President Donald Trump sparked a firestorm aboard Air Force One after a combative exchange with a Bloomberg reporter, just days before reversing his position and calling on Congress to release long-sealed records related to Jeffrey Epstein.
The confrontation occurred during a flight when Bloomberg reporter Jennifer Jacobs questioned the president about emails in which Epstein mentioned Trump.
Jacobs asked, “If there’s nothing incriminating in the Epstein files why not…?”
Trump responded, “Quiet. Quiet, Piggy.”
The remark spread across social media within seconds. Left-leaning activists and journalists condemned what they characterized as an attack on the free press.
Some Trump supporters viewed the moment differently, however. They saw the president pushing back against what they considered a dishonest question designed to advance a predetermined media narrative.
Two days after the Air Force One exchange, Trump surprised Washington by urging House Republicans to vote for releasing unclassified Epstein files. The reversal eliminated the final internal resistance among GOP lawmakers.
“Disgusting and completely unacceptable,” CNN’s Jake Tapper wrote on X.
One X user said, “If you call a female reporter “piggy” and tell her to be quiet as she’s trying to ask about the Epstein files, it means you’re in the Epstein files.”
Another, who defended Trump, wrote, “Legacy media has called Trump ‘Hitler’ and a ‘Nazi’ for years. Trump saying ‘Quiet piggy’ is well deserved.”
The House of Representatives voted 427-1 on Tuesday to compel the Justice Department to make public all files related to Epstein investigations.
Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) cast the only vote against the measure. He explained his opposition in a statement posted on X Tuesday afternoon. “If enacted in its current form, this type of broad reveal of criminal investigative files, released to a rabid media, will absolutely result in innocent people being hurt,” Higgins wrote on the social media platform.
The Louisiana congressman indicated he would be willing to support an amended version of the bill if the Senate adds stronger protections.
Higgins stated he would back legislation that better shields victims and Americans who have not been charged with crimes but whose names appear in the investigative files.
Higgins pointed to the work already being conducted by the House Oversight Committee as an appropriate model for releasing information.
He has argued the committee is currently making Epstein-related materials public “in a manner that provides all due protections for innocent Americans.”
The Epstein Files Transparency Act mandates that the Department of Justice publish all unclassified records connected to investigations involving Epstein. According to the congressional summary, the legislation would still permit the department to withhold classified material and information related to active investigations.
