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Hi! If you've heard anything about the Denver Airport, it's probably a wild conspiracy theory about it housing aliens or secret societies. But we got a behind-the-scenes tour that debunked some of the far-out theories.

In today's big story, Amazon wants to stop employees skirting in-office mandates by tracking their hours spent in the office.

What's on deck:

• Markets: A Q&A with a Goldman partner about her path from intern to exec.
• Tech: After accusations of sexual harassment surfaced, a founding father of Utah's VC industry is stepping back.
• Business: Inside the messy feud between the divorced founders of the trendy fitness juggernaut Pvolve.

But first, did you swipe in?

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If this was forwarded to you, sign up here.

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The big story

Punching the clock

At Amazon, coffee is for closers people who spend at least 2 hours in the office.

The tech giant has launched a new strategy in its ongoing fight to get employees to come to the office: tracking individual hours spent there.

Business Insider's Eugene Kim has a report on Amazon monitoring the hours its corporate employees spend in the office. As frustrating as that sounds — one Amazon employee likened it to being treated like a high schooler — it's not without reason.

Amazon is trying to crack down on "coffee badging," or swiping into the office just to satisfy an in-office mandate without doing actual work there. Currently, most of Amazon's corporate staffers must be in the office at least three times a week.

Amazon and its employees have been in an ongoing battle over its return-to-office mandate, which was first announced early last year. There were internal petitions, blocked promotions, and forced relocations as both sides have dug their heels in.

From Amazon's perspective, the business operates better when people are in the office. A spokesperson told Eugene returning to the office meant "more energy, connection, and collaboration."

For Amazon employees, the RTO mandates have been shrouded in mystery and confusion. And for some, the number of days they're in the office doesn't feel like a metric worth being judged on.

Either way, don't expect the fight to stop anytime soon. At least one Amazon employee thinks they've figured out a workaround by swiping into their local Whole Foods, which is an Amazon subsidiary.

Amazon's RTO battle isn't the only one in Corporate America.

Computer giant Dell is butting heads with employees over its strict RTO mandate, which excludes fully remote workers from promotion.

Workers voiced their anger in Dell's annual employee engagement survey. A key measure of the likelihood employees would recommend Dell as a great place to work dropped by double digits from last year, writes BI's Polly Thompson.

But getting angry is really the only thing employees fighting RTO mandates can do. The white-collar job market is brutal these days. And you can forget about finding a fully remote job.

Maybe that's why employees who still work from home have been willing to push the limit of what's possible.

For some that means quietly taking a vacation while they are still on the clock. For others it's outsourcing your entire job to a shadow stand-in.

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3 things in markets

1. A Goldman partner details her climb to the top. Elizabeth Reed is a partner and leads a team that helps price IPOs at Goldman Sachs. In a Q&A, she reflected on the beginning of her 17-year career at the bank, where she started as an intern.
2. Take a look inside JD Vance's investment portfolio. Former President Donald Trump's running mate is pro-bitcoin and has stakes in more than 120 private companies. Walmart, gold, and Treasury bonds are some of his largest publicly traded investments.
3. Small caps, big returns. Fundstrat's Tom Lee is bullish on the potential for smaller stocks as the Fed considers easing rates. The Russell 2000 Index, which tracks small-cap stocks, could rally 40% as the S&P 500 starts to slowdown, he said.

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3 things in tech

1. A high-profile Utah VC has been accused of routinely making female employees feel uncomfortable. Half a dozen women told BI they faced unwanted touching from Greg Warnock, a titan of the mountain state's tech scene, while working at the VC firm he cofounded. In June, Warnock told employees he was stepping back from day-to-day management of the company.
2. Netflix and Amazon enter a new stage of the streaming wars. The streamers are vying for brand partnerships with advertisers, which include everything from product placements to joint marketing campaigns. Though brands are eager to be featured in streaming content, not all of them are happy about the way Netflix and Amazon have courted them.
3. Musk dumps California and moves two more businesses to Texas. Elon Musk announced he's officially moving SpaceX and X's headquarters to Texas, citing laws in California "attacking both families and companies." He moved Tesla to the Lone Star State in 2021.

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3 things in business

1. Who gets the company in the divorce? Stephen Pasterino and Rachel Katzman's personal breakup sparked a legal battle. But despite a saga involving a billionaire father-in-law, a 911 call, and a defamation lawsuit, the company that now calls Jennifer Aniston an advisor and owner is soaring to new heights.
2. Your friendly, neighborhood landlord is about to get a lot meaner. Mom-and-pop landlords are often held up as a contrast to the big private-equity firms that gobble up real estate. But these small, individual owners are increasingly copying the big corporations' strategies to raise rents and profits, a foreboding sign for renters.
3. Pig roast prizes for the best AI rollouts. The private-equity firm THL uses friendly competitions and prizes to incentivize portfolio companies to implement generative AI. And the tech has helped its companies' engineers increase productivity by up to 30%.

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In other news

• Amazon Prime Day 2024: 140+ best deals worth buying.
• Trump is considering giving Jamie Dimon, who he once called a 'highly overrated globalist,' a prime Cabinet position.
• Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz have reportedly told employees they're going to donate to Trump PACs.
• JD Vance could be the first tech guy in the White House. But it's way too early to say what that means.
• Why you're going to be hearing a lot about tariffs on China for the next 4 months.
• Photos show the biggest moments from the Republican National Convention.
• Amazon warehouse workers get injured because of Prime Day rushes, according to a Senate report.
• Wall Street 'bake offs' are back. Here's what it means for dealmaking, according to Morgan Stanley CEO Ted Pick.
• A personal trainer at a longevity clinic says you should care about 3 fitness markers if you want to live a long, youthful life.
• 5 mistakes to avoid when you're posting about your new job on LinkedIn, according to an HR expert.
• Donald Trump still isn't tweeting — no matter how much Elon Musk gives him.

