By Doina Chiacu and Nathan Layne
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -House Democrats on Wednesday released emails which they said raised new questions about President Donald Trump’s ties to Jeffrey Epstein and how much he knew about his abuse of underage girls, while the swearing-in of a new Democrat kicked off a new fight in Congress over further disclosures.
The Democrats released messages between Epstein and author Michael Wolff and Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite who is serving a 20-year prison sentence on charges related to her role in facilitating Epstein’s sex trafficking. In one 2019 email to Wolff, the sex offender wrote that Trump “knew about the girls,” though it was not clear what that phrase meant.
Trump has vehemently and consistently denied knowing about Epstein’s sex trafficking. He has said that he and Epstein, who died by suicide in a Manhattan jail cell in 2019, were once friends before having a falling out.
The disclosure came on the day Democratic Representative Adelita Grijalva was sworn in by House Speaker Mike Johnson, seven weeks after she won a special election in Arizona. Her long-delayed induction should pave the way to compel a House vote to release all unclassified records related to Epstein, something Johnson and Trump have resisted up to now.
“Just this morning, House Democrats released more emails showing that Trump knew more about Epstein’s abuses than he previously acknowledged. It’s past time for Congress to restore its role as a check and balance on this administration,” Grijalva said during a ceremony on Wednesday afternoon.
“That is why I will sign the discharge petition right now to release the Epstein files.”
The batch of emails released earlier on Wednesday includes a 2011 message to Maxwell in which Epstein described Trump as “that dog that hasn’t barked,” adding that Trump had “spent hours at my house” with one of his victims, whose name is redacted.
TRUMP DENIES ROLE IN EPSTEIN SCANDAL
Trump on Wednesday accused Democrats of releasing the emails to distract from the record 43-day shutdown of the government, even though neither side appears to have won a clear victory, with a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Wednesday showing 50% of Americans blaming Republicans and 47% blaming Democrats.
“The Democrats are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax again because they’ll do anything at all to deflect on how badly they’ve done on the Shutdown, and so many other subjects,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform on Wednesday afternoon.
At an earlier briefing, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt accused Democrats of redacting the victim’s name in the released emails because the victim was Virginia Giuffre, who died by suicide in April and had called Trump friendly without accusing him of any wrongdoing in her posthumous memoir.
“These emails prove absolutely nothing other than the fact that President Trump did nothing wrong,” Leavitt said.
Republicans on the Oversight Committee released 20,000 additional documents on Wednesday from the Epstein estate.
PRESSURE ON BOEBERT AND MACE TO BACK OFF
The Epstein case has dogged Trump for months, upsetting even his own political supporters, who believe the government has been covering up Epstein’s ties to the rich and powerful, and have been unusually critical of his Justice Department for not releasing more information about the Epstein case.
Just four in 10 Republicans told an October Reuters/Ipsos poll that they approved of Trump’s handling of the Epstein files — well below the nine in 10 who approve of his overall performance in the White House.
Grijalva provided the final signature needed for a petition to force a House vote to fully release the so-called Epstein files, something Johnson and Trump have resisted up to now.
Republican Representative Thomas Massie, who has been working with Democrats to compel release of the so-called “Epstein files,” wrote earlier on X that after Grijalva was sworn in there would be enough signatures for the petition, with a floor vote expected in a few weeks’ time.
However, Trump and other administration officials have reached out to Republican lawmakers Lauren Boebert and Nancy Mace to try to get them to remove their names from the petition, according to reporting by Axios and other media outlets.
In a post on X, Boebert confirmed that she met with White House officials on Wednesday and said, “Together, we remain committed to ensuring transparency for the American people.”
Mace’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
The top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, Representative Robert Garcia, called on the Justice Department to fully release the Epstein files to the public, accusing Trump of trying to prevent their disclosure.
“These latest emails and correspondence raise glaring questions about what else the White House is hiding and the nature of the relationship between Epstein and the President,” he said in a statement.
(Reporting by Doina Chiacu and Nathan Layne, additional reporting by Bo Erickson, Andrea Shalal, Steve Holland and Kat Jackson; Editing by Franklin Paul, Nick Zieminski, Scott Malone and Noeleen Walder and Diane Craft)
Disclaimer: This report is auto generated from the Reuters news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.