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President Donald Trump is facing growing pressure, including from some of his closest allies, for more transparency on the Jeffrey Epstein case. But there are mixed opinions on what steps the administration should take next.

Trump has urged his supporters to move on from the case, decrying the story as “boring” and lashing out at those who have called for more information. Despite this, many people — including allies but also Democrats and critics on the right — have demanded more clarity about the case. Epstein was found dead in a New York jail cell in 2019 while he was awaiting a trial on sex trafficking charges. Conspiracy theories have swirled since then, including baseless claims that he was killed to protect his powerful clients.

Epstein’s death, ruled a suicide, was rocketed back into the headlines this month after Attorney General Pam Bondi’s office released an unsigned joint memo with the FBI saying an “exhaustive review of investigative holdings relating” to the case showed the financier and convicted sex offender had no “incriminating ‘client list’” and there was no evidence that would lead to charges against anyone else.

The memo infuriated some factions of Trump’s MAGA base because both he and Bondi had previously said they would release more documents related to Epstein.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Here’s a look at some of the paths forward that are being proposed by Trump’s allies:

Publish the client list — if it exists

Bondi has faced backlash from some of Trump’s supporters over comments she made about the existence of Epstein’s so-called client list months before the Justice Department memo came out. “It’s sitting on my desk right now to review,” she told Fox News in February. But she clarified this month at a Cabinet meeting that she was speaking more broadly about documents related to Epstein and not a specific list of clients.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., said last week in an all-caps post on X that the DOJ should “release the Epstein client list.”

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., told reporters Wednesday that “the attorney general ought to release whatever she thinks is credible and appropriate to release,” but that the DOJ finding on the client list was “kind of hard to believe.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., one of the president’s closest and most prominent allies, told conservative commentator Benny Johnson on Tuesday that Bondi “needs to come forward and explain” her comments about the client list.

“Pam Bondi, I don’t know when she originally made the statement, I think she was talking about documents as I understood that they were on her desk,” he said. “I don’t know that she was specific about a list or whatever, but she needs to come forward and explain that to everybody. I like Pam, I mean, I think she’s done a good job. We need the DOJ focusing on the major priorities. So, let’s get this thing resolved.”

Appoint a special counsel

Other Trump allies are urging him to appoint a special counsel to review the case.

The “best thing that the president can do is appoint a special counsel to handle the Epstein files investigation,” right-wing activist Laura Loomer told Politico, saying she didn’t want the controversy to “consume his presidency.”

Former White House adviser Steve Bannon has also voiced support for a special counsel, saying on his show “War Room” that he would “love” to have “a special counsel report directly to the office of the president.”

Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., said in an interview Tuesday with Benny Johnson that “we need a special counsel,” and had a suggestion for who that person would be.

“Maybe Matt Gaetz can lead the special counsel,” she added, referring to the former Florida congressman who was Trump’s first choice for attorney general.

Bannon said Trump is open to the idea, despite his past history with special counsels. Special counsel reports can take months and, in some cases, years to compile.

In his interview with Mike Johnson, Benny Johnson asked the House speaker if he would support Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s co-defendant, testifying before Congress or lawmakers subpoenaing the DOJ to get the files. The speaker replied that he hadn’t spoken to lawmakers “about that specific subject, but I’m for transparency.”

Asked Wednesday whether he would support a special prosecutor, Trump said, “I have nothing to do with it.

Hold congressional hearings

Hawley said he was also open to a hearing on the matter before the Senate Judiciary Committee that could include Maxwell, the only other person who’s been convicted in the case.

Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison term that she’s appealing.

“Why not put her under oath?” Hawley said. “I think that could be good,” he added.

Send a congressional message

Several House Republicans have signed on to an effort by Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., to force a vote on calling on the DOJ to release the entirety of its records related to Epstein.

“We all deserve to know what’s in the Epstein files, who’s implicated, and how deep this corruption goes. Americans were promised justice and transparency,” Massie wrote Tuesday in a pair of posts on X.

The procedural effort would force a vote to release “all unclassified records, documents, communications, and investigative materials” related to Epstein.

Massie’s discharge petition would take time to move forward.