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What's happening today

• The Fed's Beige Book is released.
• The mayor of Paris swims in the Seine, where Olympic swimmers are still expected to compete. Paris invested more than $1 billion to clean up the river, but rainfall keeps polluting it.
• United Airlines, Johnson & Johnson, and other companies are reporting.

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The Insider Today team: Dan DeFrancesco, deputy editor and anchor, in New York. Jordan Parker Erb, editor, in New York. Hallam Bullock, senior editor, in London. Annie Smith, associate producer, in London. Amanda Yen, fellow, in New York.

• Trump allies are reportedly drafting plans for an executive order on AI.
• The order could lead to "Manhattan Projects" for AI military tech, according to The Washington Post.
• Agencies will be created to study AI models and protect them from foreign powers, the report said.

Donald Trump's allies are believed to be drafting plans to create "Manhattan Projects" that will develop AI military technology and review regulations put in place by President Joe Biden.

According to The Washington Post, several people close to the former president are writing up an AI executive order to advance US interests in the technology.

It will include the creation of industry-led agencies that will study AI models and protect them from foreign powers, the report said.

The Post noted that the framework also contains a section called "Make America First in AI," which aligns with the 2016 Trump Administration's commitment to "strengthening American leadership" in the field.

Trump's former chief economic advisor, Larry Kudlow, who now heads the America First Policy Institute, is believed to be involved in the plans.

If such plans go ahead, they will likely benefit the former president's tech donors, including Tesla billionaire Elon Musk.

Musk endorsed Trump in July following the assassination attempt on the former president. Soon after, it was reported he would donate $45 million to a new super PAC called America PAC, which has garnered support from others in Silicon Valley.

Republicans have previously pledged to repeal Biden's executive order on artificial intelligence.

The order demands that major tech companies communicate the risks of their AI models with the federal government. It also limits the government's use of AI systems in high-risk situations and includes programs to study potentially harmful AI healthcare practices.

"We will repeal Joe Biden's dangerous Executive Order that hinders AI Innovation, and imposes Radical Leftwing ideas on the development of this technology," the GOP platform says. "In its place, Republicans support AI Development rooted in Free Speech and Human Flourishing."

Hilton Beckham, spokeswoman for the America First Policy Institute said in a statement to the Post that the document does not represent the organization's "official position", and must not be taken as representing the views of the Republican Party either.

In 2019, the Trump Administration established the American AI Initiative via Executive Order 13859, which aimed to "develop and implement an action plan, to protect the advantage of the United States in AI and technology critical to United States economic and national security interests against strategic competitors and foreign adversaries."

The order also directed officials, including the Secretary of Defense, to "prioritize the allocation of high-performance computing resources for AI-related applications."

Representatives for Larry Kudlow and Donald Trump did not immediately reply to a request by Business Insider for comment.

• In a private 2016 message to an old Yale roommate, JD Vance said Trump could be "America's Hitler."
• Josh McLaurin, the former roommate, released the message after Trump endorsed Vance in 2022.
• McLaurin, now a Democratic lawmaker, told BI he did it to expose Vance's "hypocrisy."

JD Vance, now former President Donald Trump's running mate, once speculated in a 2016 message to a former college roommate that Trump could end up being "America's Hitler."

Vance had also written that year that Trump was "unfit" to be president, called him an "idiot," and described him as "cultural heroin."

At the time, Trump was running for the presidency for the first time.

Josh McLaurin, Vance's former roommate at Yale and now a Democratic state senator in Georgia, sat on the "America's Hitler" message for years before deciding to publish it in 2022, shortly after Trump endorsed Vance's Senate run.

In an interview with Business Insider, McLaurin said he released screenshots of the message to expose Vance's "hypocrisy" and the "gross inconsistencies" in his political career.

Now, the message, which also speculated that Trump could simply be a "cynical asshole like Nixon," is being used to highlight Vance's dramatic journey from "Never Trump" to loyal ally and running mate.

McLaurin told BI that he decided to leak it once Vance accepted Trump's endorsement for the Senate primary in Ohio in April 2022.

"I thought at that moment his reversal was complete, and the hypocrisy of what he had done would be the most apparent," he said.

McLaurin said he wanted to hold Vance accountable for "gross inconsistencies" in his conduct prior to his candidacy, believing it was crucial to do so when he was on the precipice of power.

Reflecting on their time at Yale Law School together, between 2010 and 2013, McLaurin said that he had a "small degree of faith" that Vance might one day be able to steer the Republican Party toward a more moderate path.

"He was very thoughtful; he did not tow the party line aggressively," McLaurin said.

He said Vance's comments about Trump in 2016 demonstrated that same thoughtfulness and a "deep amount of insight," which is why he felt comfortable reaching out to him in the first place.

Shortly after the conversation, McLaurin said they stopped communicating, and he observed Vance's shift to supporting Trump from afar.

"I guess he was radicalized to some extent by media and Democratic opposition to Trump," McLaurin said. "I think he was more upset by what he saw as attacks on Trump than he was in any way convicted by Trump's approach to politics."

Vance's team did not immediately respond to BI's request for comment.

McLaurin suggested that a personality trait he had observed in Vance could also have influenced the dramatic political evolution.

