Democrats and some Republicans seized on the limited release to accuse the Justice Department of failing to meet a congressionally set deadline to produce the files, while White House officials on social media gleefully promoted a photo of Clinton in a hot tub with a woman with a blacked-out face. The Trump administration touted the release as proof of its commitment to transparency, ignoring that the Justice Department just months ago said no more files would be released. Congress then passed a law mandating it.
In a letter to Congress, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche wrote that the Justice Department was continuing to review files in its possession, was withholding some documents under exemptions meant to protect victims and expected additional disclosures by the end of the year.
Trump, who was friends with Epstein for years before the two had a falling-out, tried for months to keep the records sealed.
Trump is hardly glimpsed in the files, with the small number of photos of him appearing to have been in the public domain for decades. Those include two in which Trump and Epstein are posing with now-first lady Melania Trump in February 2000 at an event at his Mar-a-Lago resort.
Trump’s connection to Epstein is well-documented, but he has sought to distance himself from his former friend. He has said he cut off ties with Epstein after the financier hired young female employees from Mar-a-Lago and has repeatedly denied knowledge of his crimes.
Neither Trump nor Clinton has ever been accused of wrongdoing in connection with Epstein, and the mere inclusion of someone’s name in the files from the investigation does not imply otherwise.
Among other prominent Epstein contacts is the former Prince Andrew, who appears in a photograph released Friday wearing a tuxedo and lying on the laps of what appear to be several women who are seated, dressed in formalwear. Pop star Michael Jackson also appears in multiple photos, including one showing him standing next to a smiling Epstein.
Unlike Trump, Clinton is featured prominently in the files, though the records included no explanation of how the photographs of the former president related to any investigation or the context surrounding them.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote “Oh my!” and added a shocked face emoji in response to a photo of Clinton in the hot tub.
“They can release as many grainy 20-plus-year-old photos as they want, but this isn’t about Bill Clinton,” Clinton spokesman Angel Ureña said in a statement.
“There are two types of people here,” he said. “The first group knew nothing and cut Epstein off before his crimes came to light. The second group continued relationships after that. We’re in the first. No amount of stalling by people in the second group will change that.”
After nearly two decades of court action, a voluminous number of Epstein records had already been public before Friday, including flight logs, address books, email correspondence, police reports, grand jury records, courtroom testimony and deposition transcripts.
One of the few revelations in the documents was a copy of the earliest known concern about Epstein’s behavior — a report taken by the FBI of a woman in 1996 who believed photos and negatives she had taken of her 12-year-old and 16-year-old sisters for a personal art project had been stolen by Epstein. The documents don’t show what, if anything, the agency did with that complaint.
Police in Palm Beach, Florida, began investigating Epstein in 2005 after the family of a 14-year-old girl reported being molested at his mansion. The FBI joined the investigation. Authorities gathered testimony from multiple underage girls who said they’d been hired to give Epstein sexual massages.