“In 7 days we can start collecting signatures. At 218 signatures, the House must vote on our bill requiring a full release of the Epstein files,” wrote Massie, who’s repeatedly clashed with the president.

A number of Republicans have already signed on to the effort, including Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee, a Trump ally. Burchett told NBC News on Wednesday night that he’d done so because “I’m big on transparency.”

Fire Bondi

Some Trump supporters online, including Loomer, have called for Bondi to resign or be fired.

“Someone needs to be fired for this,” Loomer said on X, adding that letting Bondi “resign is more than she deserves. Trump should just FIRE her.”

Trump has vigorously defended Bondi as doing a “great job.” Bondi told reporters Tuesday, “I’m going to be here for as long as the president wants me here, and I believe he’s made that crystal clear.”

Conservative commentator and former Fox News host Glenn Beck echoed those sentiments in a video.

“Pam Bondi has created so much doubt and chaos in this whole thing,” he said, urging Trump to “fire Pam Bondi.”

Take it to the courts

The president of Judicial Watch, an organization that’s been trying to obtain Epstein documents, suggested a different way forward.

“Just give us the records under FOIA,” Tom Fitton said on Bannon’s “War Room” podcast, referring to the Freedom of Information Act.

“Describe what the records are. If they’re withholding anything, tell us why. And there’s a court process for it. If we don’t like it, we can challenge it.”

“But at least it’s a transparency that we don’t have currently because of the awful memo that was sent out,” he said.

Release all the documents

Others suggested the simplest path was for the DOJ to just release the files, while protecting information about the victims.

“The Epstein files need to be released” and “I’m for releasing it now,” said Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C.

Boebert also backed the release of the files Wednesday. “The American people deserve and can handle the truth. Let’s see the files,” she wrote in a post on X.

Hawley said he was in favor, as well.

“My view is, make public everything you can make public,” he said. “Let’s make it all public and get it out there.”

Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law, also joined the calls for more information on Epstein.

“I do think that there needs to be more transparency on this, and I think that that will happen,” she told Benny Johnson this week. “I believe that there will probably be more coming on this, and I believe anything that they are able to release that doesn’t, you know, damage any witnesses or anyone underage or anything like that, I believe they will probably try to get out sooner rather than later.”

North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis — a Republican who has clashed with Trump — was more blunt.

“Just release the damn files,” Tillis said. “Maybe somebody was wrong. Maybe they embellished a little bit about what was in the contents of the file. Apologize for it. Get this off the table. It’s sucking up too much oxygen. And we all should know.”

Trump, for his part, has placed some of the onus on Bondi, saying Tuesday that “it’s going to be up to her, whatever she thinks is credible, she should release.”

Singer Connie Francis, a star of the 1950s and ‘60s known for her hits “Pretty Little Baby” and “Stupid Cupid,” has died, her publicist announced.

She passed away on Wednesday at the age of 87. No cause was disclosed.

“It is with a heavy heart and extreme sadness that I inform you of the passing of my dear friend Connie Francis last night,” Ron Roberts, the president of Concetta Records, a music label owned by Francis and her royalties/copyright manager, wrote on Facebook.

“I know that Connie would approve that her fans are among the first to learn of this sad news,” he continued. “More details will follow later.”

Francis had told her fans in March that she was in a wheelchair “to avoid undue pressure on a troublesome, painful hip” and was in therapy.

In a July 2 Facebook post, she said she was in the hospital undergoing tests “to determine the cause(s) of the extreme pain” she had been experiencing. That same day, Francis said she had been in the intensive care unit and was transferred to a private room. Her last update was on July 4, when she wished her fans a happy Fourth of July, adding, “Today I am feeling much better after a good night.”

The American pop singer was one of the top-charting vocalists of the late ‘50s and early ‘60s thanks to her commanding yet sweet voice.

She was best known for hits including “Who’s Sorry Now” and “Where the Boys Are.”

Born Concetta Rosemarie Franconero, she grew up in an Italian-American family in New Jersey. She often participated in talent contests and pageants, singing and playing the accordion, as described in her 1984 autobiography, “Who’s Sorry Now?”