"I think that both JD and Trump derive a great deal of pleasure out of violating norms or rules that other politicians in the establishment were afraid of violating," he told BI.

"Anybody can go up onstage with Trump and say, 'Make America Great Again,' wear a red hat, and try to play the part," McLaurin said. "But only a handful of people genuinely enjoy dismantling the norms and the institutions that Americans have come to rely on."

He said he saw this behavior recently when Vance blamed President Joe Biden's campaign for the Trump assassination attempt, without evidence.

"What JD really wants to do most of all, I think, is prove that nobody can tell him not to say that," McLaurin said.

• Earlier this year I left my job of seven years to go full time freelance. 
• With my regular wages gone, I had to ask my parents for financial help. 
• My parents are not well-off and are helping me pay my mortgage for six months. 

If anyone asks how I would describe myself, "independent" would be at the top of the list. I've always been focused and hardworking, having been employed since I was 15 years old.

How I earn my money has changed over the years, from working in retail, selling prom dresses and skinny jeans, to writing for a living.

Yet, at 31 years old, I'm more broke than I've ever been.

I left my job to go freelance

In March, I left my job of seven years to go freelance. It was something I'd been working toward since 2021 when I went part-time — after securing a mortgage and my first apartment — so I could properly dip my toe in self-employed waters. In the two days a week I wasn't working at a glossy publishing house, I built up contacts, wrote for different titles, covered new areas, and experienced the joy of controlling my own time.

But being my own boss for two days a week is a lot different from five, something I didn't properly appreciate until my last pay cheque ran out. Until then, I'd been able to focus on writing what I wanted to, often poorly paid but good for my portfolio, with the safety of a good monthly salary. But when my regular wages were gone, writing op-eds about race and identity or hot takes on Hollywood's latest releases wasn't cutting it, and I hadn't yet established consistent income streams. I did something I'd never done before — asked my parents for money to help pay my mortgage.

My parents are helping me for 6 months

I hoped to only ask once, but the next month was tight, too. Now, my parents have committed to paying my mortgage for six months without me asking. They've witnessed how unhappy I was in my 10 years of corporate employment and how my mental health suffered. They've seen me bullied by a former manager and face racial and gender-based micro and macro aggressions. They've seen me apply for endless jobs, mostly to be beaten to the role by someone already covering the vacant position.

They say they're glad to be able to support me, knowing that I'll work hard to be self-sufficient again and that I don't take this gift for granted.

The money is a relief in a world where titles are closing every day, budgets are being slashed, and the pay per piece of work hasn't increased in almost a decade. But my parents' help means more than that — it's a vote of confidence at a time when I'm scared to jump into this new way of working. It's a message that they're here for me, despite living three hours away, and an encouragement to make my goals happen.

They don't expect me to pay them back

It's also special for its singularity, my parents not expecting to be able to help me in this way. While I lived a comfortable childhood and never wanted for anything, we weren't particularly well off. Sometimes, the stars align — my move to freelancing coincided with them receiving a small lump sum, hence their ability to pay my mortgage.

My parents haven't been able to sustain me in such a significant way before, and their insistence that they don't begrudge giving me this money, nor expect me to pay it back, despite my offers, makes it easier not to feel embarrassed or like a failure. After all, it's a tough time to be a journalist. I know that I've done as much as I can to lay the foundations for a sustainable career in a struggling industry in a country deep in a cost-of-living crisis.

I know that this support isn't an ongoing offer nor something I want to rely on. I've got six months to earn enough to build up some savings and start paying into a private pension, hopefully no longer anxious about every penny I spend or in my overdraft after a direct debit I forgot about.

I want to stand on my own two feet, but I can't feel too guilty when the world's not the same as it was for my parents' generation. Until then, I'm taking the money.

• Tyrone McKillen, who leads an 8-person brokerage team in Los Angeles, is leaving Official Partners.
• It's the first major departure after Official cofounders Tal and Oren Alexander were accused of rape.
• Official has distanced itself from the Alexanders and is "assessing options" for its future.  

Tyrone McKillen, a high-profile residential real estate agent based in Los Angeles, is leaving Official Partners, the luxury brokerage company that was thrown into turmoil after two of its cofounders were accused of rape.

McKillen said he hasn't yet formally parted ways with the New York-based firm, but is arranging his exit. The 36-year old broker's sales group, called Plus Real Estate, will now operate independently under that brand going forward. He said that 8 brokers who worked with him at Official will remain with Plus in its breakaway from the firm.

"We have been building the Plus brand over the past 10 years, so it's a natural progression for us," he said.

Nicole Oge, Official's chief growth officer, said that she and McKillen "have a deep amount of respect for one another, I support him in his decision."

The team is the most visible departure so far from the once-ascendant brokerage in the aftermath of startling allegations against Tal and Oren Alexander, sibling agents who were among the cofounders of Official when it was launched in 2022.

In June, The Real Deal, a real estate-focused publication, broke the news that two women had accused Oren and another brother, Alon, of rape in a pair of civil lawsuits that were filed in New York State court in March.

Shortly after the revelation of those cases, a third woman claimed in a New York civil case filed that month that Tal and Alon raped her as Oren watched.

The alleged sexual attacks took place more than a decade ago. The three brothers have denied the allegations.

In a response to the lawsuit against him, Tal stated that his accuser's claims were "fabricated allegations for financial gain." His attorney has sought to dismiss the case.

Official has distanced itself from the Alexanders

In the aftermath of the allegations, Oge announced that "Oren was immediately isolated from the business" and that "the process of removing him from ownership is well underway."

