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Mike Baker

@ByMikeBaker

Jul 21

Amid all the noise, it can be hard to figure out the facts of the Epstein-Trump relationship.

Here is a year-by-year timeline thread summarizing their connections (with sourcing and documentation) from 1990 until present.

🧵 1/17

1990: Epstein buys a property two miles north of Mar-a-Lago.

Two years later, in 1992, NBC video shows Epstein and Trump partying at Mar-a-Lago at an event featuring Buffalo Bills cheerleaders.

2/17

Weeks later, still in 1992, another Mar-a-Lago party was for a "calendar girl" competition. Epstein and Trump were there.

Jill Harth later accused Mr. Trump of sexual assaulting her that night. Trump denied the allegations.

3/17 nytimes.com/2025/07/19/us/…

Read 17 tweets

Mike Baker

@ByMikeBaker

Jul 10

We have been mapping and studying the known flood risks at Camp Mystic.

It turns out that not only was the camp in a flood zone, some cabins were located in areas that local county officials had deemed “extremely hazardous.”

Here is more of what we found.

🧵 1/9

The riskiest areas are known as “floodways,” where rushing waters are expected during flood events.

In Kerr County, like many places, officials put strict limits on development in those areas “to protect human life.”

Story link:

2/9 nytimes.com/interactive/20…

We found that Camp Mystic had 6 cabins in the floodway, including those housing some of the youngest campers. Other camp buildings were also in that part of the flood zone.

3/9

Read 10 tweets

Mike Baker

@ByMikeBaker

Jul 7

Texas officials have long worried about the dangers to children who packed into camps each summer along the flood-prone Guadalupe River. They knew that warning systems were inadequate.

So why was nothing done? We have reviewed documents spanning a decade to find answers.

🧵 1/9

Without a more advanced warning system, the youth camps on the river had instead relied on a word-of-mouth strategy: Upstream camps would warn downstream peers of water surges coming their way.

2/9

nytimes.com/2025/07/06/us/…

But officials repeatedly wondered whether that was sufficient.

Here's a county commissioner talking in 2017, during a discussion about river gauges, sirens, and other ways the might alert people to flash floods.

3/9

Read 12 tweets

Mike Baker

@ByMikeBaker

Jun 13

NEW: There is a fascinating political drama unfolding right now at Indian Creek Village, the small gated island known as the “Billionaire Bunker,” home to the likes of Jeff Bezos, Tom Brady and Ivanka Trump.

It is a saga revolving around the island's 💩

THREAD (1/8)

Despite the island’s extreme luxury (an empty lot sold for $110M), Indian Creek does not have a sewer system. The island proposed sending waste into the pipes of neighboring Surfside but then balked at the town’s $10M ask.

That was just the start.

(2/8)
nytimes.com/2025/06/13/us/…

One of Indian Creek’s residents called the $10 million fee a “shakedown.” Another called it “extortion.” The village attorney called it a “ransom.”

(3/8)

nytimes.com/2025/06/13/us/…

Read 8 tweets

Mike Baker

@ByMikeBaker

Mar 14

Seattle’s only national park honors the grit of the Klondike gold rush, where Donald Trump's grandfather built the family's early wealth.

But the DOGE cuts have placed the park’s future at risk.

A 🧵 about the park and Frederick Trump...

There are some fascinating twists of history in this story.

Frederick Trump had his first foray into the world of hospitality as a 22-year-old in Seattle, when he opened a restaurant very close to the site of the current national park.

nytimes.com/2025/03/14/us/…

In 1896, Frederick Trump made the family's first foray into U.S. politics in the mining town of Monte Cristo. In a local campaign, he apparently allied himself with William Jennings Bryan, the populist Democrat who railed against tariffs.

nytimes.com/2025/03/14/us/…

Read 6 tweets

Mike Baker

@ByMikeBaker

Jan 30

NEW:

A preliminary FAA report says staffing in the air traffic control tower at Reagan National was "not normal" last night.

One controller was managing both helicopters in the vicinity and planes — tasks typically divided between two controllers.

More here:
nytimes.com/live/2025/01/2…

For those who haven't seen it, my NYT colleagues did an outstanding project looking at FAA records, air traffic control staffing, and a series of close calls in commercial aviation.

nytimes.com/interactive/20…

Read 4 tweets

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