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The explosive claim by the entrepreneur Elon Musk that US President Donald Trump was named in the ‘Epstein files’ has opened a can of worms, with the White House calling Musk’s claim “an unfortunate episode.” It also cited Elon was unhappy with the “Big Beautiful Bill” because it didn’t include the policies he wanted.
Trump’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier and sex offender who died in 2019 two weeks after he pleaded not guilty to charges of sex trafficking minors, was not exactly a secret – the duo were close friends until 2002 when they fell out over a real estate feud.
The US President had praised Epstein in a 2002 interview with New York magazine, calling him a “terrific guy” who he had known for over 15 years, but later changed track, stating he wasn’t a fan of Epstein.
Also read: Musk says Trump is in ‘Epstein files’: A look back at the US President’s once-close ties with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein
However, Epstein’s biographer Michael Wolff has added fuel to the fire, stating that Trump and Epstein were “best of friends” for 15 years and “shared girlfriends, airplanes, [and] business strategy.”
Wolff made these claims in a podcast The Daily Beast Podcast on Thursday. The author of many books on Trump’s journey as a businessman, Wolff said he had seen “evidence” from Trump’s relationship with Epstein which included “lewd images of Trump and the sex offender.”
“I have seen these pictures. I know that these pictures exist and I can describe them,” Wolff told The Daily Beast, adding that there were a dozen of them. “The ones I specifically remember are the two of them with topless girls of an uncertain age sitting on Trump’s lap. And then Trump standing there with a stain on the front of his pants and three or four girls kind of bent over in laughter—they’re topless, too—pointing at Trump’s pants,” he claimed.
A photograph had recently surfaced showing the duo speaking to each other at a party in Mar-a-Lago. They were also seen together at a Victoria’s Secret Angels party.
Epstein died by suicide in his jail cell in 2019, two weeks after pleading not guilty to the charges. Though the Trump administration has consistently vowed to declassify the Epstein files, they have yet to do so. The inclusion of a person’s name in files related to the case does not indicate they have been accused of any wrongdoing.
Though the White House reacted to Musk’s Epstein allegations, Trump has yet to react. It is also unclear why Musk was making the statement or whether he had access to the classified Epstein Files.
Wolff too added that he was uncertain what Musk was referring to but believes that he could be referring to “Epstein file writ large”. “The scope of the Jeffrey Epstein life intersects with the Donald Trump life in a very meaningful, in fact, profound way. These guys kind of made each other,” he told the podcaster.
Wolff had earlier published an audio recording made during his interview with Epstein in 2017 in which the sex offender described Trump as his “closest friend for 10 years”, revealing more personal details about Trump and his wife Melania. Epstein also claimed that Trump was “unfaithful in his marriage”.
Trump camp denounced the tapes as “false smears” that amounted to “election interference.”
