(Washington) Former US President Bill Clinton did not appear at the Capitol in Washington on Tuesday for a parliamentary hearing on his past links with sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein, exposing himself to prosecution for obstructing Congress.
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“He did not show up today,” regretted James Comer, the Republican head of a powerful committee in the House of Representatives investigating the Epstein affair, to the press.
“No one is accusing Bill Clinton of anything wrong, we just have questions,” added the elected official about the 79-year-old former Democratic president.
His wife Hillary Clinton, former head of diplomacy and presidential candidate lost in 2016 to Donald Trump, is expected at Congress on Wednesday, but her presence is far from certain. She could also face prosecution.
Requested by AFP, the services of the former American president (1993-2001) did not respond immediately.
The death of Jeffrey Epstein, found hanging in his New York cell in 2019 before his trial for sex crimes, has fueled countless conspiracy theories that he was murdered to protect high-profile figures.
A figure of the New York jet set, Jeffrey Epstein is accused of having sexually exploited more than a thousand young women, including minors.
Transparency
During his 2024 campaign, Donald Trump promised his base shattering revelations. But since his return to power, the Republican has been reluctant to publish the documents in the file and has suffered a backlash, including among his supporters.
In August, as controversy grew over the government’s lack of transparency, the Clintons were subpoenaed before Congress.
“By your own admission, you traveled on Jeffrey Epstein’s private plane four times in 2002 and 2003,” stated the summons letter sent to Bill Clinton by James Comer.
Regarding Hillary Clinton, the elected Republican explained: “Your family seems to have had close ties with both Jeffrey Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell”, sentenced in 2021 to 20 years in prison for sexual exploitation.
The committee will vote next week to begin the procedure of obstructing the prerogatives of Congress against Bill Clinton, James Comer said Tuesday.
Such a procedure would then need to be adopted by a vote in the House before possible prosecution by the Justice Department.
Redacted documents
The former president, who claimed in 2019 to have not spoken to Jeffrey Epstein for more than a decade, has always denied having any knowledge of the “terrible crimes” committed by him.
Once close to the financier with whom he moved in the same circles, Donald Trump has always denied, like Bill Clinton, having any knowledge of his criminal behavior and claims to have broken up with him well before he was concerned by the courts.
At the end of December, after months of delay, the Trump government began publishing thousands of photos, videos and texts about the wealthy financier.
But the entire file has not yet been made public as required by a law promulgated in November, and many published files have been largely redacted, including a document completely blacked out on 119 pages.
In a press release at the end of December after the partial publication of the file, a spokesperson for Bill Clinton called for shedding light on the Epstein affair and for publishing all of the documents, including all those mentioning the former Democratic president.
