House Oversight Committee Democrats on Friday, released several photographs from convicted sex-offender Jeffrey Epstein’s estate, including many of US President Donald Trump, former US President Bill Clinton, and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor.
Epstein died by suicide in a New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting prosecution on sex trafficking allegations. The disgraced financier’s estate provided the House Oversight Committee with over 95,000 photographs, of which the dozens that were first released by Democratic members were only a small portion. The images that were made public on Friday had nothing to do with the case files that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is currently required to release.
However, there is growing expectation as the Trump administration must produce the Epstein files by next week, which have long been the subject of rumours and conspiracy theories.
The photos, which featured a black-and-white picture of Trump next to six women with blacked-out faces, were released without any context or captions.
Although he hadn’t seen the photos from Epstein’s mansion that were made public on Friday, the US president said they were “no big deal.”
Trump said that Epstein had “photos with everybody” and was “all over Palm Beach.”
Representative Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee said, “Our commitment from day one has been to redact any photo, any information that could lead to any sort of harm to any of the victims.” However, he he did not specify whether any of the women in the photo was a victim of abuse.
Democrats are “selectively releasing cherry-picked photos with random redactions to try and create a false narrative,” said White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson, who also termed it as a “Democrat hoax against President Trump.”
The public has already seen several photographs. To put pressure on Trump regarding his Republican administration’s previous refusal to reveal documents related to the Epstein investigation, Democrats promised to keep releasing photos in the coming days and weeks.
Garcia said that his staff had examined roughly 25 percent of the photos they had received from Epstein’s estate, including pictures that were either in his possession or those that he received.
“Donald Trump right now needs to release the files to the American public so that the truth can come out and we can actually get some sense of justice for the survivors,” Garcia added.
He first released 19 photos on Friday morning. Later, he posted over 70 more, including one of Epstein in the shower, one of him with a swollen lip, pictures of his house, and one of him holding a book about the scandal.
Trump, who was formerly close to Epstein, has said that he severed ties before Epstein was charged with sex trafficking. Clinton has also downplayed his ties to Epstein, admitting that he flew on Epstein’s private jet but claiming via a spokesperson that he was unaware of the late financier’s wrongdoings. Additionally, none of Epstein’s known victims have ever accused Clinton of misconduct. But he and Hillary Clinton are being pressured to testify in the House committee’s probe by Republicans.
The GOP chair of the House Oversight Committee, Rep. James Comer, warned late Friday to start contempt of Congress procedures against the Clintons if they failed to show up next week or reschedule their January depositions.
Nothing in the documents the committee has received demonstrates “any wrongdoing” by Trump, according to a spokesperson for the Republican-controlled committee.
Despite denying any wrongdoing, Andrew lost his royal titles and privileges this year due to new revelations about his connections to Epstein.
Images of billionaires Richard Branson and Bill Gates, filmmaker Woody Allen, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, law professor Alan Dershowitz, and right-wing political operative Steve Bannon were all featured in the photo release. The men have denied any misconduct related to their ties with Epstein, who had many prominent people in his social circle.
Summers resigned from his teaching post at Harvard University and experienced additional harm to his reputation in academic circles following the earlier disclosure of emails between him and Epstein.
Dylan Farrow, Allen’s adopted daughter accused him of molesting her when she was a child. However, he has denied the accusation.
Other senators think that if the DOJ’s complete case files are released, other prominent people may be implicated in Epstein’s abuse.
The DOJ’s efforts to have grand jury material released from many courts are encouraging, according to Rep. Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky who helped passing a bill requiring the public release of the files.
“The grand jury material is just a small fraction of what the DOJ needs to release, because the FBI and DOJ probably has evidence that they chose not to take to the grand jury because the evidence they’re in possession of would implicate other people, not Epstein or Maxwell,” he said.