An attorney for Tal announced in a statement in late June that he and Official had mutually agreed that he would "take a leave" from the firm as he focused "fully on clearing his name."

Nonetheless, the close association between the Alexanders, who were among the country's most successful real estate brokers, and Official has dealt collateral damage to the company's image and business pipeline, even as it seeks to distance itself from its once-marquee stars.

JDS Development Group plans to remove the company this week from the sales assignment for 888 Brickell, a high-rise condo tower the firm is building in Miami, according to a person with direct knowledge of JDS's decision making.

Michael Shvo, another builder who is planning a luxury condo project at the Raleigh hotel in Miami Beach, also recently dropped Official from that development's marketing efforts.

John Hudak, a broker based in New York who worked under the Alexanders, also left the company in June, moving to the rival firm Compass.

"You don't go through something like this as a business and be completely unaffected," Oge said.

Oge said that the firm was "in active and productive discussions to move forward as a strengthened entity." She declined to say whether that included a rebranding or reorganization of the company's ownership structure that would seek to more thoroughly eliminate its connection with the Alexanders.

"We have spent time assessing options to determine what's best for our agents and clients," Oge said.

McKillen was a much-heralded addition to Official when he joined the firm in early 2023, credited with overseeing a team that had tallied $1.8 billion of pricey home sales.

In 2017, he arranged the $88 million sale of a Bel Air mansion to the megastar music couple Beyonce and Jay-Z.

"Tyrone is the ultimate exemplification of Official's vision," Richard Jordan, the company's CEO said in a statement at the time of his hiring.

• Steve Bannon took 15 hours of video of Jeffrey Epstein in the months before Epstein died in jail.
• He said it was for a "documentary" — a claim that doesn't stand up to scrutiny.
• Sources say Bannon was friends with Epstein and was trying to rehabilitate his reputation.

Before his 2019 death in jail, Jeffrey Epstein spent hours being interviewed on camera by Steve Bannon.

A clip published by the New York Post in 2021 shows Bannon verbally sparring with Epstein.

Epstein declared he was a "firm believer and supporter" of Time's Up, the organization founded to fight sexual harassment.

"I made my living from old thinking," Epstein said from his palatial Manhattan home. "But the future is for the way women think."

Bannon pushed back.

"Is that kind of sop because of all the depravity you've done against young women?" he asked.

It was vintage Bannon. The right-wing operator threw a Molotov cocktail into the political left's arena, hoping for chaos. And he promoted himself by lashing out at Epstein.

The clip supposedly promoted a documentary, "The Monsters: Epstein's Life Among the Global Elite," from Bannon's production company Victory Films. Before Epstein went to jail on sex-trafficking charges in July 2019, Bannon spent months in the financier's homes in Manhattan and Paris. He boasted that he shot 15 hours' worth of video.

Three years later, no documentary has been released. And Bannon's close relationship with Epstein has been curiously memory-holed.

Bannon grew closer to Epstein in the summer of 2018, advising him on how to handle his myriad legal and media investigations. They continued to spend time with each other through the following summer, when Epstein was arrested in Manhattan on sex-trafficking charges.

The footage remains under wraps.

It has not surfaced anywhere — not in the criminal trial of Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted of assisting Epstein's sex trafficking, nor in numerous civil lawsuits from his victims.

Bannon's explanation that he was producing a documentary about Epstein was nonsense, according to people who spent time with both men around the time they were in each other's lives.

In reality, the two acted like friends around each other. And Bannon, these people said, was trying to help Epstein — a notorious sex offender — with his public-relations problems.

Bannon met Epstein in December 2017, shortly after he stopped working in Donald Trump's White House. Epstein had his own history with Trump; participants in the Manhattan and Palm Beach, Florida, social scenes, they befriended each other in the 1980s but had a falling-out in the 2000s.

After Epstein died in jail while awaiting trial, a compensation program funded by his $630 million estate identified about 150 of his victims. Later litigation put the number closer to 200.

Bannon is serving a four-month sentence after a jury found him guilty of contempt of Congress for flouting a subpoena from the House panel investigating the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021. He's also awaiting trial on criminal charges over his role in We Build the Wall, an organization whose cofounders enriched themselves with money donated for the purpose of building a US-Mexico border wall.

Recent media coverage of Bannon has seldom mentioned Epstein. A 10,000-word Esquire magazine article published last fall about Bannon's machinations in right-wing media, including his role in the ouster of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, made no mention of Epstein.

Bannon, who frequently speaks to journalists, did not respond to numerous voicemails, emails, and text messages from Business Insider over the course of several years requesting comment about his relationship with Epstein.

He did not respond to an additional request for comment in a letter mailed to him on July 9 in the federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut, where he is incarcerated.

Alexandra Preate, a spokesperson for Bannon, told BI in December 2021 that the documentary about Epstein would be screened "probably around Labor Day." The date came and went. Preate has not responded to follow-up queries in the two years since, including a request for comment sent Tuesday.

On tape, Epstein talked about his relationship with Trump

Bannon first publicly claimed the footage was for a "documentary" in September 2021, more than two years after Epstein's death. He told the Daily Mail in a statement at the time that the footage was part of "a planned 50 hours of open ended no holds barred interviews with Epstein for a 8 to 10 hour expose on his deep relationships with the global elites in finance, science, education, medicine, politics and culture."

But people who spoke with Bannon around the time he was shooting the footage told BI that he was trying to improve Epstein's public image. He also may have just wanted some of Epstein's money.

