US President Donald Trump was told by the Justice Department in May that his name was among those in the unreleased Epstein Files, according to a new report from the Wall Street Journal.
The newspaper reports that Mr Trump was made aware in May of this year – claiming that Mr Trump was informed by his Attorney General, Pam Bondi at a meeting in the White House.
It comes as a US federal judge on Wednesday rejected a request from the Justice Department to release transcripts from a grand jury investigation into Epstein. US District Judge Robin Rosenberg of Florida claimed that her hands were “tied” in the matter as the request, initiated by Trump, because it is not part of a judicial proceeding.
The unsealing of grand jury testimony is relatively rare, owing to the need for secrecy in criminal investigations.
Sources from the Trump administration told The Wall Street Journal that Bondi and her deputy, Todd Blanche, told Trump that his name was mentioned “multiple times” after a “truckload” of documents related to Epstein were reviewed by Department of Justice officials. According to the WSJ, Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche told the US president that the files contained “what officials felt was unverified hearsay about many people, including Trump.”
Trump has never been accused of misconduct in connection with the Epstein case, and appearing in the files is not indicative that an individual has committed any wrongdoing. The report from the WSJ which cited unnamed anonymous sources, and did not specify the context of the references to Trump’s name in the documents.
It is typical for law enforcement to collect information about individuals who are not suspected of any wrongdoing while following leads during a criminal probe.
While Trump is widely known to have been friendly with the disgraced financier during the 1990s, he told reporters in 2019 that he had not spoken to Epstein in 15 years, after a “falling out” between the pair, later calling him a “creep.”
Several outlets report that top Department of Justice officials are to meet with Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s accomplice, inside a Florida federal prison where she is serving time for her role in their sex trafficking scheme to abuse girls.
She is to meet with U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, with Blanche saying that he contacted the former girlfriend of Epstein’s attorneys in pursuit of any potential new leads amid controversy from Trump’s own support base over the handling of the so-called Epstein files.
The administration has been plunged into controversy after Trump last week called the Epstein case a “hoax,”while hitting out at supporters of the Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement who have continued to criticise Attorney General Pam Bondi’s refusal to release case files from the prosecution of the multimillionaire sex trafficker.
Mr Trump is facing sustained backlash from his own supporters, including key members of the MAGA movement, as suspicion grows that his administration is concealing details of Epstein’s crimes to protect the elite. It followed the US Department of Justice and FBI concluding that sex offender Jeffrey Epstein did not have a so-called client list – something that could have implicated high-profile associates. They also found that Mr Epstein, who died in prison in August 2019, did take his own life.
Earlier this month, when asked if Ms Bondi had informed him he was mentioned in the documents, the President told reporters: “No, no. She’s given us just a very quick briefing, and in terms of the credibility of the different things that they’ve seen.”
The White House has pushed back, labelling the WSJ report a “fake news story.”
An official told CNN: “The White House is not surprised by this – Trump’s name was present in the binders that Bondi produced and handed out.”
He reiterated that a significant amount of materials related to the case, already released by the Justice Department, had included Trump’s name, and there is no evidence to suggest that the President was involved in any wrongdoing.
White House communications director Steven Cheung said the WSJ report was “fake news,” adding that Trump had long ago broken with Epstein and “kicked him out of his club for being a creep.”
“This is nothing more than a continuation of the fake news stories concocted by the Democrats and the liberal media, just like the Obama Russiagate scandal, which President Trump was right about,” he told CNN.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, meanwhile, issued a joint statement with Bondi this week, saying: “The DOJ and FBI reviewed the Epstein Files and reached the conclusion set out in the July 6 memo. Nothing in the files warranted further investigation or prosecution, and we have filed a motion in court to unseal the underlying grand jury transcripts. As part of our routine briefing, we made the President aware of the findings.”