Trump and Jeffrey Epstein

In 2002 Trump told New York magazine: “I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy. 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.” They were photographed together at parties in the early 1990s. [1][2]

A January 2020 email from a federal prosecutor, released by the Justice Department, says flight records showed Trump on at least eight Epstein flights between 1993 and 1996, some with his then-wife Marla Maples and children. Epstein’s pilot testified in 2021 that Trump had flown with them. None of the known records puts Trump on Epstein’s island. [3][4]

In July 2025 the Wall Street Journal reported on a bawdy letter signed “Donald,” framed by a drawing of a woman’s body, in the album made for Epstein’s 50th birthday in 2003. Trump said he never wrote it and sued for $10 billion. In September the House Oversight Committee released the album page from Epstein’s estate. A judge dismissed his suit in April 2026 for failing to plead actual malice, with permission to refile, and he refiled in May. [5][6][7]

In November 2025 House Oversight Democrats released emails from Epstein’s estate. In one, from 2019, Epstein told the writer Michael Wolff that Trump “knew about the girls,” adding that Trump had asked Maxwell to stop. In another, from 2011, Epstein told Maxwell that a victim had “spent hours at my house” with Trump. The White House said the emails were selectively leaked and proved nothing, and identified the unnamed victim as Virginia Giuffre, who had said Trump did nothing wrong. [1][2]

In July 2025 Trump told reporters he fell out with Epstein because Epstein “stole” young women who worked at the Mar-a-Lago spa, including Giuffre. That matches her own account: she met Epstein in 2000, weeks before turning 17, while working at the Mar-a-Lago spa, and was recruited by Maxwell. [3][4]

Giuffre, who died in 2025, said in depositions and interviews that she never saw Trump take part in abuse. Her posthumous memoir describes meeting him once at Mar-a-Lago, where her father worked; she writes that he “couldn’t have been friendlier” and makes no accusation against him. [5][6]