President Trump tried to dismiss his name appearing over 1,600 times in released Jeffrey Epstein emails on Friday by asking the press, “Give me a break.”
While taking questions aboard Air Force One en route to Mar-a-Lago, Trump, 79, was asked about an email written by Jeffrey Epstein in which the disgraced sex offender wrote that Trump ”knew about the girls” and “asked Ghislaine [Maxwell] to stop.” Ghislaine Maxwell was Epstein’s partner and recruited girls for his sex trafficking scheme.
Trump, who was once friends with Epstein before their falling out in 2008, maintained he didn’t know about Epstein’s crimes. He also attempted to deflect to his demand that the Justice Department look into prominent Democrats and institutions whose names appear in the files.
“I know nothing about that,” said Trump. “They would’ve announced that a long time ago. It’s really, what did he mean when he spent all the time with Bill Clinton, with the president of Harvard, who you know, that is Summers, Larry Summers, whatever his name is, and all of the other people that he spent time with.”
“Jeffrey Epstein and I had a very bad relationship for many years, but he also saw a strength because I was president,” he continued. ”So he dictated a couple of memos to himself. Give me a break. You’ve got to find out what did he know with respect to Bill Clinton, with respect to the head of Harvard, with the respect of all of those people that he knew, including JPMorgan Chase.”
When the reporter attempted to follow up, Trump loudly shushed her.
“Sir, if there’s nothing incriminating in the files—” she began before Trump cut her off, shouting, “Quiet! Quiet!”
For days, President Trump dodged questions about his outsized presence in the Epstein files after Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released a trove of emails they subpoenaed from Epstein’s estate on Wednesday.
In three emails highlighted by the Democrats, Epstein said Trump “knew about the girls,” “spent hours” in Epstein’s home with a “victim,” said by House Republicans to be Virginia Giuffre.”
Trump began answering reporters’ questions on Friday after he ordered on Truth Social that investigations into the Epstein files be re-opened with a focus on former president Bill Clinton, former treasury secretary and Harvard president Larry Summers, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, J.P. Morgan and Chase.
Attorney General Pam Bondi, who previously closed investigations into the Epstein files and said further release of them was neither “appropriate or warranted,” said the Justice Department would “pursue this with urgency and integrity to deliver answers to the American people.”
Thank you, Mr. President. SDNY U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton is one of the most capable and trusted prosecutors in the country, and I’ve asked him to take the lead. As with all matters, the Department will pursue this with urgency and integrity to deliver answers to the American… pic.twitter.com/5zlybVu44U
— Attorney General Pamela Bondi (@AGPamBondi) November 14, 2025
The investigation order comes as the House of Representatives gets set to vote on releasing the Epstein files this week. The “Epstein Files Transparency Act” has begun to pick up more Republican support, as a number of Republicans who had previously not signed the discharge petition forcing a vote on the bill have signaled they will support its passage.
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