This past year, her 1962 track “Pretty Little Baby” resurged to the top of the charts after going viral on TikTok.

Francis posted about her viral hit on Facebook, writing in May, “My thanks to TikTok and its members for the wonderful, and oh so unexpected, reception given to my 1961 recording ‘Pretty Little Baby.’”

“The first I learned of it was when Ron called to advise me that I had ‘a viral hit.’ Clearly out of touch with present-day music statistics terminology, my initial response was to ask: ‘What’s that?’” she continued.

WASHINGTON — One of the three nuclear enrichment sites in Iran struck by the United States last month was mostly destroyed, setting work there back significantly. But the two others were not as badly damaged and may have been degraded only to a point where nuclear enrichment could resume in the next several months if Iran wants it to, according to a recent U.S. assessment of the destruction caused by the military operation, five current and former U.S. officials familiar with the assessment told NBC News.

The assessment, part of the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts to determine the status of Iran’s nuclear program since the facilities were struck, was briefed to some U.S. lawmakers, Defense Department officials and allied countries in recent days, four of those people said.

NBC News has also learned that U.S. Central Command had developed a much more comprehensive plan to strike Iran that would have involved hitting three additional sites in an operation that would have stretched for several weeks instead of a single night, according to a current U.S. official and two former U.S. officials.

President Donald Trump was briefed on that plan, but it was rejected because it was at odds with his foreign policy instincts to extract the United States from conflicts abroad, not dig deeper into them, as well as the possibility of a high number of casualties on both sides, one of the current officials and one of the former officials said.

“We were willing to go all the way in our options, but the president did not want to,” one of the sources with knowledge of the plan said.

In a speech in the hours after they took place, Trump called the strikes he directed “a spectacular military success” and said, “Iran’s key enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.”

The reality as gleaned through intelligence so far appears to be more nuanced. And if the early findings about the damage inflicted to Iran’s nuclear program hold up as more intelligence comes in, the United States could find itself back in a conflict there.

There have been discussions within both the American and Israeli governments about whether additional strikes on the two less-damaged facilities could be necessary if Iran does not soon agree to restart negotiations with the Trump administration on a nuclear deal or if there are signs Iran is trying to rebuild at those locations, one of the current officials and one of the former officials said. Iran has long said its nuclear program is purely for peaceful, civilian purposes.

The recent assessment is a snapshot of the damage U.S. strikes inflicted amid an intelligence-gathering process that administration officials have said is expected to continue for months. Assessments of Iran’s nuclear program after the U.S. strikes are expected to change over time, and according to two of the current officials, as the process progresses, the findings suggest more damage than previous assessments revealed. That assessment remains for now the current thinking on the impact of the strikes, officials said.

“As the President has said and experts have verified, Operation Midnight Hammer totally obliterated Iran’s nuclear capabilities,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly told NBC News in a statement. “America and the world are safer, thanks to his decisive action.”

In a statement of his own, chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said: “The credibility of the Fake News Media is similar to that of the current state of the Iranian nuclear facilities: destroyed, in the dirt, and will take years to recover. President Trump was clear and the American people understand: Iran’s nuclear facilities in Fordow, Isfahan, and Natanz were completely and totally obliterated. There is no doubt about that.”

He added, “Operation Midnight Hammer was a significant blow to Iran’s nuclear capabilities thanks to the decisive action of President Trump and the bravery of every man and woman in uniform who supported this mission.”

Destruction and deterrence

The U.S. strikes targeted three enrichment sites in Iran: Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. U.S. officials believe the attack on Fordo, which has long been viewed as a critical component of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, was successful in setting back Iranian enrichment capabilities at that site by as much as two years, according to two of the current officials.

Much of the administration’s public messaging about the strikes has focused on Fordo. In a Pentagon briefing they held in response to reporting on an initial Defense Intelligence Agency assessment that concluded that Iran’s nuclear program had been set back by only three to six months, for instance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, talked extensively about the strike at Fordo but not the strikes at Natanz and Isfahan.

