(Washington) A senior American government official and former lawyer for Donald Trump spoke on Friday for the second consecutive day with Ghislaine Maxwell, an accomplice of Jeffrey Epstein, who is serving a prison sentence, an unusual approach revealing the embarrassment of the executive in this case.
President Donald Trump, for his part, distanced himself from the late businessman, of which he was very close to more than twenty years ago, citing several personalities, such as the former Democratic President Bill Clinton, much more linked to Jeffrey Epstein than he, he said.
Questioned by journalists from his departure from Washington for a trip to Scotland on the possibility of granting presidential pardon or a sentence switch to Ghislaine Maxwell, ex-partner and collaborator of Jeffrey Epstein, sentenced to 20 years in prison for sex trafficking, Donald Trump said “not having thought of it”.
“Now is not the time to talk about grace,” he said there.
The death of Jeffrey Epstein, a rich businessman found hanged in his cell in New York on August 10, 2019 before his judgment for sexual crimes, fueled countless conspiracy theories that he was murdered to prevent embarrassing revelations on leading personalities.
Donald Trump, who for months has promised his basis of shattering revelations on this file, underwent a return of flame, including in his own camp, since his government announced in early July that he had discovered any new element which would justify the publication of additional documents.
The Ministry of Justice and the FBI, the federal police, concluded that there was no evidence of the existence of a secret list of “customers” of Jeffrey Epstein and confirmed his suicide.
The American president repeated on Friday that he had “never been informed” that his name appeared in these documents.
Photo Bryan R. Smith, Agence France-Presse Archives
A woman wears a cap on which is written “Epstein did not commit suicide” while she demonstrated in a New York court in November 2021.
His Minister of Justice, Pam Bondi, had however advised him in May, stressing that the presence of his name, with that of other known personalities belonging to the Circle of Jeffrey Epstein, did not imply “reprehensible” actions, several American media reported this week.
“Nothing asked” in exchange
It is in this context that Todd Blanche, number 2 of the Ministry of Justice and former personal lawyer of Donald Trump in several criminal procedures, met on Friday for a second day Ghislaine Maxwell at the Tallahassee court, capital of Florida, where she purges her sentence.
“We have finished, Ghislaine answered all the questions asked to him during this and a half day,” said his lawyer, David Markus, repeating that she had replied “honestly and as much as she could”.
“We did not ask for anything,” said the lawyer, adding that “no leniency measure had been proposed to him” in exchange for his testimony.
This highly unusual interview between number 2 of the Ministry of Justice and a person convicted in a closed file aroused many questions among the legal experts and detractors of the Trump administration. They notably criticize Todd Blanche for continuing to behave like Donald Trump’s lawyer at the service of the sole interests of the latter.
Photo John Raoux, Associated Press
David Markus, Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyer
“It has been unjustly treated in the past five years,” said Mr.e Markus, indicating that he would produce a new written memory on Monday in support of the appeal of his client before the Supreme Court to obtain the cancellation of the proceedings which led to his conviction.
Ghislaine Maxwell was sentenced in 2022 for recruiting between 1994 and 2004 minor girls so that Epstein exploits them sexually.
On July 14, the Ministry of Justice had opposed this appeal.
But he has changed his tone significantly with regard to Ghislaine Maxwell since.
Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reported a health letter attributed to Donald Trump for Jeffrey Epstein in 2003 for the 50e anniversary of the latter. The American president categorically denies and continues the daily defamation, demanding billions of dollars.
