Donald Trump breaks silence on pictures of him being in bombshell new Epstein recordsdata
The US President dismissed the significance of photos of him being in a trove of Jeffrey Epstein’s photos after more lurid images were published by congress
Donald Trump dismissed being pictured in a new trove of Jeffrey Epstein’s photos released tonight, saying it was “no big deal”.
In photos published online by Democrat members of the US House of Representatives, Trump is seen with his shirt partially unbuttoned, posing with his arm around five unidentified women. The black and white photo appears to have been taken at a party or event, and all of the garland-wearing women’s faces were blacked out.
House Democrats did not say who the women were, when the photo was taken or why their identities had been obscured. A second newly released photo shows Trump on a private jet alongside a blonde-haired woman, whose identity is also obscured. The interior of the jet matches the Gulfstream G550 Epstein that was among the aircraft used by Epstein.
Pilot records show Trump as a passenger on multiple flights aboard jets owned by Epstein in the 1990s. But Trump claimed on his Truth Social website last January (2024): “I was never on Epstein’s Plane, or at his ‘stupid’ Island.”
Trump was quizzed about the newly released images at an Oval Office ceremony to honour veteran Ice Hockey players, which started two and a half hours later than scheduled. He said being in Epstein’s photos was “no big deal.”
“I haven’t seen them,” he said. “But I mean everybody knew this man. He was all over Palm Beach, he had photos with everybody. Almost, hundreds and hundreds of people are in photos with him. That’s no big deal. I know nothing about it.”
In an email that was part of a previous cache of documents released by the same committee in tktk, Epstein asked a journalist: “Would you like photos of Donald and girls in bikinis in my kitchen?”
It’s not clear if this was a reference to the black and white photo of Trump released last night. Nor is inclusion in Epstein’s photo collection an indication of guilt, knowledge or involvement in any of his crimes.
Epstein famously kept a large collection of photos, many of which featured the high profile people he kept in his orbit.
Other photos kept by Epstein show Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson with Epstein in a covered area on a sandy beach with palm trees in the background and Woody Allen with Epstein on a film set.
Another shows Microsoft founder Bill Gates posing on an airport tarmac next to what appears to be Epstein’s Gulfstream jet. In the photo he is standing next to Larry Visoski, a pilot who worked for Epstein from 1991 to 2019.
In another, Steve Bannon – formerly Trump’s senior White House aide – is shown talking with Epstein across a large desk. Three framed photos appear on the desk, including one that appears to show a woman lying down. All the photos have blacked out faces.
No captions or context have been provided for any of the images.
Rep. Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, did not say whether any of the women in the photos was a victim of abuse, but he added, “Our commitment from day one has been to redact any photo, any information that could lead to any sort of harm to any of the victims.”
A spokesperson for the Republican-controlled House Oversight Committee accused Garcia and Democratic lawmakers of “cherry-picking photos and making targeted redactions to create a false narrative about President Trump,” adding that nothing in the documents the committee has received shows “any wrongdoing” by the president.
Epstein was found dead in his cell at a federal jail in Manhattan, New York, in August 2019 while he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges. His death was ruled a suicide.
Trump, once a close friend of Epstein, has said that he parted ways with him long before he faced the sex trafficking charges.
