New Epstein files release includes mentions of Trump. What they say

 New Epstein files release includes mentions of Trump. What they say

New Epstein files release includes mentions of Trump. What they say WILLIAM BRINGHAM: Welcome to the “News Hour.” The Justice Department has released nearly 30,000 more pages of documents related to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein,

citing President Donald Trump. The new batch comes as the DOJ has been criticized for failing to release all of the documents by the deadline set by Congress and for rejecting many of them.

Our White House correspondent, Liz Landers, has been going through the most recent batch, and she joins us now. Hi, Liz. What’s in this latest release? LIZ0 and more is the page:

LIZ0 and more. Last night, it was taken down, and then the Justice Department reposted it. It includes photos, surveillance video, and a lot of legal correspondence between the various prosecuting departments that prosecuted the Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell cases.

There are a few pages that have been completely redacted, with no explanation. There’s also an email that mentions 10 co-conspirators that the FBI was discussing in 2019.

These are some of the stories that people have picked up on. And there are some mentions of President Trump. William Brangham: Let’s talk about some of them. We should say that the president has not been accused of any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein,

but there are some disturbing references here. Liz Landers: There’s a reference in an FBI file that includes a rape allegation. This was apparently made during the height of the 2020 campaign.

There’s also a court document that tells of a 14-year-old girl who was taken to Mar-a-Lago in 1994. She said she was there with Jeffrey Epstein,

who introduced her to his boss, Donald Trump. Epstein apparently teased Trump, asking him, referring to Jane Doe: “That’s good, right?”

Trump smiled and nodded. They both laughed, and Doe felt uncomfortable, but at the time, she was too young to understand why. Here’s another internal Justice Department email

that was sent by the U.S. attorney to an unidentified person, again redacted. It was sent in January 2020, discussing Trump’s being on Epstein’s plane.

It says -- quote -- “For your information, we want to point out that the flight records we received yesterday reflect

that Donald Trump traveled on Epstein’s private jet far more times than we have previously reported or known.” And it says

that he was listed as a passenger on at least eight flights between 1993 and 1996. Now, the Justice Department released a statement on social media this morning saying:

“Some of these documents contain false and sensational claims against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI before the 2020 election.

Reliability, they would have certainly already weaponized President Trump.” WILLIAM BRANGHAM: But we don’t know which of these documents they’re referring to. LIZ LANDERS: No, there’s no clear indication.

What the latest Epstein files release reveals, and where Trump is mentioned

What the latest Epstein files release reveals, and where Trump is mentioned WILLIAM BRANGHAM: So what is President Trump saying about all of this? LIZ LANDERS: So President Trump was asked yesterday at his club in Palm Beach about some of the releases,

and specifically some of these photos of former President Bill Clinton that we saw last week. 

What did he say? 

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: A lot of people are very upset that

There are photos of other people being released that really had nothing to do with Epstein. But they're in a photo with him because he was at a party.

And you tarnish someone's reputation. So a lot of people are very upset that this is going on. LIZ LANDERS: The president has repeatedly expressed his frustration that the Epstein files story is dominating the news,

While he said it's hiding some of the accomplishments of his administration. Congress passed a law. Lawmakers are upset about it, as are some of the survivors.

What are they saying? LIZ LANDERS: To put it bluntly, the way the Justice Department has released it is not in accordance with the original intent of the law.

The Epstein Transparency Act directs the Justice Department to release all files and materials related to Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. Flight logs, records, and any grand jury testimony,

All of that was supposed to be released, redacted to protect the names of the victims, but that’s what happened. And anything related to the ongoing investigation, which should have been redacted.

What we’ve seen is that not everything has been released at once. Instead, we’ve seen this kind of trickery over the course of several days now. We’ve also seen names.

That has been redacted in some of these emails for no apparent reason, which appears to be a common practice among lawyers.

Some of those redactions should not have covered that. And, also, we have seen these files posted by the Department of Justice without explanation and then removed.