U.S. officials knew before the airstrikes that Iran had structures and enriched uranium at Natanz and Isfahan that were likely to be beyond the reach of even America’s 30,000-pound GBU-57 “bunker buster” bombs, three of the sources said. Those bombs, which had never been used in combat before the strikes, were designed with the deeply buried facilities carved into the side of a mountain at Fordo in mind.

As early as 2023, though, there were indications that Iran was digging tunnels at Natanz that were below where the GBU-57 could reach. There are also tunnels deep underground at Isfahan. The United States hit surface targets at Isfahan with Tomahawk missiles and did not drop GBU-57s there, but it did use them at Natanz.

White House officials pointed NBC News to a closed-door briefing conducted in late June by CIA Director John Ratcliffe, who told lawmakers that Iran’s nuclear program was “severely damaged” and that several key nuclear facilities were “completely destroyed,” according to an administration official’s description of the briefing. Ratcliffe said the only metal conversion facility at Natanz, required for nuclear enrichment, was destroyed to the point that it would take “years to rebuild,” according to a White House official who was authorized to describe some contents of the classified briefing.

Ratcliffe also said that the intelligence community believes the strikes buried the vast majority of enriched uranium at Isfahan and Fordo and that thus it would be extremely difficult for the Iranians to extract it to resume enrichment, according to the official. The United States has not seen indications that Iran is trying to dig out the facilities, two officials said.

As NBC News has reported, the Israeli government believes at least some of Iran’s highly enriched uranium remains intact but buried beneath the Isfahan facility, according to a senior Israeli government official who briefed reporters in Washington last week. The official said, however, that Israel considers the material effectively unreachable, because it is watching and will conduct new strikes if it believes Iran is trying to dig up the uranium. The official also said Israel believes Iran’s nuclear program has been set back by up to two years.

Similarly, even if the targeted Iranian nuclear sites were not completely destroyed, U.S. officials and Republican advocates of the operation believe it was a success because it has changed the strategic equation for Iran. From their point of view, the regime in Tehran now faces a credible threat of more airstrikes if Israel and the United States believe it is trying to revive clandestine nuclear work.

Asked late last month whether he would consider bombing Iran again if intelligence reports concluded Iran can enrich uranium at a level that concerns him, Trump said: “Sure. Without question. Absolutely.”

Iran’s air defenses have been largely destroyed, making it all but impossible for Iran to defend against further strikes on facilities in the future, the White House official said.

“It was made clear that Iran no longer has any more [air defenses], so the idea that they can easily rebuild anything is ludicrous,” the White House official said.

The ‘all-in’ plan

Beginning during the Biden administration, as early as last fall and into this spring, Army Gen. Erik Kurilla, the head of U.S. Central Command, had developed a plan to go “all-in” on striking Iran, according to a current U.S. official and two former officials. That option was designed to “truly decimate” Iran’s nuclear capabilities, in the words of one of the former officials.

Under the plan, the United States would have hit six sites. The thinking was that the six sites would have to be hit repeatedly to inflict the kind of damage necessary to completely end the program, people familiar with the thinking said. The plan would also have involved targeting more of Iran’s air defense and ballistic missile capabilities, and planners projected it could result in a high number of Iranian casualties. U.S. officials expected that if that were to take place, Iran would target American positions, for example in Iraq and Syria, a person familiar with the plan said.

“It would be a protracted air campaign,” the person said.

Some Trump administration officials believed a deeper offensive option against Iran was a viable policy, two of the former officials said.

Trump was briefed on the so-called all-in plan, but it was rejected ultimately because it would have required a sustained period of conflict.

The history

During his first term, in 2018, Trump pulled the United States out of a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers that was negotiated during the Obama administration. The agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, imposed strict limits on Iran’s nuclear program in return for an easing of economic sanctions.

Under the deal, Iran was a year away from obtaining enough fissile material for a nuclear bomb. After Trump withdrew from the accord and reimposed sanctions, Iran flouted restrictions on its uranium enrichment. Before the June airstrikes, the regime had enough fissile material for about nine to 10 bombs, according to U.S. officials and United Nations inspectors.

