Withheld Epstein Files With Accusations Against Trump Released By Justice Department

FBI documents summarising interviews with a woman who made unsubstantiated claims of sexual assault against Donald Trump have been released as part of the US Department of Justice’s (DOJ) trove of Epstein files.

The release follows reports that the documents were missing from the DOJ’s database, prompting Democrats to accuse officials of a cover-up.

The DOJ said it mistakenly withheld the files during its review process because they had been “incorrectly coded as duplicative”.

The memos describe a series of interviews in 2019 with the woman, who makes uncorroborated claims against Trump and Jeffrey Epstein. The president has consistently denied wrongdoing in relation to the late sex offender.

According to one of the three memos, the unnamed woman told FBI agents during an interview that she was introduced to Trump by Epstein in the 1980s when she was a teenager. The woman accused both men of sexually assaulting her when she was between 13 and 15 years old.

The FBI agents did not have further contact with the woman after the interviews, according to the files.

It is unclear whether Trump and Epstein knew each other during the time period that the woman alleges the incidents took place.

In a statement responding to the newly published allegations, the White House said they were “completely baseless” and “backed by zero credible evidence”.

“As we have said countless times, President Trump has been totally exonerated by the release of the Epstein Files,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said.

She added that the Justice Department under the previous Joe Biden administration had not brought charges against Trump based on the accusations “because they knew President Trump did absolutely nothing wrong”.

Trump is mentioned thousands of times in the files released by the justice department, including in emails and correspondence sent by Jeffrey Epstein himself to others.

Trump has not been accused of any crimes by the Epstein survivors who have come forward so far.

As well as summaries of FBI witness interviews, including those with the unnamed woman in 2019, the full batch of Epstein files also contains a list of allegations made against Trump by callers to its national Threat Operation Center tip line.

The list includes numerous allegations of sexual abuse made against Trump, Epstein and other high-profile figures. Many of these appear to be based on unverified tips and often no supporting evidence is included.

After a January release of Epstein files, the justice department said: “Some of the documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election.

“To be clear, the claims are unfounded and false, and if they have a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already.”

The three newly published memos follow reports in US media that they had been wrongly withheld in the initial Epstein file releases.

NPR first reported that indexes and serial numbers in the files suggested the FBI had conducted four interviews with the woman in 2019 as part of its investigation into Epstein’s accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, who was jailed in 2022 for sex trafficking.

But three of the interview summaries and related notes, totalling more than 50 pages, were not available on the justice department’s website, according to reports by NPR and others including the New York Times.

Epstein appears to have been friends with Trump for a number of years. They later fell out – which happened in the early 2000s, according to Trump, two years before Epstein was first arrested.

Earlier this week, a House committee voted to subpoena Attorney General Pam Bondi to answer questions about the justice department’s handling of the Epstein files.

Republicans on the House Oversight committee joined Democrats to vote to subpoena her.

Last November, Congress passed a law compelling the department to release all material from its investigations into Epstein. Millions of documents have since been released.

—BBC