Mark Epstein, Jeffrey Epstein's brother, said Bannon was trying to help his brother "rehabilitate his reputation" after the Miami Herald in 2018 published a series of articles — which ultimately led to an indictment by federal prosecutors in Manhattan — about his sexual abuse of girls in Palm Beach.

Mark Epstein told BI that his brother had sent him footage of some of Bannon's interview with him.

In that interview, Mark Epstein told BI last year, "Jeffrey said he stopped hanging out with Trump when he realized Trump was a crook."

In the 2000s, Trump and Jeffrey Epstein fought over Trump's purchase of a Palm Beach mansion that Epstein coveted. The Miami Herald also reported that Epstein lost his Mar-a-Lago membership after he harassed another member's daughter.

Mark Epstein said he inquired about the footage in a meeting with Bannon in New York after his brother's death but that Bannon refused to share more information.

"He told me he had like 16 hours of videotaping with Jeffrey in his vault," Mark Epstein said. "And he told me it was protected because it was witness preparation and it was protected under attorney-client privilege. But the thing is, Bannon's not an attorney."

Do you have any information about Steve Bannon's footage of Jeffrey Epstein? Contact Business Insider Legal Correspondent Jacob Shamsian at jshamsian@businessinsider.com or on the secure messaging app Signal at JacobShamsian.07.

Mark Epstein said Bannon asked him for money, saying he needed $6 million to complete the documentary. Mark Epstein told BI he declined.

Jeffrey Epstein died in jail before he could go to trial. A years-in-the-making 121-page Justice Department watchdog report published last year found that he killed himself in his cell, but Mark Epstein found it unpersuasive, telling BI last year that it was "blatant bullshit."

Mark Epstein said his brother told him that Bannon recorded the video to help prepare him for testimony. At the time, Jeffrey Epstein was facing civil lawsuits from accusers that could have led to depositions.

"I have also tried to reach Bannon about it a couple of times since our meeting and get no response," Mark Epstein told BI in an email this week.

Mark Epstein said Jeffrey Epstein told him he wasn't subpoenaed for any depositions at that time.

But Mark Epstein said his brother told him that if he had to testify in the future, he "would've had fun with it" and "channeled" Brett Kavanaugh during the now Supreme Court justice's Senate confirmation hearings.

"You know when Kavanaugh was going through his confirmation hearings and he said to the senator: 'Senator, I like beer. My friends like beer. Do you like beer, Senator?'" Mark Epstein said.

"So Jeffrey said he's going to channel Kavanaugh and say: 'Senator, I like pussy. My friends like pussy. Do you like pussy, Senator?'" he said.

The footage hasn't come up in any of the Epstein lawsuits

If Bannon actually needed money, he didn't seem to mention it to his usual financial backers.

Mike Lindell, a long-standing sponsor of Bannon's media empire through his ads for MyPillow, told BI in a recent interview that Bannon never asked him for money to complete the purported documentary.

"I've never heard about it in my life," he said, before launching into a digression about Dominion Voting Systems.

It's also not clear whether Bannon sought money from Guo Wengui, a Chinese business tycoon who is said to be a billionaire and who was a member of Mar-a-Lago. Guo — who also uses the names Ho Wan Kwok and Miles Guo — served as a financial backer of Bannon, allowing the right-wing firebrand to live on his yacht and promoting Bannon's various media projects to his social-media audience of Chinese dissidents. Evidence in Guo's criminal fraud case in Manhattan shows Guo told his followers to watch some of Bannon's other documentaries, but no discussion of Epstein appears in the records.

A representative for Leon Black, the former CEO of Apollo Global Management who maintained a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, told BI that Bannon never asked for money from Black, adding that Bannon did not have a camera during the one occasion when Black and others met with Bannon in Epstein's home. The representative said that the meeting took place shortly after the strategist left the White House and that the group discussed politics.

David Bossie, the president of the right-wing advocacy group Citizens United, who produced other Bannon media projects around this period, didn't respond to a request for comment.

Though the footage would offer a window into the final months of Epstein's life, it doesn't appear to have been subpoenaed for any legal cases involving him or his estate.

Bobbi Sternheim, an attorney for Ghislaine Maxwell, said federal prosecutors didn't subpoena the footage for Maxwell's trial, which was part of the same criminal investigation into Epstein.

Gloria Allred and Arick Fudali, two other attorneys who each represent numerous Epstein victims, also each said they were not aware of the footage being subpoenaed in any case. An attorney representing Epstein's estate executors didn't respond to a request for comment. David Schoen, an attorney who represented both Bannon and Epstein, told BI in an email that he didn't know anything about the footage.

Brad Edwards, an attorney who represents dozens of Epstein's accusers in numerous lawsuits, said the footage hadn't been a part of any of his cases — yet.

"To my knowledge nobody has served a subpoena on Bannon for them, but I see no reason why not," he told BI in an email.

However, he wrote, "there are a couple pending cases now where those tapes will likely be subpoenaed."

Bannon planned to rehabilitate Epstein's reputation

The New York Post story featuring the purported trailer was cowritten by Emma-Jo Morris, who also worked with Bannon to disseminate the contents of Hunter Biden's laptop. Morris told BI she hadn't seen any of Bannon's other Epstein footage and didn't know what happened to the project.

Bannon's time in Epstein's orbit was recounted in the book "Too Famous," published in October 2021 by Michael Wolff, who heavily relied on Bannon as a source for his books about Trump's White House.

In a section titled "Monster," Wolff wrote that Bannon sought to change the public perception of Epstein.

