogs and wheels of their money-making machine.
Epstein was certainly a monster. But he and his guilty associates are only the most visible of the vile creatures that dwell in the upper echelons of the monstrous system that is capitalism.
He and his ilk, including Trump, are but the ugly face of the entire degenerate, parasitic, billionaire class whose interests they protect and represent.
And that, above all, is why the outcry from the liberals about this scandal stinks of hypocrisy: because they ultimately defend and support this capitalist cesspit; this same decrepit status quo.
For us, as communists, by contrast, the slogan ‘Wipe out the Epstein class’ is not a moralistic condemnation of a few bad apples, but a call to arms for workers and youth to overthrow this whole rotten system.
Threat to the establishment
That it was Epstein at the epicentre of this scandal, then, was largely accidental. There are undoubtedly more potential Epsteins out there; other well-connected charlatans and middlemen who can – and will – fill his shoes.
In fact, looking back, it is clear that the Epstein scandal is not unique in its grotesqueness. What separates it from previous cases is rather its scale and extent.
Jimmy Savile, for example, was also protected by the establishment as he indulged his perversions, paedophilia, and predatory desires.
Similarly, wealthy businessmen and Hollywood barons like Mohamed Al-Fayed and Harvey Weinstein were able to get away with systematic sexual abuse for years thanks to their money, influence, and power.
What also differentiates the Epstein scandal, in this respect, is the impact it has had – on politics, on events, and on consciousness.
In Britain, it has already dethroned a prince. And it could yet help defenestrate a much-hated prime minister.
The more sober and far-sighted strategists of the capitalist class, meanwhile, recognise that this scandal has the potential to go even further – threatening the entire establishment, given the role of the monarchy, the police, Westminster, the civil service, and other key components of the capitalist state in this affair.
“The arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor may yet prove to be the downfall of the monarchy and the British establishment which it props up,” comments one author in The Times, a more serious mouthpiece of British capitalism.
“For the tax-paying public, watching aghast,” this same writer continues, “it is hard not to sense a decades-long conspiracy of silence and self-interested self-protection as well as a strong whiff of rotten corruption at the heart of the state.”
And they reach a bleak conclusion for their class:
“The Epstein files have fatally undermined public confidence and trust in the establishment and in particular trust in the House of Windsor.
“The scale and public revulsion surrounding the Epstein scandal means not all our institutions will survive intact.
”The monarchy sits at the top of the establishment and should it collapse under the weight of a criminal investigation, then the whole edifice will come crashing down.”
For this particular journalist, this is a warning to the British ruling class. For us, it is the revolutionary goal that we are fighting to bring about.
Molecular process of revolution
These are the revolutionary reverberations and explosive aftershocks that the Epstein earthquake could yet provoke.
This begs the question though: why is this scandal having such deep ramifications at this time?
After all, Epstein’s crimes have been relatively common knowledge for years. Likewise, it was no secret that figures like Andrew and Mandelson remained friends with the disgraced financier long after his sexual offences came to light.
The impact of this scandal can only be understood by stepping back and taking stock of all the titanic events – the repeated hammer blows – that have shaken consciousness in recent years and decades.
The incendiary spark of the Epstein revelations does not fall on virgin ground, but upon a mountain of combustible material; upon the minds of a generation that has witnessed and experienced nothing but crises, wars, injustices, and attacks for their entire lives.
All of this has given rise to a deep anger in society, which the Epstein scandal is further fuelling – pouring petrol on the flames of fury that the crisis of capitalism has already ignited, stoked, and fanned.
This is accelerating the “molecular process of revolution”, as Trotsky described it: the transformation of consciousness amongst ever-larger layers, as the incremental accumulation of frustration and discontent gives rise – at a certain point – to a qualitative leap in the political conclusions drawn by millions.
Corporate arson; CEO shootings; the rise of populists on the right and left: all of these are symptoms of the intolerable pressures and radical mood in society, seeking an outlet.
The task for communists is to connect with this developing mood, bring out and nurture its progressive kernel, and channel this anger in a revolutionary direction.
This requires a Marxist perspective to provide a rational understanding for all the turmoil and tumult wreaking havoc upon us, and a clear class-based programme that consciously connects the dots back to their real common cause: capitalism.
It requires a skillful combination of audacity, flexibility, and – above all – patient explanation to win over the most radicalised and questioning layers of workers and youth.
And most importantly, it requires the building of a revolutionary party that can lead the working class in saying: wipe out the Epstein class! Overthrow all the warmongers! Expropriate the billionaires! Bring down their putrid system!
View this post on Instagram
Join the communists!
The Epstein scandal has clearly revealed the systemic abuse and corruption that takes place under capitalism. But more than that, it has shown how the ruling class rule: through their corrupt connections and clubs; through their mutual favours and backroom deals; and through their unscrupulous exploits.
And it shows how everyone in the establishment is in on this: from the billionaires and bosses, through to the politicians and police, to the judges and diplomats.
But what this scandal obscures is the other – more essential – side of how this Epstein class dominates over us: through their ownership of the key levers of the economy; through their banks and boardrooms; and through the monopolies and technologies that are under their control.
Former UK prime minister Liz Truss, for example, was brought down not through any particular plot by identifiable individuals, but by a rebellion of the markets; by a nebulous force of bond holders and wealthy investors.
Under capitalism, the same objective pressures will face any government that does not act in the interests of the super-rich. Bourgeois democracy, in other words, for all its window dressing, is but the dictatorship of capital.
Unless and until society is run according to our needs rather than their profits, there will always be more Epsteins, Saviles, and Al-Fayeds. And there will be billionaires, bankers, and businessmen who get to decide our fate and future.
Only by putting power in the hands of the working class can we truly put an end to the Epstein class, and to all the exploitation, abuse, and misery that they and their system are responsible for.
This is what the communists are fighting for. Join us in this struggle.
