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Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee released a report Monday alleging the Justice Department covered up evidence involving five women who claim that President Donald Trump raped or sexually assaulted them in the presence or close company of Jeffrey Epstein in the 1990s. The report claims six other women described apparent attempts by Epstein or his confidante Ghislaine Maxwell to traffic them to Trump.
Epstein was convicted of Florida state prostitution charges in 2008 and charged with federal sex trafficking of minors in 2019 but died by suicide in his jail cell while awaiting trial that year.
According to the Justice Department, Epstein abused at least 1,000 women and children starting as early as 1985, targeting girls as young as 13. A DOJ indictment says Epstein sexually exploited and abused minor girls at his homes in New York City; Palm Beach, Florida; and other locations.
The president has long denied having any knowledge of Epstein’s abuse of underage girls or involvement with Epstein’s crimes.
“Donald Trump says he knew Jeffrey Epstein ‘just like everybody in Palm Beach knew him.’ Not exactly,” House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said in a statement. “Evidence involving 11 women tells a completely different and far more damning story about their relationship and the abuse of young women and girls that took place in their network.”
The White House said in a statement to Spectrum News on Monday, "None of these allegations are true."
“This ‘report’ is nothing more than a desperate attempt by crazed Democrats to distract Americans from the surging Republican momentum driven by President Trump’s historic achievements," said White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis. "The President kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club at Mar-a-Lago because he was a creep, and he has been fully exonerated of anything related to Epstein.”
Based on survivor accounts, FBI records, documents released through the Epstein Files Transparency Act and interviews conducted by the committee’s staff, the report alleges that Trump may have been a co-conspirator in Epstein’s alleged trafficking and abuse of young women in the 1990s, along with Paolo Zampolli, a former modeling agent who served as a U.S. special envoy for global partnerships until earlier this month.
The report cites FBI records that describe several young models having sexual relationships with Zampolli or connections to his modeling agency who said they were later sexually assaulted by Epstein.
Zampolli has said he represented Melania Knauss — now Melania Trump — and organized her first meeting with Trump, but the House Judiciary Committee report contradicts that claim, saying a former longtime Epstein associate told the FBI that Epstein made the introduction.
The first lady vociferously denied that allegation in April, when she held a news conference to say she never had a relationship with Epstein or Maxwell. Melania Trump said she met Donald Trump by chance at a New York City party in 1998 and that the first time she crossed paths with Epstein was in 2000 at an event she attended with Donald Trump.
Monday’s report cites a committee staff interview with Beatrice Keul, a former Miss Switzerland and Miss Europe beauty pageant contestant who alleges Donald Trump raped her at the Plaza Hotel during a November 1993 American Dream Pageant. She said Donald Trump told her to keep quiet and that he would help her get accepted to New York University.
Spectrum News typically does not identify people who claim to have been victims of sexual abuse, but Keul has gone public with her allegations, giving multiple media interviews.
The House Democrats' report also cites “Katie Johnson,” who alleged to the FBI that she was repeatedly raped by Trump and Epstein when she was 13. Another woman who was 13 in the 1980s, when she alleged Trump assaulted her, also claims Trump hit her after she resisted him.