Bannon believed Epstein needed a public-facing communications strategy in response to Julie K. Brown's "Perversion of Justice" series in the Miami Herald. Brown reported Alexander Acosta, who, as a US attorney in Florida in the 2000s, oversaw a criminal investigation into the financier, arranged a light plea deal even though law-enforcement agents were aware that Epstein had abused dozens of girls. Acosta resigned from his position as labor secretary in the Trump administration following the publication of the series.

Wolff's book says that in a March 2019 conference call, Bannon, Epstein, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, and Epstein's defense attorney Reid Weingarten discussed whether Epstein should give a primetime TV interview. They floated the idea of going on CBS's "60 Minutes" or interviewing with Rachel Maddow or Gayle King, Wolff reported.

At one point, Wolff wrote, Epstein "made the gesture of the noose above his head" to express his distaste at the idea of being interviewed by King.

According to the book, Bannon said that recording videos would help Epstein prepare for an interview that would convince the world "he's not a monster."

"He's got to sit there and watch the tape all the time, that's how you learn," Bannon said, according to Wolff. "This is like preparing for a deposition, except this is preparing for the court of public opinion."

Wolff's book includes long excerpts of conversations between Epstein and Bannon, as well as descriptions of Epstein's activities during the time he was close with Bannon. The book does not disclose whether Wolff viewed Bannon's footage.

Quotes in the book suggest that during sit-down interviews with Bannon, Epstein created an air of mystery: He was evasive about his interactions with girls, declined to name the wealthy people he advised on financial issues, and said he'd "escorted" Princess Diana "on occasion."

Bannon also said he believed Epstein was an "intelligence asset," though it doesn't describe any evidence he offered to support the claim.

Bannon, who was the chairman of Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, believed Epstein knew "dangerous secrets about Trump," Wolff wrote.

"You were the only person I was afraid of during the campaign," Bannon told Epstein, according to Wolff's book.

Wolff wrote that Epstein said Trump "regaled him with the torrid details" of his sexual encounter with E. Jean Carroll in Bergdorf Goodman in the mid-1990s. A civil jury last year found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll in the Manhattan department store and defaming her by lying about it.

Wolff wrote that Bannon also appeared skeptical of Epstein's many stories.

"Come on, dude. This is a stinking fish." Bannon told his camera operator, according to Wolff.

"God, it's all such bullshit. Nothing makes any sense in this story," he reportedly said. "Which is what makes it so fucking compelling."

• Ryan Reynolds said he "let go of getting paid" for "Deadpool" to pay his co-writers. 
• The 2016 Marvel movie raked in $782 million worldwide and spawned a franchise worth over $1 billion.
• An analyst said there's an "expectation" that "Deadpool & Wolverine" could make $1 billion.

Ryan Reynolds said he "let go of getting paid" for "Deadpool" because he was determined to make the film and used his salary to pay his co-writers.

Now, the franchise is worth over $1 billion, a figure that a film industry analyst told Business Insider the upcoming sequel "Deadpool & Wolverine," out on July 26, could make on its own.

The film partners Reynolds' foul-mouthed mercenary Deadpool with Hugh Jackman's Wolverine in an adventure that brings the "X-Men" characters into the Marvel Cinematic Universe following Disney's acquisition of Fox.

Reynolds told The New York Times ahead of the film's release that he didn't get paid for the first installment so the co-writers could be on set to ensure its quality.

"No part of me was thinking when 'Deadpool' was finally greenlit that this would be a success. I even let go of getting paid to do the movie just to put it back on the screen," he said.

"They wouldn't allow my co-writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick on set, so I took the little salary I had left and paid them to be on set with me so we could form a de facto writers' room," he added.

Reynolds also acknowledged that many Hollywood blockbusters have huge, inflated budgets, which limit the creativity of the people responsible for bringing them to life.

"I think one of the great enemies of creativity is too much time and money, and that movie had neither time nor money. It really fostered focusing on character over spectacle, which is a little harder to execute in a comic-book movie," Reynolds said.

An analyst says there's an 'expectation' that 'Deadpool & Wolverine' will make $1 billion

Rob Mitchell, director of theatrical insights at Gower Street Analytics, told BI that "'Deadpool' was seen as a big risk," but said that an actor like Reynolds putting their own money into a movie is "not uncommon."

"They're basically saying, 'I won't take money up front. I am basically putting my money where my mouth is. If it's a success, I make money down the line.' That is not uncommon, particularly with some big-name actors. But it's probably less common in superhero franchises," he said.

Mitchell noted that aside from 1998's "Blade," R-rated comic book movies "were an oxymoron" prior to "Deadpool." But Reynolds' faith in the movie paid off because it proved to studios that a violent comic book movie could work.

According to Box Office Mojo, the first "Deadpool" movie made $782 million worldwide against a $58 million budget in 2016, thanks to the character's signature fourth-wall-breaking humor and well-choreographed, violent action scenes.

The 2018 sequel, "Deadpool 2," was given $110 million to play with and raked in $785 million. So, the billion-dollar franchise was worth Reynolds' initial gamble.

Mitchell also pointed out that this success paved the way for Jackman's bloody 2017 Wolverine movie, "Logan," and Warner Bros.' "Joker" in 2019 — the first R-rated movie to make $1 billion at the box office.

"I think there's a lot of expectation that 'Deadpool & Wolverine' could be the second one to do that," Mitchell added.

• Aivaras Vilutis, 28, grew up in Lithuania and moved to Vilnius, the country's capital, as an adult. 
• He shares why he thinks Lithuania was ranked the happiest place on earth for under 30s.
• Vilutis says the outdoor culture, growing startup and tech scene and busy social life are crucial. 

