Is Trump showing signs of mental shakiness after claiming he had "nothing to do" with Jeffrey Epstein and had been "totally exonerated" in the whole matter?

Trump addresses reporters on Air Force One (Reuters)

If you are among the many Americans who have been wondering about Donald Trump's mental health, you now have additional reasons to suspect the president has more than a few misfiring synapses inside his 79-year-old brain. As Trump flew back to Washington on Monday night after spending a holiday weekend at Mar-a-Lago, he stood before assembled reporters on Air Force One and proclaimed that he had "nothing to do" with the late sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and that he had been "totally exonerated" in the matter.

Assuming journalists consume the news while also creating it, those gathered before Trump likely knew he was lying on the first point. As for Trump's second point, about "exoneration" . . . well, those who gather the news often have experience covering court proceedings. That means Trump's words must have left them thinking, "The president of the United States has no idea what 'exoneration' means." 

Here is a primer on a word that often is used as a legal term, one with a specific meaning. This is from the website for the Capitol City Group of the Twin Cities in Minnesota:

The legal definition of exoneration is the official clearing of a person’s name from guilt or blame. It typically applies when a person has been convicted of a crime and later proven to be innocent. When a court sets aside a conviction, vacates a judgment, or dismisses all charges based on new evidence, that person is said to have been exonerated.

The Epstein files represent an ever-growing mountain of evidence that eventually could be used to charge Trump with some of the most heinous crimes imaginable -- the rape and murder of children, perhaps the financing or furtherance of Epstein's human-trafficking scheme. But at this point, Trump does not appear close to being charged. And with his own Department of Justice (DOJ) seemingly engaged in a cover-up -- as Hillary Clinton eloquently alleged on Tuesday -- the odds seem slim that anyone in authority ever will have the stones to hold Trump accountable. 

Speaking of Mrs. Clinton, her words seemed to get under Trump's tissue-thin skin when relayed to him by reporters. A jointly published article by Mediaite and Yahoo! sets the scene under the headline "Trump Tells Reporters He Had 'Nothing To Do With Jeffrey Epstein' Amid New Accusations in Epstein Files; 'Totally Exonerated!' Tommy Christopher writes:

President Donald Trump claimed he “had nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein” and is “totally exonerated” despite 38,000 mentions and new accusations in the Epstein Files.

Media and public attention has intensified since the latest release of Epstein files documents at the end of January. Among the 3 million pages were more than 5,300 documents mentioning Trump, including multiple claims of sexual misconduct against Trump in FBI documents.

One document contained an allegation that Trump and Jeffrey Epstein raped a girl together, from a witness who said he heard Trump brag about the crime. 

How did Trump go off the rails on the word "exoneration"? It happened mainly because a reporter pushed him on the issue, as Christopher sets out:

One reporter asked Trump about comments that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made in an interview with the BBC in which she said she and former President Bill Clinton were “pulled in” to divert attention from Trump.

The president responded by claiming the files “totally exonerated” him:

REPORTER: So Hillary Clinton said in an interview today that she and her husband are getting pulled into the Epstein matter to divert attention from you. !And that your administration has something to hide. What’s your response?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I have nothing to hide! I’ve been exonerated! I have nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein.

They went in hoping that they’d find it and found just the opposite. I’ve been totally exonerated.

And in fact, Jeffrey Epstein was fighting that I don’t get elected with some author, a sleazebag, by the way. 

And I’ve been totally exonerated.

No, no, they’re getting pulled in. And that’s their problem. I don’t know. They’re gonna have to see what happens. But I watched her in Munich, and she seriously has Trump derangement syndrome.

REPORTER: You think that she should publicly testify? 

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: You know, I’ve been totally exonerated on Epstein. And it’s really interesting because they’ve been pulled in.

Think of it. They’ve been pulled in. Clinton and many other Democrats have been pulled in.