Jeffrey Epstein’s imprisoned former girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell has contradicted President Donald Trump by denying former President Bill Clinton ever visited Epstein’s private island.
Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence after being convicted of helping lure girls to be sexually abused by Epstein, said the former president “absolutely never went” to Little Saint James while being interviewed by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche last month. The Department of Justice released transcripts and audio recordings of the interviews on Friday.
The comments contradict President Donald Trump, who claimed in July that Clinton had visited Epstein’s small private island “28 times.”
Clinton’s office said in a July 2019 statement that the former president “knows nothing” about Epstein’s crimes and denied that he ever went to the island.
Newsweek has contacted Clinton’s office and the White House for comment via emails sent outside regular business hours.
Why It Matters
The Trump administration released the transcripts and audio recordings as it continues to grapple with the fallout over its handling of files related to Epstein’s case and as Trump has faced renewed questions over his past friendship with the disgraced financier.
Officials including FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino had primed Trump’s base for the release, repeatedly promoting the idea that damaging revelations about prominent figures allegedly connected to Epstein were being withheld.
But the DOJ reversed course in July, saying in a two-page memo that Epstein had killed himself despite conspiracy theories to the contrary, that a “client list” that Attorney General Pam Bondi had intimated was on her desk did not actually exist, and that no additional records from the investigation would be made public. The decision outraged many of Trump’s supporters and conspiracy theorists who were hoping for proof of a cover-up in the case.
Epstein, a convicted sex offender, was found dead in a New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges in what authorities have ruled a suicide.
What To Know
Maxwell told Blanche that she was sure Clinton had never been to Epstein’s island.
“He never. Absolutely never went,” she said, according to the transcript.
“And I can be sure of that because there’s no way he would have gone—I don’t believe there’s any way that he would’ve gone to the island had I not been there. Because I don’t believe he had an independent friendship, if you will, with Epstein.”
She said trips that Clinton took on Epstein’s plane had a “humanitarian side.”
“I thought it was an honor and a privilege to be part of something so amazing and to have an opportunity to spend time with a man that I found truly extraordinary,” she said.
Maxwell also said she never witnessed any wrongdoing by either Clinton or Trump.
Trump “was never inappropriate with anybody. In the times that I was with him, he was a gentleman in all respects,” she said.
What People Are Saying
Asked if he was considering a pardon for Maxwell, Trump told reporters on July 25: “Well, I don’t want to talk about that. What I do want to say is that Todd is a great attorney, but you ought to be speaking about Larry Summers. You ought to be speaking about some of his friends that are hedge fund guys. They’re all over the place. You ought to be speaking about Bill Clinton, who went to the island 28 times. I never went to the island.”
Clinton’s office said in a statement in July 2019: “President Clinton knows nothing about the terrible crimes Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to in Florida some years ago, or those with which he has been recently charged in New York. In 2002 and 2003, President Clinton took a total of four trips on Jeffrey Epstein’s airplane: one to Europe, one to Asia, and two to Africa, which included stops in connection with the work of the Clinton Foundation. Staff, supporters of the Foundation, and his Secret Service detail traveled on every leg of every trip.
“He had one meeting with Epstein in his Harlem office in 2002, and around the same time made one brief visit to Epstein’s New York apartment with a staff member and his security detail. He’s not spoken to Epstein in well over a decade, and has never been to Little St. James Island, Epstein’s ranch in New Mexico, or his residence in Florida.”
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche wrote on X on Friday: “In the interest of transparency, @TheJusticeDept is releasing the complete transcript and audio of my proffer of Ms. Maxwell.”
He added: “The audio is divided into segments to reflect breaks during the interview. Some segments are shorter than others. Shorter segments are the result of audio tests and size limitations per recorded session. Except for the names of victims, every word is included. Nothing removed. Nothing hidden.”
Representative Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, wrote on X: “Ghislaine Maxwell is a convicted sex trafficker and known liar. Her interview with Trump’s DOJ lawyer shows she’s desperate for a pardon. She claims no involvement in wrongdoing, which is insulting to the girls and young women she victimized and trafficked. She cannot be trusted.”
What’s Next
The Justice Department on Friday began sending to the House Oversight Committee records from the investigation that the panel says it intends to make public after removing victim’s information.
Maxwell is appealing her conviction before the Supreme Court, and the justices are expected to decide whether to take up the appeal in late September.
Read the full transcripts and hear the audio recordings of Maxwell’s interviews here.
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