What Trump Has Said About Jeffrey Epstein Over the Years
Donald Trump hasn’t exactly done a great job handling the backlash to the Justice Department’s memo announcing that Jeffrey Epstein killed himself and there is no high-profile “client list.” The president lashed out at a reporter who asked about the memo, before posting a bizarre rant on Truth Social in which he claimed that Barack Obama “wrote” the so-called Epstein files, and that everyone should stop focusing on the convicted sex offender and accused sex trafficker whose associates the administration has long promised to expose.
Conservative influencers and Justice Department officials alike have been outraged over the memo, with many alleging it’s part of a cover-up and that Trump himself could be implicated in the Epstein files. Elon Musk, the former White House adviser and Trump confidant, said as much as he and the president feuded last month. “Time to drop the really big bomb: @realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files,” he wrote on X. “That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!”
Trump appeared to be close with Epstein — at least at some point. They’ve been photographed together, and video shows the pair partying together in the 1990s. Epstein reportedly said in 2017 that he was Trump’s “closest friend.”
Trump has spoken plenty about Epstein, too, both lauding the disgraced financier and, more recently, trashing him and teasing conspiracy theories about his death. Now, he wants the MAGA base, which has long thirsted for the government to release the Epstein files, to simply forget about it.
Here’s a brief history of the president’s comments about Epstein:
Trump says Epstein is a “terrific” guy who loves young, beautiful women
Trump famously lauded Epstein, and remarked on his penchant for young women, in a New York magazine piece in 2002.
“I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy,” Trump said. “He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it — Jeffrey enjoys his social life.”
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Trump has trashed Epstein in recent years … but yeah, this isn’t a good look.
Trump says he is “not a fan” of Epstein
A reporter asked Trump if he had a falling out with Epstein and if he had banned him from Mar-a-Lago during a press conference in July 2019.
“Yes. And I did have a falling out a long time ago. The reason doesn’t make any difference, frankly. But I haven’t spoken to him in probably 15 years or more. I wasn’t a big fan of Jeffrey Epstein, that I can tell you.”
A reporter then asked him if he had “any suspicions that he was molesting … underaged women.”
“No, I had no idea,” Trump said. “I had no idea. I haven’t spoken to him in many, many years.”
He continued: “I was not a fan of Jeffrey Epstein. And you watched people yesterday saying that I threw him out of a club. I didn’t want anything to do with him. That was many, many years ago. It shows you one thing: that I have good taste. OK? Now, other people, they went all over with him. They went to his island. They went all over the place.
“He was very well known in Palm Beach. His island — whatever his island was, wherever it is — I was never there. Find out the people that went to the island. But Jeffrey Epstein was not somebody that I respected. I threw him out. In fact, I think the great James Patterson, who is a member of Mar-a-Lago, made a statement yesterday that, many years ago, I threw him out.”
Trump pushes conspiracy theories about Bill Clinton and Epstein
During his first run for office in 2015, Trump was asked to give his opinion about former President Bill Clinton. “Nice guy,” he responded. “Got a lot of problems coming up in my opinion with the famous island with Jeffrey Epstein. A lot of problems.”
In August 2019, immediately after Epstein’s death, Trump reposted a tweet suggesting Clinton killed Epstein. “#JefferyEpstein had information on Bill Clinton & now he’s dead I see #TrumpBodyCount trending but we know who did this! RT if you’re not Surprised,” wrote conservative comedian Terrence K. Williams in the post Trump shared.
“Yeah, he’s a very highly respected, conservative pundit. He’s a big Trump fan. That was a retweet. That wasn’t from me, that was from him,” Trump told reporters in New Jersey.
A reporter asked if it was “appropriate” to be spreading a conspiracy theory.
“Basically what we’re saying is we want an investigation,” Trump said. “I want a full investigation, and that’s what I absolutely am demanding.”
A reporter asked again about the theory.
“I have no idea. I know he was on his plane 27 times, and he said he was on the plane four times … And then the question you have to ask is: Did Bill Clinton go to the island? Because Epstein had an island that was not a good place, as I understand it. And I was never there. So you have to ask: Did Bill Clinton go to the island? That’s the question. If you find that out, you’re going to know a lot.”
Documents unsealed around the same time showed Clinton had flown on Epstein’s plane on trips related to the Clinton Foundation and his paid speeches. The documents also showed Trump had flown on Epstein’s plane at least once.
Trump tells Tucker Carlson he isn’t sure if Epstein killed himself
In 2020, after Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell was charged with recruiting and grooming underage girls, Trump discussed his feelings about Maxwell and his uncertainty around Epstein’s death in an interview with Axios on HBO.
“Her friend or boyfriend was either killed or committed suicide in jail,” Trump told reporter Jonathan Swan. “She’s now in jail. Yeah, I wish her well. I’d wish you well. I’d wish a lot of people well. Good luck. Let them prove somebody was guilty.”