This as-told-to essay is based on a transcribed conversation with a digital marketer Aivaras Vilutis, about being a 28-year-old living in Vilnius, Lithuania. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

I grew up in a small Lithuanian town but moved to the capital, Vilnius, for university. I've lived here most of my adult life.

Vilnius is a growing city full of opportunities. Compared to smaller Lithuanian cities, it has more jobs and events, and there's a constant influx of new people.

Recently, Lithuania topped the World Happiness Report ranking for under 30s, with the country's young people rating themselves 7.76 out of 10 on the happiness scale. I completely understand why, especially as a young person living in Vilnius.

Young people can study for free in Lithuania

When I was in high school, most classmates planned to either learn a trade in college or go to university.

The state funds higher education in public institutions. As long as you pass your national exams during high school, you can apply to a state-funded university with free tuition.

Although our degrees are specialized, you can still change your mind and switch degrees. I initially studied creativity communication but changed my mind. Because I'd completed less than half of my credits for the degree, I could still switch to a new bachelor's and complete it free of charge. This is the standard practice in Lithuanian universities. Our education system didn't put me in a box. I started and completed a degree in neurophysics.

If I had completed more than half the credits for my degree, I would have had to pay to start another degree.

During my four-year neurophysics bachelor's degree, I did several paid internships in science labs and traveled abroad for a semester at NASA, which the university paid for.

When I did an International Internship for NASA in America, people said they appreciated how specialized Lithuanian degrees were, which showed me that our education system is respected internationally.

I left university without any debt, giving me a strong financial start.

There are lots of job opportunities for young people

Lithuania has plenty of laser, medical, and customer support industries that have been around for years. They're still thriving and generating new job opportunities.

We're also becoming a major tech hub. Startups and tech companies are booming in cities like Vilnius, Kaunas, and Klaipėda.

Lithuania is home to unicorn companies like Vinted and Nord Security, and the government has started investing in tech development through national programs. My first job after university was in tech at a simultaneous language interpretation company. I've also worked in digital advertising.

Vilnius is an affordable location for young people

While working in Vilnius, I've earned more than my parents did in their small town. Salaries aren't as high as in Western Europe, but they align with the lower cost of living.

I never worried about money on my digital advertising salary. I ordered takeaway for most dinners and never turned down a social event for money reasons. I've still been able to travel to western countries as well as to cheaper destinations in Eastern Europe.

When I briefly lived in America and other European countries, the cost of everything seemed really high compared to Vilnius.

I can find a place to rent on my own in Vilnius for 600 euros a month. Although I'm not looking to buy a house, my parents bought a two-bedroom apartment eight years ago for around 80,000 euros. House prices are more expensive now, but still cheaper than in other European cities.

Going out with friends is cheap, making for a great social life. A beer costs five euros, and an average restaurant meal costs 10 euros.

As a single person, I can spend as little as 40 euros a week on groceries.

My friends and I attend several concerts or festivals a month because they are either free or very cheap. Nightclub entry is often 10 euros or less.

The capital city is lively and inclusive

Autumn and winter can be very cold in Lithuania. People get excited by the first snowfall of the year, but they also tend to socialize less than they do in the spring and summer. The occasional person experiences seasonal depression when the seasons change, and people go out less, but most appreciate this calmer time.

In Vilnius, outdoor cafés stretch throughout the Old Town, with people catching up over espresso that is just as good as in Italy.

The mix of city and nature is perfectly balanced. There are beautiful outdoor areas, and I run in the woods every morning.

In the summer, my friends and I flock to one of the many lakes scattered around Vilnius.

The city is home to many young people and is more multicultural than other parts of the country, so it feels more open to minorities.

As a member of the LGBTQ+ community, I find Vilnius very safe. People from the LGBTQ+ community move to the city because it's a younger, more accepting demographic, and the culture is more vibrant here. Living in a post-Soviet country, it's difficult to change the views of older people.

I prefer Vilnius to other places I've lived as a young person

I love my country. I have lived elsewhere, including in Portugal, America, and Italy, but I always wanted to return to Vilnius. I missed the hipster bars, Lithuanian craft beer, and the forest greenery. It is the happiest place for me as a young person.

However, outside Vilnius, the situation isn't as good for young people. It's less diverse, and there aren't the same opportunities, so young people often move to bigger cities.

I don't think people in old age would classify Lithuania as one of the happiest places in the world. They don't want to leave, either, but in regional areas, there are fewer opportunities for them. The generation spent most of their lives in the Soviet era and was not exposed to the same opportunities as we are now.

I would love Lithuania to become more multicultural. Our happiness ranking for under 30s is great publicity, but I'm not sure it will encourage people to move here.

You have to live in Vilnius to really understand how welcoming and wonderful the city is. There is a vibe here unlike any other place I have visited or lived.

• Chinese firms have been accused of making job applicants take pregnancy tests.
• Prosecutors in Jiangsu investigated 16 companies in Nantong, according to  Procuratorial Daily.
• This contradicts China's push for higher pregnancy rates amid declining national birth rates.

Several Chinese companies have been accused of introducing a controversial and illegal new step to their recruitment process: Pregnancy tests.

Prosecutors in Nantong, a city in the province of Jiangsu, investigated 16 companies which they said had 168 candidates take pregnancy tests as part of physical pre-employment exams, according to a report by state-run outlet Procuratorial Daily, cited by CNN and South China Morning Post (SCMP).

