Secretary of the Navy John Phelan was listed on a March 3, 2006 flight manifest for Jeffrey Epstein’s Boeing 727, traveling from Luton, London to JFK. The flight-manifest-march-3-2006, released by the House Oversight Committee, is document HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_007300.
The private jet flight lasted six hours and forty-seven minutes. It’s not something you accidentally step on, or go without a reason. The Jeffrey Epstein manifest shows six men with six redactions:
- Jean-Luc Brunel — the French modeling agent whose documented role in Epstein’s operation was procuring underage girls, and who was found hanged in a Paris prison cell in 2022 while awaiting trial for rape of minors.
- Jimmy Cayne, then-CEO of Bear Stearns, who died in 2021.
- Theodore Serure, a New York plastic surgeon.
- Brian Higgins.
- Craig Overlander.
- And John Phelan.
Six other names, next to these men on the manifest, had to be redacted to protect them. The Department of Justice explains the redactions in these documents as “largely used to protect the names of victims and other identifying information.”
Six named men. Six redacted names. That’s an escort pattern of Brunel.
A private 727 with a convicted sex trafficker and his primary recruiter of underage girls, flying from one of his primary sourcing cities to New York.
Phelan of course declined to comment.
CNN wants us to know that a “close friend” said Jimmy Cayne had invited Phelan, that Phelan didn’t know it would be Epstein’s plane until he arrived, and that after he boarded anyway with Brunel, Epstein and six redacted “victims”… during the entire flight Epstein only pitched “a tax concept”, which Phelan “had no interest in.”
A tax concept. For six hours. In a sealed tube over the Atlantic. We are being forced to guess why he was too busy with other matters to be interested.
Anyone who has investigated crimes of big corporate America recognizes this story instantly. The private jet, as a controlled environment for sexual access to young women, is not an Epstein invention. This is an executive perk of a long institutional history of misogynistic abuse.
The mechanics are always the same: a sealed environment with no exit, no outside witnesses, a crushing power asymmetry, and a business reason for everyone being there. Think about what Phelan reveals through his friend’s statement: no data before getting on the plane, then a dumb tax concept, and can’t get away from it for seven hours. Trapped.
That’s a confession, a projection of the entrapment scheme for underaged girls. If Phelan couldn’t get out how could they?
The young women are always young “staff” or “assistants” or “models” or, in this case, names that had to be redacted to protect them. There is always a meeting, always a pitch, always a thin legitimate purpose that explains why everyone was in a locked tube together. The business reason is not the point. The business reason is the thing you say afterward for why you couldn’t escape.
“Tax concept” as cover story machinery shows that it is still operating. No one gets on a plane let alone flies nearly seven hours on a private 727 to hear a tax pitch they have no interest in. But “tax concept” is exactly the kind of explanation that gets generated when someone needs a reason — any reason — for why six names are redacted. It has the specific vagueness of a story constructed after the fact: detailed enough to sound like something, empty enough to be unverifiable. Epstein pitched a concept. Phelan wasn’t interested in that concept. That is not a memory. That is a curated press statement.
The invitation came from Jimmy Cayne, who is dead.
The host was Jeffrey Epstein, who is dead by suspicious “suicide”.
The recruiter aboard was Jean-Luc Brunel, who is dead by suspicious “suicide”.
Every person positioned to confirm or deny the circumstances is either deceased, redacted, or hiding behind an anonymous “close friend.”
The CNN reporter emphasizes “there is no evidence Phelan knew of any wrongdoing.” This does not mean evidence of innocence. It’s the opposite, that evidence of guilt has not been made public yet. It is a statement about the state of disclosure, not about what happened.
What the manifest establishes is simpler than any cover story: John Phelan chose to get into a tube with Brunel and Epstein and remain on a private aircraft for over sex hours with sex individuals whose identities required legal protection. Sorry, I meant six and six. The redaction pattern says who they were. The passenger ratio says why they were there.
Donald Trump, the primary name in the Epstein Files, nominated Phelan for Secretary of the Navy in November 2024, calling him a man who “excelled in every endeavor.” Presumably he includes this file. The Senate confirmed him in March 2025.
He now oversees the United States Navy.
No one has asked Phelan, on the record, who the six redacted passengers were. No one has asked him what happened during those six hours and forty-seven minutes beyond a tax pitch. No one has asked him why every corroborating witness is conveniently dead.
The manifest is out. Six men, six redacted, six hours. How can this be anything other than six? Oops, I meant sex.
The silence is deafening.