“So you’re saying you hope she doesn’t die in jail?” Swan asked. “Is that what you mean by ‘wish her well’?”
“Her boyfriend died in jail. And people are still trying to figure out how did it happen,” Trump said. “Was it suicide? Was he killed? And I do wish her well. I’m not looking for anything bad for her.”
In 2023, Tucker Carlson asked Trump if it was possible Epstein was killed.
“I don’t know,” Trump said. “I will say that, you know, he was a fixture in Palm Beach.”
Carlson asked again later in the interview.
“Oh, sure, it’s possible. I mean, I don’t really believe — I think he probably committed suicide,” Trump said. “He had a life with, you know, beautiful homes and beautiful everything. And he, all of a sudden, he’s incarcerated and not doing very well. I would say that he did, but there are those people, there are many people — I think you’re one of them, right? But a lot of people think that he was killed. He knew a lot of people.”
Carlson then confirmed that he believed Epstein was “killed.”
Trump hesitates to say he’ll release the Epstein files while campaigning in 2024
Trump awkwardly hesitated to say he’d declassify the Epstein files during an interview with Fox News last year.
Rachel Campos-Duffy, the wife of current Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, began by asking Trump if he would declassify the 9/11 files if he became president.
“Yes,” Trump said without hesitation.
“Would you declassify JFK files?” Campos-Duffy asked.
“Yeah,” Trump said, again without hesitation.
“Would you declassify the Epstein files?”
Trump paused briefly. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I would. I guess I would. I think that less so because you don’t want to affect people’s lives if it’s phony stuff in there, because it’s a lot of phony stuff with that whole world. But I think I would.”
“Do you think that would restore trust?” Campos-Duffy asked.
“Yeah, I don’t know about Epstein so much as I do the others,” Trump said. “Certainly about the way he died, it’d be interesting to find out what happened there, because that was a weird situation and the cameras didn’t happen to be working. Et cetera, et cetera. But yeah I’d go a long way toward that one.”
Fox News seemed to know Trump’s answer didn’t look good, as the segment ended after he initially said, “Yeah, I would,” cutting out the part where he carried on about how it could affect people’s lives. The official Trump “War Room” X account also posted the edited clip last year.
Trump lashes out at a reporter who asks about the DOJ’s memo
During a Cabinet meeting in July, a reporter asked Attorney General Pam Bondi a question about the Justice Department’s memo. Trump cut in. “Are you still talking about Jeffrey Epstein? This guy’s been talked about for years,” he said, incredulous. “You’re asking … we have Texas, we have this, we have all of the things, and are people still talking about this guy, this creep? That is unbelievable. I mean, I can’t believe you’re asking a question on Epstein at a time like this, where we’re having some of the greatest success and also tragedy with what happened in Texas. It just seems like a desecration.”
Trump — who amid the furor over the DOJ’s Epstein memo has posted about deporting Rosie O’Donnell and supposedly winning a golf championship — isn’t exactly known to stay laser-focused on the world’s most pressing affairs, of course.
Trump posts wild rant accusing Barack Obama of writing the Epstein files
The DOJ’s Epstein memo reportedly led tensions to explode among the department’s brass, with FBI Director Kash Patel and FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino clashing with Bondi. Bongino even ditched work on Friday in protest and reportedly discussed leaving his post altogether. Trump tried to put out the fire the weekend following the memo’s release. “What’s going on with my ‘boys’ and, in some cases, ‘gals?’” he wrote on Truth Social, apparently referring to the members of his administration reportedly warring over the memo. He then tried to claim that the Epstein files were authored by Barack Obama and others.
“For years, it’s Epstein, over and over again. Why are we giving publicity to Files written by Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration, who conned the World with the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, 51 ‘Intelligence’ Agents, ‘THE LAPTOP FROM HELL,’ and more?” the president claimed.
“They created the Epstein Files, just like they created the FAKE Hillary Clinton/Christopher Steele Dossier that they used on me, and now my so-called ‘friends’ are playing right into their hands,” he continued. “Why didn’t these Radical Left Lunatics release the Epstein Files? If there was ANYTHING in there that could have hurt the MAGA Movement, why didn’t they use it? They haven’t even given up on the John F. Kennedy or Martin Luther King, Jr. Files.”
OK, then!
Trump says only “bad” people still care about Epstein
Trump continued to allege that the Epstein files are some sort of Democratic hoax perpetrated against him, while speaking to reporters over a week after the memo’s release. “These files were made up by Comey, they were made up by Obama, they were made up by Biden.”
Later the same day, Trump wondered why anyone cares about the story.
“I don’t understand it, why they would be so interested,” he said. “He’s dead for a long time. He was never a big factor in terms of life. I don’t understand what the interest or the fascination is. The credible information has been given…. I don’t understand why the Jeffrey Epstein case would be of interest to anybody. It’s pretty boring stuff. It’s sordid, but it’s boring. I don’t understand why it keeps going. I think only really pretty bad people, including fake news, want to keep something like that going.”