US lawmakers have made available over 20,000 pages of documents from the estate of Jeffrey Epstein, a financier and convicted sex offender, with some files referencing President Donald Trump. On Wednesday, Democrats from the House Oversight Committee shared email exchanges involving Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell, who is currently serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex trafficking. The disclosed emails also included communication between Epstein and author Michael Wolff.
In response, House Republicans released a substantial number of documents to counter claims made by the Democrats. They criticized the Democrats for allegedly cherry-picking information to create a misleading narrative about Trump. Although Trump had a longstanding friendship with Epstein, he claims they had a falling out in the early 2000s, before Epstein’s first arrest. Trump has consistently denied any involvement in Epstein’s activities.
One notable email from 2011 quotes Epstein mentioning Trump in relation to a victim, the identity of whom was initially redacted but later revealed as Virginia Giuffre. The White House indicated that Giuffre had spoken positively about Trump during their limited interactions. Representative Robert Garcia explained that victim names were redacted in line with family wishes.
Additional emails concerned Trump’s relationship with Epstein during the 2016 presidential campaign. Wolff suggested strategies for managing Trump’s narrative regarding Epstein. In a 2019 email, Epstein claimed Trump had asked him to resign from his membership at Mar-a-Lago and alleged that Trump had knowledge of “the girls” involved.
The White House, through Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, condemned the emails as selectively leaked to smear Trump, emphasizing that he had distanced himself from Epstein years prior. Leavitt stated that the released documents did not prove any wrongdoing on Trump’s part.
Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3rj0d97ynvo?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=rss