New emails suggest Trump knew about conduct of late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein

In messages released by House Democrats, Epstein wrote ‘of course [Trump] knew about the girls’

Portrait of American financier Jeffrey Epstein (left) and US president Donald Trump as they pose together at the Mar-a-Lago estate, Palm Beach, Florida, 1997. Picture: Davidoff Studios/Getty Images

Damning new emails that suggest Donald Trump knew about the conduct of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein were released Wednesday, including one in which Epstein said “of course [Trump] knew about the girls” that were procured for his sex-trafficking ring.

The release of the three messages by Democrats on the House oversight committee is likely to add significant pressure on the White House to release the so-called Epstein files, reportedly detailing the long-running scandal that has overshadowed Trump’s second term of office.

Numerous victims have said they were assaulted at Epstein’s infamous parties that took place at his home in New York, his Florida mansion, and at his compound at Little St James in the US Virgin Islands, to which “clients” would be ferried by private jet.

In one of the memos, Epstein alleged to his co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell in April 2011 that Trump had a lengthy engagement in the company of one of the disgraced financier’s sex-trafficked victims.

“I want you to realize that that dog that hasn’t barked is trump.. [victim name redacted] spent hours at my house with him ,, he has never once been mentioned,” the message reads.

In her reply, Maxwell said: “I have been thinking about that.” 

A second message, sent by Epstein to Trump biographer Michael Wolff in January 2019, indicates that Trump had asked him to resign from Mar-a-Lago, the president’s exclusive members-only club in Florida.

But Epstein said he was “never a member ever” and adds “of course he knew about the girls as he asked Ghislaine to stop”.

Epstein’s long-time friend and co-conspirator Maxwell is currently serving a 20-year sentence after her conviction for sex-trafficking crimes, including procuring girls to be abused.

A third message, sent by Epstein to Wolff in December 2015, solicited the author’s advice about fashioning a response for Trump to questions CNN was reportedly preparing to ask him about their relationship.

“If we were able to craft an answer for him, what do you think it should be?” Epstein asked.

“I think you should let him hang himself,” Wolff responded.

“If he says he hasn’t been on the plane or to the house, then that gives you a valuable PR and political currency. You can hang him in a way that potentially generates a positive benefit for you … “Of course, it is possible that, when asked, he’ll say Jeffrey is a great guy and has gotten a raw deal and is a victim of political correctness, which is to be outlawed in a Trump regime.” 

Trump has consistently denied having knowledge of Epstein’s activities, which included the operation of a sex-trafficking ring that procured teen girls for wealthy and influential associates. Epstein killed himself in 2019 while in federal custody.

In a statement on Wednesday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Democrats “selectively leaked emails to the liberal media to create a fake narrative to smear President Trump”.

Leavitt identified the unnamed victim in the redacted email as Virginia Giuffre, who named Epstein, Maxwell and the Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the former prince, among her abusers, but never publicly accused Trump.

In her posthumous memoir, Nobody’s Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice, Giuffre said she was recruited by Maxwell from Mar-a-Lago, where she worked as a teenager. She died by suicide in April aged 41.

Giuffre, Leavitt said in the statement, “repeatedly said President Trump was not involved in any wrongdoing whatsoever and ‘couldn’t have been friendlier’ to her in their limited interactions.

“The fact remains that President Trump kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club decades ago for being a creep to his female employees, including Giuffre.

“These stories are nothing more than bad-faith efforts to distract from President Trump’s historic accomplishments, and any American with common sense sees right through this hoax and clear distraction from the government opening back up again.” 

Democrats, however, have accused the White House of covering up Trump’s alleged involvement and have consistently called on Pam Bondi, Trump’s attorney general, to release documents about the scandal which have come to be known as the Epstein Files.

In a statement, the oversight committee’s ranking member, Robert Garcia, said: “The more Donald Trump tries to cover up the Epstein Files, the more we uncover. These latest emails and correspondence raise glaring questions about what else the White House is hiding and the nature of the relationship between Epstein and the president.” 

Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California, told the Guardian that this is “exactly why” he was working with the Republican representative Thomas Massie to force a House floor vote on the full release of the Epstein files.

“The public deserves transparency and the survivors deserve justice,” he said.

A vote could come quickly as the House prepared to reconvene Wednesday after the lengthy government shutdown.

The Republican speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, who has opposed the release of the full tranche of Epstein investigation records, has said he will swear in Arizona’s newly elected congresswoman Adelita Grijalva, set to be the 218th signature needed on a discharge petition that would force a vote.

“Republicans are running a pedophile protection program, they are intentionally hiding the Jeffrey Epstein Files,” Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader, said on Tuesday, accusing Johnson of delaying Grijalva’s swearing-in for seven weeks to defend Trump.

Maxwell, meanwhile, is seeking a commutation of her sentence from Trump, according to Democrats on the House judiciary committee.

“You should not grant any form of clemency to this convicted and unrepentant sex offender,” the committee’s ranking member, Congressman Jamie Raskin, wrote the president.

The supreme court last month rejected Maxwell’s appeal to overturn her criminal conviction.

Additional reporting by Shrai Popat

 - The Guardian