Following Trump’s lawsuit, the Justice Department will investigate Epstein’s ties to Democrats

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Justice Department said on Friday it will carry out President Donald Trump’s request to investigate Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged ties to former Democratic President Bill Clinton and U.S. bank JPMorgan, as Trump sought to shift focus from his own relationship with the convicted sex offender.

The move comes two days after a congressional committee released thousands of documents that raised new questions about Trump’s relationship with the late financier, and marks the latest in a series of demands by Trump that federal authorities go after his alleged political enemies.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said Jay Clayton, Manhattan’s top federal prosecutor, will lead the investigation.

The Epstein scandal has been a political thorn in Trump’s side for months, in part because it amplified conspiracy theories about Epstein among his own supporters. Many Trump voters believe Bondi and other Trump officials covered up Epstein’s ties to powerful figures and obscured details about his death by suicide in a Manhattan jail in 2019.

Along with Clinton, who socialized with Epstein in the early 2000s, Trump said he had asked the Justice Department to investigate former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn founder who is also a prominent Democratic donor. The three men were named in the 20,000 Epstein-related documents released by the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday.

“Epstein was a Democrat and he is the Democrats’ problem, not the Republicans’ problem!” Trump wrote on social media. “Everyone knows about him, don’t waste your time on Trump. I have a country to govern!” JPMorgan said in a statement that it regrets its past association with Epstein, who was a client between 1998 and 2013, and did not help him commit “heinous acts.”

Clinton and Summers did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Hoffman could not immediately be reached for comment.

Illustration: Kelly Caminero/News themezone; Photo: Getty Images

TRUMP FACES CONTINUED PRESSURE ON EPSTEIN

Trump and Epstein were friends during the 1990s and 2000s, but Trump says he severed ties before Epstein pleaded guilty in 2008 to charges of soliciting a minor for prostitution.

Trump has consistently denied knowledge of the late financier’s abuse and sex trafficking of underage girls. Still, some of Trump’s most ardent supporters have accused his administration of a cover-up. Trump, who frequently interacts with reporters, has refused to answer questions in recent days as new revelations about Epstein became public.

The Republican-controlled House of Representatives is expected to vote next week on legislation that would force the Justice Department to release all material it has on Epstein, who was facing federal charges of sex trafficking of minors at the time of his suicide. The measure is expected to pass, even after House Speaker Mike Johnson repeatedly maneuvered to try to block the vote. It would also require the Senate to pass similar legislation and Trump’s approval to force the Justice Department to act.

Only four in 10 Republicans in an October Reuters/Ipsos poll said they approved of Trump’s handling of the Epstein files, far below the nine in 10 who approve of his overall performance in the White House.

TRUMP ‘TRYING TO DISTRACT’

“Clearly, Trump is desperately trying to distract from his own presence in Epstein’s emails,” said Alan Rozenshtein, a law professor at the University of Minnesota and former Justice Department lawyer.

JPMorgan paid $290 million in 2023 to some of Epstein’s victims to resolve allegations that it had turned a blind eye to their sex trafficking. The settlement followed embarrassing revelations that JPMorgan ignored internal warnings and overlooked red flags about Epstein, who was a client of the bank from 1998 to 2013. The bank admitted no wrongdoing in the deal.

No credible evidence has emerged that Clinton, Summers or Hoffman were involved in Epstein’s sex trafficking. All have previously denied wrongdoing and expressed regret over their relationships with him.

Clinton flew on Epstein’s private jet several times before the financier’s 2008 conviction, while Summers accepted philanthropic donations from Epstein while serving as president of Harvard University. Hoffman has acknowledged meeting Epstein several times in professional situations.

Before his conviction in 2008, Epstein worked and socialized with a long list of well-known figures, including former Prince Andrew of the United Kingdom, who was stripped of his royal title due in part to his association with Epstein.

Trump has leveraged the Justice Department to attack other political opponents, some of whom now face criminal charges that outside experts have described as politically motivated.

“It is outrageously inappropriate for the president to direct the Department of Justice to investigate individual American citizens,” said Patrick J. Cotter, a former federal prosecutor now with the law firm UB Greensfelder. “That’s not how it’s supposed to work.”

Clayton, the prosecutor who will lead the investigation, is a political independent who chaired the Securities and Exchange Commission during Trump’s first term in the White House.

(Reporting by Andy Sullivan, Jan Wolfe, Chris Prentice, Sarah N. Lynch, Maiya Keidan, Lananh Nguyen, Steve Holland and Andrea Shalal and Susan Heavey; Editing by Scott Malone, Rod Nickel)