The Tongzhou district launched the investigation into the unnamed companies earlier this year after being tipped off by a public litigation group, the report said.

Prosecutors said they looked into a physical exam center and two hospitals, the latter of which reported that the women were only given vague verbal warnings and no written confirmation about the tests, the publication said.

In one instance, a woman who was tested and found to be pregnant was not initially hired, according to staff and insurance records cited by the prosecutors in the report.

However, the report added that the woman was later hired and given compensation after the unnamed company was warned about its behavior.

"We can speculate from this evidence that the pregnancy tests were required by these companies, and it had violated women's rights to equal work opportunities," the prosecutors said, according to SCMP.

The report didn't mention whether any companies involved had been fined. As CNN and SCMP reported, Chinese companies can be fined up to 50,000 yuan, or around $6,900, for gender discrimination.

Business Insider could not verify the reports.

The reported anti-pregnancy strategy contradicts the Chinese government's push for women to have more children amid falling birth rates.

The birth rate has fallen so much in recent years that some hospitals are giving up on delivering babies.

The country's national birth rate dropped from 6.77 births per 1,000 people in 2022 to a record low of 6.39 births per 1,000 people in 2023.

Meanwhile, the number of maternity hospitals fell from 807 in 2020 to 793 in 2021, according to official data.

As Business Insider previously reported, the shift can be attributed partly to evolving views of Chinese women, who are prioritizing financial freedom and saving for their retirement over starting a family.

"Let's face it, having a child is like owning an investment with no guaranteed return for at least 18 years," Chen, a Chinese venture capital analyst, told BI in February.

"There's just so much to explore in this world, so much to do in this very short life that I don't see myself taking on the responsibility of having children," Huang, a content creator, told BI.

However, according to Human Rights Watch, those who are choosing to have children are facing discrimination.

It said that after China scrapped its one-child policy several years ago, the majority of women surveyed by various Chinese companies and women's groups said they had been subjected to discrimination.

"Numerous women have described, on social media, to the Chinese media, or in court documents, their experiences being asked about their childbearing status during job interviews, being forced to sign contracts pledging not to get pregnant, and being demoted or fired for being pregnant," it said.

• My grandparents raised me and my brother, and they were older than my friends' parents.
• They were more strict than other parents, but there were also benefits to their age.
• They also became loving and affectionate great grandparents to my kids.

I can't remember the first time I realized how different my family was from my friends' families, but the feeling followed me right into college and my adult life afterward. My parents both had drug addictions and split up by the time I was 10 months old. My father got remarried and disappeared from my life, and my mother retreated to what seemed like the other side of the world, Southern California. She died of a drug overdose when I was 7.

In my parent's absence, my grandparents raised me and my brother. We also had an extended family helping out and a foster mother, Esther, who started taking us during the week when my grandmother went to work. Soon, we stayed with Est and her three biological children on weekends and for certain holidays.

I always felt like my family was different

We lived in a city just outside Boston and were not what the 1980s nuclear family we were surrounded by looked like. I wanted so desperately to be normal. On the sitcoms I grew up with, kids went to their moms and dads to help solve whatever problems they had. Then, 30 minutes later — 22, if you don't count commercials — the issue was fixed.

Most of my friends had a mother and a father. I watched them go to father-daughter dances. Some of their parents were divorced but still involved in their lives. They didn't have to wonder who to make the card out to for Mother's Day or if they could make two because they didn't want to hurt anybody's feelings by leaving them out. I never saw them ask how to get a Father's Day card to their dad because they didn't have his address. For Mother's Day, I went to the cemetery, stole flowers from a random gravesite, and searched for my mother's grave. I never found her.

While I loved my grandparents, being raised by them was confusing to me and to every parent who ever asked if they could call my mom about a sleepover or check in about a bake sale. Every time I made a new friend, it also meant making a fresh introduction to my unusual family. "No, I don't have a mother," I remember saying so often it seemed to become a cursory part of any conversation I had with my friends' parents.

"Who do you live with?" They would ask as confusion was replaced with sadness when I answered.

My grandparents were strict; they came from a different generation when kids had adult responsibilities. I could cook dinner at 10 and knew how to wash and hang curtains. I spent the Saturdays of my youth cleaning the house alongside my grandmother, who believed cleanliness was next to Godliness. Sometimes my friends would come to see if I could play, and I would have to send them away in what felt like a Cinderella moment.

They were different from my friends' parents. They dressed differently, listened to music from a different era, and held beliefs based on how and when they were raised. My grandmother and grandfather were the children of immigrants. They had witnessed the Great Depression and World War II. Hard work and their belief in God were the standards they lived and died by. They didn't care to discuss mental health, believed kids should be seen and not heard, and we've always had different political views.

There were benefits to being raised by my grandparents

While being raised differently from most of my peers wasn't easy, it also had benefits. It was through my grandparents that I learned some of my greatest lessons. I knew the words to every single song from the 1950s and 1960s.

When my friends and I went through a phase where we were obsessed with the 1950s, I had access to people who lived through the era and looked back on it fondly. My grandparents even allowed me to have a 1950s birthday party where we played their records and learned their dances.

My friends loved my grandparents, who were always eager to have them over for dinner or a sleepover, as long as chores were done. My grandmother loved to sit and talk with us and hear the latest gossip. Being raised by my grandparents also gave me an appreciation for hard work and seeing things through.

Gram and Gramps also went on to become caring and attentive great grandparents to my kids. Because of them, I had a place to grow up alongside my extended family. I am forever grateful, even if my childhood didn't look the same as my friends.