Trump has since sought a new agreement with Iran that would block it from developing nuclear weapons. Indirect talks between U.S. and Iranian officials failed to clinch a deal before Israel launched airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Iran has long denied that it wants to build a nuclear weapon, a position its foreign minister reiterated in an interview with NBC News the day before the U.S. strikes.

Martha Martin has to use up all of her remaining vacation days for the year to stay home with her infant son, and it still won’t be enough.

Nine-month-old Hal was recently exposed to measles at day care and can’t go back for almost a full month. He’s not had the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine, which isn’t recommended until age 1. When Martin has to return to work, her husband will need to take several unpaid days off to stay home with the boy.

“It just makes me so mad that this is happening,” said Martin, 26, of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “It’s scary because my son is not protected, and I’m having to worry about child care and my job and my husband’s job.” In these situations, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends quarantine for 28 days.

Because he’s too young for the measles vaccine, Hal needed emergency shots of immunoglobulin, or IG, an antibody that helps the immune system fight off infections.

At this point, Martin said, “it’s just a waiting game.”

Her family’s worry and frustration are playing out in households nationwide as the number of measles cases has surpassed a level not seen since the highly contagious virus was declared eliminated in the U.S. in 2000.

On Wednesday, the CDC reported 1,309 cases of measles in 39 states. The vast majority of patients are children.

Each of those cases has had the opportunity to expose hundreds or even thousands of other people, especially kids, either too young to be vaccinated, like Hal, or children with weak immune systems, experts said.

Dr. Ana Montanez, a pediatrician at Texas Tech Physicians in Lubbock, Texas, cared for many families during the recent measles outbreak in West Texas.

“A lot of our families, hard-working families, typically don’t have a month’s savings of salary to stay home, yet they have to,” Montanez said. “Oftentimes it’s not just one job, but two, maybe three.”

Cedar Rapids isn’t experiencing an outbreak of measles. Just seven cases have been confirmed across Iowa in 2025, according to the latest data in the state. They are the first reported measles cases in Iowa since 2019.

Still, the Martin family’s situation illustrates the ripple effects of a single exposure.

“What’s happening in our town is a perfect example of why vaccination is important,” said Dr. Dustin Arnold, chief medical officer at UnityPoint Health-Cedar Rapids. “It just takes one” measles case, he said, to set off waves of impact.

On Saturday, Arnold ran a command center giving out immunoglobulin, or IG shots for eight babies who were exposed to measles at the same day care as Hal. Three others were sent to a nearby medical facility for the same treatment.

IG injections can be given up to six days after exposure to measles. A 2021 study found that the therapy is highly effective in protecting exposed newborns from getting sick.

IG treatments aren’t a permanent fix, said Dr. Tina Tan, president of the Infectious Diseases Society of America. Children “develop much higher levels of immunity from vaccination than from immunoglobulin,” she said.

The Cedar Rapids IG clinics, led by Arnold, were pulled together at the very last minute. The babies who got the injections had been exposed six days earlier, on Monday, July 7. Families were notified late Friday, July 11, and the treatments started the next morning.

“There are infants out there who have no protection, and we don’t want them to get sick,” Arnold said. “Measles can be mild, but it can also be life-threatening.”

The majority of measles patients have fared well despite their illness. Still, 13%, or 164 patients, needed to be hospitalized because of the infection.

Three people — including two young girls in Texas — have died of measles this year. This past week, a child in England died of the virus.

Syria’s leader accused Israel on Thursday of sowing discord with a wave of intense airstrikes following deadly sectarian clashes that threatened the country’s fragile unity and illustrated its neighbor’s capacity to attack across the region.

In a televised speech, Interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa promised to protect the rights and freedom of Syria’s Druze community — and avoid an “open war” with Israel. He said Syria “will never be a place for division or fragmentation” as he called protecting the rights of the religious minority a “priority” of his administration.

His comments came after the Syrian government and leaders in the Druze community announced a renewed ceasefire Wednesday after days of clashes in the southern city of Sweida threatened the relative stability achieved in the country since the toppling of the Assad regime in December.

Government forces were withdrawing from the area, the Associated Press news agency reported, though a previous ceasefire in the area quickly crumbled and it was not immediately clear whether the latest truce would hold.

