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The president Donald Trump accused the Democrats of using the case of Jeffrey Epstein to distract from what he described as their “huge failures,” particularly the government shutdown in the United States.
In messages posted on his social media Truth Social, Trump stated that his rivals “are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein deception again” because “they will do anything” to prevent public attention from focusing on the budget crisis.
"In other words, the Democrats are using Jeffrey Epstein's deception to try to divert attention from their immense failures, particularly the most recent one: THE GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN!” wrote the president.
In another message, he insisted that “only a very bad or stupid Republican would fall into that trap” and argued that his opponents “have cost our country 1.5 trillion dollars with their recent antics of cruelly shutting down our country while endangering many, and they should pay a fair price.”
Trump claimed that “there should be no distractions towards Epstein or anything else” and that any Republican involved must focus “solely on reopening our country and repairing the enormous damage caused by the Democrats.”
The president's statements came after the Democrats of the House Oversight Committee released previously unreleased emails related to Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender whose death and network of high-profile contacts remain under intense scrutiny.
These messages, obtained from referencing Epstein's estate, show correspondence spanning over a decade with Ghislaine Maxwell —his former associate, convicted of sex trafficking— and author Michael Wolff, who is close to Trump's circle. In them, Epstein mentions the president by name several times.
In one of the emails, dated April 2, 2011, and independently reviewed by CNN, Epstein writes to Maxwell: “I want you to realize that the dog that hasn’t barked is Trump… (CENSORED) spent hours at my house with him, and he has never been mentioned. Chief of police, etc. I’m convinced 75% of the time.”
Maxwell responds: “I have been thinking about that…”. Other messages indicate that Trump allegedly spent a lot of time with a woman whom Democrats describe as a victim of Epstein's human trafficking, and they include a statement in which Epstein claims that Trump “knew about the girls,” apparently referencing the former president's public assertion that he expelled the financier from his Mar-a-Lago club for soliciting young women who worked there.
The Republicans on the very Oversight Committee identified that woman as Virginia Giuffre, one of the most well-known survivors of the Epstein case, who in her book recounts how, while working at Mar-a-Lago, Trump was "extremely kind" to her and spoke to her about houses he lent to friends with children who needed care.
Republican lawmakers accused the Democrats of hiding her name because she has not alleged that Trump committed any wrongdoing. In her work Nobody’s Girl, Giuffre does not accuse Trump of any crime, according to a report by CNN.
The White House Press Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, stated that the emails “prove absolutely nothing, except that President Trump did nothing wrong.”
Trump himself did not send or receive any of those messages, most of which predate his presidency, and he has not been accused of any crime in connection with Epstein or Maxwell.
Maxwell, for her part, stated this year before Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche that she "never saw the President in any inappropriate situation of any kind" and claimed not to remember ever seeing Trump at Epstein's home, although she did at social gatherings.
The backdrop of this dispute is Epstein's criminal history: in 2008 he was sentenced to 18 months in prison after pleading guilty to charges of solicitation of prostitution and to prostitution involving a minor under 18 years old, but he served only 13 months in a minimum-security prison under a plea deal that would later be harshly criticized for being excessively lenient.
His death in 2019, officially classified as suicide, brought renewed scrutiny to his connections with politicians, businessmen, and celebrities.
Now, while the Democrats insist on releasing more documents from their archive, Trump accuses his opponents of reopening the case not to seek truth or accountability, but to cover the political cost of the government shutdown and "many other issues" that, according to him, demonstrate Democratic mismanagement.
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