New resignations in Keir Starmer’s entourage after the Epstein scandal. Tim Allan leaves, pressure on the prime minister. Prince William expresses “deep concern” and thinks of the victims
The publication of the new Epstein Files continues to send shockwaves through governments, diplomacies and royal families. In the United Kingdom the epicenter is Downing Street, where the Labor prime minister Keir Starmer finds itself facing a political crisis that does not arise from a direct act, but from a chain of relationships and appointments that today appear politically explosive.
The person who resigned was Tim Allan, the prime minister’s communications director, a veteran of media strategy who was already close to Tony Blair in the 1990s. “I have decided to step aside to allow the construction of a new team in Downing Street,” he declared, in a formula that in the British political lexicon sounds like a necessary step backwards to ease the pressure on the top. He is the fourth communications director to leave since Starmer took office, a fact that tells more than any analysis of the fragility of the internal balance.
The resignation comes a few hours after that of Morgan McSweeney, the prime minister’s chief of staff, overwhelmed by the scandal linked to Peter Mandelsonhistorical figure of New Labor and former British ambassador to the United States, came under fire in a Scotland Yard investigation for his relations with Jeffrey Epstein. The issue does not only concern Mandelson’s past, but the political choice of repositioning him in a leading diplomatic role despite already known and discussed ties.
Downing Street, however, has made it known that Starmer does not intend to resign and remains “focused on his job”. A line of resistance that will be put to the test this evening, when the prime minister will speak to Labor MPs in an attempt to regroup the parliamentary group and rebuild internal trust. The conservative opposition, led by Kemi Badenochopenly calls for the prime minister to “take responsibility” and leave office.
The royal family breaks their silence
If the political crisis moves on the terrain of institutional responsibilities, the symbolic one directly affects the monarchy. For the first time since the last wave of revelations in the United States, the Prince of Wales Prince William And Catherine Middleton have released an official note in which they express “deep concern” about the continuing revelations emerging from the Epstein Files and underline how their thoughts are “aimed at the victims”.
It is a measured but significant stance, because it breaks the silence that until now had characterized the most prominent members of the Windsors on a matter that directly involves the former Duke of York, Prince Andrew, already excluded from public life after the scandal linked to his relations with Epstein. In recent days too King Charles III it had been contested during a public visit, a sign that the pressure of public opinion is not limited to politics but affects the entire British establishment.
Maxwell, Congress and the American echo
On the American side, Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s former partner and collaborator, is expected for a closed-door hearing before the House Oversight Committee, although her lawyer has already confirmed that she will exercise her right to remain silent. Meanwhile, new hypotheses on the international role of the financier continue to circulate in the United States, relaunched by the press and conservative commentators, while the Washington Post reports that as early as 2011, Epstein’s lawyers had asked the CIA for documents to clarify a possible affiliation with the agency, receiving a response that neither confirmed nor denied.
The story, which has been going through the courts and front pages for years, is thus transformed into a prism that reflects political fragilities, diplomatic embarrassments and questions that have never completely subsided about the relationships between power, finance and international relations.
A government under pressure
For Starmer, the challenge is not only mediatic but structural: to demonstrate that Labor in government can guarantee transparency and accountability without being sucked into the long shadow of the past. The risk, otherwise, is that the Epstein scandal becomes the detonator of a broader crisis, capable of eroding the credibility built over months of work.
The evening in Westminster will tell whether the prime minister will be able to contain the fracture or whether the resignation already received represents only the first chapter of a more turbulent political phase. Meanwhile, the clearest message, at least symbolically, comes from Kensington Palace: the victims must remain at the center. Everything else – governments, positions, careers – comes later.