Israel launched rare strikes in Damascus and elsewhere on Wednesday in a campaign it said was aimed at defending the Druze, who also have a strong presence in Israel — and to force Islamic militants away from its border.

“We are not among those who fear war,” Sharaa said Thursday, as he accused Israel of “targeting our stability and creating discord among us since the fall of the former regime,” according to a transcript from the Reuters news agency. “But we put the interests of the Syrians before chaos and destruction,” he said, adding that local factions and sheikhs had been assigned the responsibility of maintaining security in Sweida.

“We are very worried about the violence in southern Syria,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday, calling it a “direct threat to efforts to help build a peaceful and stable Syria.” He added that the Trump administration had “been and remain in repeated and constant talks with the governments of Syria and Israel on this matter.”

The flare-up of violence appears to mark the most serious threat yet to the fragile control Syria’s new leadership holds over the country following dictator Bashar al-Assad’s ouster, with repeated eruptions of violence threatening to undermine Sharaa’s vow to rebuild a more inclusive Syria representative of its myriad religious and ethnic groups.

Sharaa has worked hard in recent months to shake off his past as a jihadist leader with links to both the Islamic State terrorist group and Al Qaeda. The Trump administration’s move to revoke the foreign terrorist organization designation for his Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham group signaled growing, but cautious, global confidence in his leadership.

HONG KONG — Chinese authorities in Hong Kong have launched a criminal investigation after more than a dozen female students and teachers at the University of Hong Kong accused a male law student of using AI to generate deepfake porn images of them.

The probe, announced Tuesday by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data, came after an outcry from students at the university, the city’s oldest, who said it hadn’t done enough to protect them or punish the accused.

“The images were organized into folders named after the victims, totaling 700+ images (including the original photos),” read a widely circulated letter that was posted Saturday on Instagram from an account run by three unnamed victims.

The accused, referred to in the letter only as “a male law student,” took photos of the victims from social media and used AI software to generate pornographic images with their faces, according to the letter. The images were discovered on his laptop reported to the university in February. They were not known to have been widely distributed.

In March, the university interviewed some of the victims, and in April informed one of them that the accused student had written a 60-word “apology letter.”

While NBC News was unable to confirm the authenticity of that letter, and the account did not respond to a request for comment, the university said it was “aware of the social media posts concerning a student allegedly using AI tools to create indecent images.”

“The University has already issued him a warning letter and demanded him a formal apology to his affected peers,” the university said Saturday in a statement.

Deepfake porn is a type of nonconsensual pornography that involves altering existing images or creating entirely new ones using readily available AI tools to make it appear that a person has participated in sexual acts.

Regulations in Hong Kong around the technology are currently sparse. While it criminalizes “publication or threatened publication of intimate images without consent,” it does not explicitly outlaw their generation.

In the U.S., regulations govern dissemination, with President Donald Trump signing legislation in May that bans nonconsensual online publication of AI-generated porn, but federal law does not explicitly prohibit personal possession, and a district judge ruled in February that possessing such images was protected by the First Amendment.

After it was rocked by a number of scandals similar to the one playing out in Hong Kong, South Korea passed a law last year that criminalizes not only the possession but also the consumption of such content.

Though the University of Hong Kong said that it had undertaken various steps on behalf of the victims, “including class adjustments,” the victims wrote in the letter that the university’s inaction had resulted in them being forced to share the classroom with the suspect “at least four times, causing unnecessary psychological distress.”

Outrage has since grown in the wider student community, which has demanded more stringent action. That prompted a response from the city’s top official, Chief Executive John Lee, who said at a news briefing Tuesday that universities have the “responsibility of developing students’ moral character,” adding institutions should “deal with student misconduct seriously.”

“Any conduct that causes harm to others may constitute a criminal offense and may also infringe individual rights and also privacy,” he said.

The university did not respond to a request for comment from NBC News, but it told the South China Morning Post this week that it was conducting a review of the incident and vowed further action if victims demanded more.

“The university is now further reviewing the case and will take further actions when appropriate to ensure a safe and respectful learning environment,” it said.