Following a two-day session with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche last month, the Justice Department on Friday released transcripts of its interview with Ghislaine Maxwell, the former associate and co-conspirator of sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
During the interview, Maxwell, who is openly seeking a pardon from President Donald Trump, praised the president repeatedly and said he was essentially a Boy Scout.
Maxwell told Blanche that she “never” saw Trump in any compromising situation with Epstein and that she only saw the two men together in social settings, never privately.
“I don’t think they were close friends or I certainly never witnessed the President in any of ― I don’t recall ever seeing him in his house, for instance. I actually never saw the president in any type of massage setting. I never witnessed the President in any inappropriate setting in any way. The president was never inappropriate with anybody,” she said.
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Trump dispatched Blanche, formerly his personal attorney, to interview Maxwell last month amid a furor over the administration’s refusal to release the government’s files from its prosecution of Epstein, who died in prison in 2019 after being charged with sex trafficking minors. Trump socialized for years with Epstein and Maxwell.
Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years in prison following her conviction in 2020 on sex trafficking charges as Epstein’s accomplice. At the time she was charged, Trump offered well wishes.
“I just wish her well, frankly,” Trump said. “I’ve met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach, and I guess they lived in Palm Beach.”
Not only did Maxwell not see Trump receive any massages, but Maxwell also told Blanche that Epstein never recruited a masseuse from Mar-a-Lago, contrary to Trump’s recent statements that he cut ties with Epstein after doing exactly that.
Maxwell also went out of her way to praise Trump for becoming president, essentially offering well wishes of her own to the man who could let her out of prison.
“Trump was always very cordial and very kind to me. And I just want to say that I find ― I ― I admire his extraordinary achievement in becoming the president now. And I like him, and I’ve always liked him. So that is the sum and substance of my entire relationship with him,” she said.
And as for the birthday card Trump reportedly gave Epstein with a racy note, that was not something Maxwell could recall.
“I don’t remember,” she said.
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The testimony with Blanche is extremely unusual; typically, it wouldn’t be a high-ranking Justice Department official who would conduct an interview like Maxwell’s but instead the prosecutors who worked her case.
The Justice Department has seemingly already let Maxwell enjoy some benefits of testifying to Blanche privately as the Epstein Files scandal rocked the Trump administration earlier this summer. They moved her from prison to a minimum-security prison camp, contrary to regulations requiring she be housed in a facility requiring at least “low” level security for sex offenders.
Though the Justice Department said last month it wouldn’t release its files from the Epstein case, on Friday the department began sharing the material with the Republican-led House Oversight Committee in response to a subpoena.
“The production contains thousands of pages of documents,” a committee spokesperson said Friday, adding that the committee “intends to make these records public after thorough review to ensure any victims’ identification and child sexual abuse material are redacted.”
Democrats have blasted Republicans’ plans to make piecemeal disclosures of the Epstein files and also the Justice Department’s unusual interview with Maxwell, especially in light of her favorable prison transfer.
Trump said Friday in the Oval Office that the whole Epstein affair is a hoax.
“You’ve got a lot of people that could be mentioned in those files that don’t deserve to be,” Trump said. “It’s a Democrat hoax. It’s just a hoax. The whole Epstein thing is a Democrat hoax.”
Trump also claimed that former President Bill Clinton had been to Epstein’s private island 28 times, but Maxwell told Blanche he never did.
“He never. Absolutely never went,” Maxwell said. “And I can be sure of that because there’s no way he would’ve gone ― I don’t believe there’s any way that he would’ve gone to the island, had I not been there. Because I don’t believe he had an independent friendship, if you will, with Epstein.”