Clinton evidence ‘raises new questions’ about Trump’s falling out with Epstein

Las Vegas: Bill Clinton’s closed-door evidence about Jeffrey Epstein raised “new questions” about Donald Trump’s falling out with the disgraced sex offender, Democrats said following an unprecedented deposition of a former president, as they escalated their calls for the current president to testify.

Clinton spent hours on Friday (US time) answering questions under oath at a hearing in New York state, marking the first time a former or sitting president had been compelled to testify before Congress. His wife, former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, had testified to the same committee the previous day.

Republicans praised Clinton for being “candid” in his responses, even answering questions against his attorney’s advice. Committee chairman James Comer, a Republican and close ally of Trump, was asked after the six-hour-plus hearing whether he now accepted the Clintons had nothing to do with Epstein’s crimes.

“They said they weren’t – I guess [it’s] innocent until proven guilty,” Comer said.

But the two sides of politics were at odds over elements of Clinton’s testimony, which remains sealed for now. Comer emerged from the morning session to tell reporters that Clinton had partly exonerated Trump.

Trump “has never said anything to me to make me think that he was involved” with Epstein, Clinton told the committee, according to Comer.

“I know there’s a lot of curiosity about President Trump. I thought that was an interesting thing that President Clinton said,” Comer added.

However, Democrats immediately cast doubt on the accuracy of those remarks. Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the committee, said it was an incomplete summary and that the former president had brought up additional information that called into question some of Trump’s past comments about Epstein.

Maxwell Frost, a Democratic congressman from Florida, said on X that Clinton “brought up a conversation he had with Trump” in New York about Epstein.

Trump told Clinton he fell out with Epstein “due to a land dispute”, Frost said, summarising Clinton’s evidence. “This directly refutes Trump’s claims about why he fell out with Epstein.”

Trump previously claimed he fell out with Epstein because the financier was “stealing” young female staff from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida – specifically, Epstein’s most well-known accuser, Virginia Giuffre, who died by suicide in Australia last year.

This masthead could not immediately verify the claims about Clinton’s testimony. Under the US system, these semi-private hearings are held behind closed doors, and the video and transcript are typically released by the committee at a later date.

Democrats said the transcript should be released immediately. “Claims that President Clinton fully exonerated Trump are wrong and a mischaracterisation,” they said in a statement.

Clinton published a copy of his opening statement, reiterating his claim that he had no knowledge of the crimes Epstein was committing, and this would not change, “no matter how many photos you show me”.

“I saw nothing, and I did nothing wrong,” Clinton said. “Even with 20/20 hindsight, I saw nothing that ever gave me pause. We are only here because he hid it from everyone so well for so long. By the time it came to light with his 2008 guilty plea, I had long stopped associating with him.”

The Clintons have not been accused of any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein. They were issued a subpoena by the Republican-controlled House oversight committee on the grounds that Bill Clinton was friends with Epstein in the 1990s and early 2000s, and made numerous trips on the financier’s private plane.

Bill Clinton also appeared frequently in the millions of pages of Epstein files released by the Justice Department. That included new photos of Clinton in a jacuzzi with a woman whose face was redacted, and of Clinton and Epstein’s friend and accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell in a pool with another woman.

CNN reported that Clinton told lawmakers he did not know who the woman in the jacuzzi was, and he did not have sex with her, citing sources familiar with the testimony.

Democrats said the Clintons’ appearance before the committee set a new precedent that meant Trump should now answer questions about his relationship with Epstein under oath.

‘Historic day for transparency’

Yassamin Ansari, a congresswoman from Arizona, said it was a “historic day for transparency” in the US, and “ultimately, what this demonstrates is that nobody is above the law”.

She also mentioned “very credible allegations” against the president that had been investigated by the FBI – a reference to notes from FBI interviews with a woman who accused Epstein and Trump of sexual crimes, and which were missing from the Epstein files.

Garcia said Trump should be forced to testify. “This is not a hoax; he has not been exonerated, and we have serious questions for President Trump.”

Earlier on Friday, Trump told reporters that he didn’t like seeing Clinton deposed before Congress. He also said his commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, would comply with any subpoena to testify about his relationship with Epstein if one were issued.

Lutnick was a next-door neighbour of Epstein in Manhattan, and has recently acknowledged meetings with Epstein years after he claimed to have severed contact with the convicted sex offender. That included visiting Epstein’s island with his family for lunch in December 2012.

Trump said on Friday that Lutnick was “a very innocent guy” – which again elicited a harsh response from the Democrats.

“Donald Trump has asserted many times that he knew nothing of Epstein’s crimes,” Frost said. “If he doesn’t know anything … how can he know for sure that Lutnick is a ‘very innocent guy’?”

Speaking after the deposition concluded, some Republicans on the committee said they still had questions about whether Epstein was an intelligence asset or was running a honeypot operation to compromise powerful people using sexual blackmail.