Second big batch of Epstein files includes many mentions of Trump
The newly released documents include several tips that were collected by the FBI about Presideont Donald Trump’s involvement with Jeffrey Epstein and parties at their properties in the early 2000s.
Three days after releasing a large tranche of Jeffrey Epstein documents that contained few mentions of President Donald Trump, the Justice Department disclosed thousands more files that included wide-ranging references to the president.
The documents show that a subpoena was sent to Mar-a-Lago in 2021 for records that pertained to the government’s case against Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s accomplice in sex trafficking. They include notes from an assistant U.S. attorney in New York about the number of times Trump flew on Epstein’s plane, including one flight that included just Trump, Epstein and a 20-year-old woman, according to the notes.
The newly released documents also include several tips that were collected by the FBI about Trump’s involvement with Epstein and parties at their properties in the early 2000s. The documents do not show whether any follow-up investigations took place or whether any of the tips were corroborated.
» READ MORE: Justice Department releases limited set of files tied to Epstein sex trafficking investigation
In a statement Tuesday morning, the Justice Department said: “Some of these documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims made against President Trump” that it characterized as “unfounded and false.”
“Nevertheless, out of our commitment to the law and transparency, the DOJ is releasing these documents with the legally required protections for Epstein’s victims,” the statement said.
The documents were available for several hours Monday afternoon and evening on the Justice Department website but appeared to have been taken down around 8 p.m. The Washington Post downloaded the full set of files while they were accessible. The department reposted the files on its website shortly before midnight Monday night. It was not immediately clear whether officials had done any further redactions of the documents before posting.
The department did not immediately respond to questions about why the documents had been posted and then apparently removed. The White House also did not respond to requests for comment about the newly released documents.
» READ MORE: At least 16 files have disappeared from the DOJ webpage for documents related to Jeffrey Epstein
Being mentioned in a mass trove of investigatory documents does not demonstrate criminal wrongdoing. Trump has not been accused of being involved in Epstein’s criminal activities. It has long been known that Trump had a years-long friendship with Epstein that ended in the early 2000s.
The president has said he did not know about Epstein’s criminal behavior, and his spokesperson has said he kicked Epstein out of his Mar-a-Lago Club for being a “creep.”
Epstein, a wealthy financier and convicted sex offender, died in 2019 while in federal custody awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges. His death was ruled a suicide.
» READ MORE: Judge chides Ghislaine Maxwell for mentioning victim names in papers seeking to overturn conviction
The files include correspondence among prison officials about Epstein’s psychological assessments, with discussions about holding him in a special housing unit about two weeks before he died.
“We have supporting memorandums from the responding officers who indicated they observed inmate Epstein with a makeshift noose around his neck,” one of the emails stated.
At one point, the documents indicate, prison officials planned to house Epstein in a cell with Cesar Sayoc, a fanatical supporter of Trump’s who in 2019 was sentenced to 20 years in prison after he mailed explosive devices to prominent Democrats and media figures.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons did not respond to requests for comment about Epstein’s incarceration.
Also included in this batch of files are a large number of documents related to objections filed by Epstein’s victims in 2008 after Alex Acosta, the U.S. attorney in Miami, reached an agreement not to prosecute Epstein on federal charges in return for his pleading guilty to less-serious state charges of soliciting prostitution from a minor.
There is a 22-page memo from the criminal division of the Justice Department to authorities in the United Kingdom, seeking to interview “material witness PA,” a reference to Prince Andrew. It outlines what has been uncovered about him and seeks a voluntary interview. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the brother of King Charles III, was recently stripped of his royal titles, including that of prince, because of his links to Epstein.
The files are being released in compliance with a law passed by Congress last month that mandated the disclosure of Epstein-related documents. Trump signed the measure into law, but on Monday, he repeated some of his long-standing objections to the disclosures.
Asked about the Justice Department’s release on Friday of photos of former president Bill Clinton with Epstein, Trump, who has called on the department to investigate Clinton and other Democrats, suggested that he had some sympathy for the former president.
“I don’t like the pictures of Bill Clinton being shown. I don’t like the pictures of other people being shown. I think it’s a terrible thing,” he told reporters during an event at Mar-a-Lago. “Bill Clinton’s a big boy. He can handle it, but you probably have pictures being exposed of other people that innocently met Jeffrey Epstein years ago. Many years ago. And they’re, you know, highly respected bankers and lawyers and others.”
» READ MORE: House Democrats release photos of Trump, Clinton, and Andrew from Epstein’s estate
Trump was responding to questions about Epstein at an event at Mar-a-Lago on Monday at which he announced he would be overseeing the development of a new class of Navy battleship named after himself.
“Everybody was friendly with this guy, either friendly or not friendly,” Trump said. “But I mean, he was around. He was all over Palm Beach and other places. The head of Harvard was his best friend — Larry Summers — and Bill Clinton was a friend of his, but everybody was. I actually threw him out of Mar-a-Lago.”
The wave of files released Friday had few documents that mentioned Trump, even while administration officials have acknowledged that the president’s name is included multiple times throughout the files.
The initial batch, however, included a number of photographs of Clinton, who appeared in a swimming pool and a hot tub, as well as in more formal settings or posing with Michael Jackson.
Clinton spokesman Angel Ureña suggested Monday that the administration had engineered the releases to shield Trump, something Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has denied. On Monday, Ureña issued a statement on X demanding that all photographs and documents related to Clinton be released immediately.
“What the Department of Justice has released so far, and the manner in which it did so, makes one thing clear: someone or something is being protected,” Ureña said in the statement. “We do not know whom, what or why. But we do know this: We need no such protection.”
The new documents at times provide a window onto what federal prosecutors had been examining, as well as their awareness of ties that Epstein had with Trump.
In January 2020, during Trump’s first term, for example, an assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York wrote an internal email about a review of flight records the day before as part of the government’s case against Maxwell, who was convicted in 2021 of sex trafficking.
“For your situational awareness, wanted to let you know that the flight records we received yesterday reflect that Donald Trump traveled on Epstein’s private jet many more times than previously has been reported (or that we were aware), including during the period we would expect to charge in a Maxwell case,” the email states.
There were at least eight flights, the prosecutor wrote, between 1993 and 1996 in which Trump was a passenger. On at least four of those flights Maxwell was also present.
In some cases, the prosecutor wrote, there were passengers who could be called as possible witnesses in a case against Maxwell.
“We’ve just finished reviewing the full records (more than 100 pages of very small script) and didn’t want any of this to be a surprise down the road,” the prosecutor wrote.
The full reason for the subpoena to Mar-a-Lago was not immediately clear, but an assistant U.S. attorney had been seeking past employment records from Trump’s club that were relevant in the case against Maxwell.
“I have not been able to locate anyone who recalls [redacted] working at Mar a Lago in 2000,” the federal prosecutor wrote in an internal email.
The subpoenas issued to Mar-a-Lago were also included in the latest documents. Attached to one of the subpoenas was a letter dated Feb. 12, 2015, on Mar-a-Lago letterhead, in which officials of the club indicate that they don’t have the employment records from 1999 to 2001 that federal agents are seeking. They found an employee by the name they were seeking on a 2000 spreadsheet but could not confirm it was the same person without more identifying information.
Trump on Monday also grew annoyed with reporters who asked him about Epstein.
“What this whole thing is with Epstein is a way of trying to deflect from the tremendous success that the Republican Party has,” he said. “Like, for instance, today we’re building the biggest ships in the world, the most powerful ships in the world, and they’re asking me questions about Jeffrey Epstein. I thought that was finished."