Donald Trump has been thrust back into the Epstein controversy after House Democrats released a batch of emails on Wednesday suggesting the former president knew about Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse of young women and chose to stay silent.
The newly revealed exchanges, part of a trove of 23,000 documents obtained from Epstein’s estate, include messages between Epstein, his longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell, and journalist Michael Wolff. The emails, spanning from 2011 to 2019, were made public by the Democratic members of the House Oversight Committee. A more pointed accusation came in a 2019 email to Wolff, where Epstein wrote: “Of course he knew about the girls as he asked ghislaine to stop.” He also pushed back on Trump’s previous claim that he had banned Epstein from Mar-a-Lago, stating, “never a member ever.”
The revelations come as Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence for sex trafficking, is reportedly seeking clemency from Trump’s administration. House Judiciary Democrats have already called on the former president to reject any pardon request. Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, said the disclosures support his bipartisan push with Rep. Thomas Massie to force a House vote on making the full Epstein files public.