President Donald Trump is mentioned more than 1,000 times in the 3 million Jeffrey Epstein documents released Friday, after the president initially resisted the effort. While some of the references are benign, others include newly disclosed unverified sexual assault claims against Trump as well as fresh details about how some of Epstein’s victims described their interactions with the future president.
Most notably, the newly released documents contain a list of unverified assault allegations against Trump compiled by FBI officials last year. There are also FBI notes about a woman who accused Trump in a lawsuit of raping her when she was 13, and an FBI interview with one of Epstein’s victims who stated that Epstein’s accomplice Ghislane Maxwell once “presented her” to Trump at a party.
There’s no public evidence that any of the allegations against Trump contained in the new documents were deemed credible by the FBI, and the Justice Department said on Friday that the allegations against Trump in the documents were false. Trump has long denied any wrongdoing related to Epstein or any allegation of sexual misconduct.
Commenting Saturday on the release of the files, Trump said, “I didn’t see it myself, but I was told by some very important people that not only does it absolve me, it’s the opposite of what people were hoping.”
The latest revelations serve as a reminder of Trump’s initial resistance against releasing the files, despite pledging to do so when he took office.
Congress ultimately bucked Trump and passed a law forcing the Justice Department to release all of the Epstein files by mid-December. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the Justice Department belatedly completed that duty on Friday with its release of 3.5 million documents, though Blanche said some documents were withheld under exceptions to the law.
The new details are also a reminder of Trump’s decades-long friendship with Epstein, a convicted sex offender who died by suicide in 2019, and Maxwell, Epstein’s longtime associate who is currently in prison for sex trafficking.
It’s hard to capture at this point the full scope of what’s contained in the millions of documents that were put online Friday morning, due to the sheer enormity of the release.
A search of the Justice Department’s Epstein website for “Donald Trump” yielded more than 1,800 hits, a number that rose during the day Friday as the DOJ website seemingly indexed more files. Many of those references are news articles mentioning Trump during his presidency that Epstein shared with others, as well as his commentary about Trump with a mix of journalists and other associates, like Steve Bannon.
Blanche said Friday the White House had “no oversight” of the review of documents related to the Epstein investigation.
“Let me just be clear — they had nothing to do with this review,” Blanche said. “They had no oversight over this review. They did not tell this department how to do our review, what to look for, what to redact, what to not redact.”
The Justice Department said in its release that “some of the documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election. To be clear, the claims are unfounded and false and if they have a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already.”
FBI compiled Trump allegations last year
One of the most intriguing documents involving Trump was a list officials at the FBI compiled this past August with more than a dozen allegations related to Trump, many of which appear to have come from unverified tips through the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center, which takes tips from the public.
The documents were included in emails that were sent by officials in the FBI’s New York field office on the Child Exploitation & Human Trafficking Task Force. “Yellow highlighting is for the salacious piece,” one official wrote to explain how the allegations were being sorted.
It’s not clear why the allegations were compiled last summer. In July, the FBI and DOJ released a memo claiming there was no evidence that Epstein had a list of powerful men who participated in his alleged underworld of sex trafficking and pedophilia.
The allegations appear to be unverified, and officials note that some are secondhand information. The FBI document says that in many instances, there was no contact made with the individuals who sent in the allegations, or no contact information was provided.
There are also unverified allegations made in the document against former President Bill Clinton, who has denied wrongdoing related to Epstein.
Trump didn’t want this day to come
Between Trump’s stints in the White House, many of his allies became right-wing influencers and podcasters. And many, like now-FBI Director Kash Patel, latched onto the Epstein saga and suggested that the Justice Department was protecting Democrats and liberal celebrities – while largely ignoring Trump’s well-documented ties to Epstein.
After whipping up activists in the GOP base, pressure built last year on the Trump administration to use its new powers over the DOJ and FBI to release Epstein-related materials from the vault. One early attempt by Attorney General Pam Bondi backfired when new materials she touted ended up being a curation of already public filings.
This led to a drumbeat of Republican lawmakers calling for the full release of the Epstein files. They worked with Democrats who were eager to use the issue as a cudgel against a man that many of them saw as a sexual predator, after more than a dozen women accused him of assault and harassment and he was found liable by a jury in 2023 for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll in a civil defamation case. (He denies all of these allegations and hasn’t ever been accused by law enforcement of any wrongdoing related to Epstein.)
Trump fought hard to stop Congress from passing the law and personally lobbied individual GOP members at the White House. But he was outmaneuvered by a bipartisan groundswell of support from lawmakers and the public, and eventually dropped his opposition. The bill passed nearly unanimously and Trump signed it into law in November.
New revelations from December drops
The first wave of releases began on December 19, which was the deadline to release everything. Even though it was only a partial release, Trump’s name was all over it.
The documents revealed that federal prosecutors collected evidence in 2020 that Trump flew on Epstein’s private plane multiple times in the 1990s. This blew a hole in Trump’s previous denials, including a 2024 statement that “I was never on Epstein’s Plane.”
The December documents also revealed that the Justice Department subpoenaed Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club before Maxwell’s criminal trial in 2021. It’s unclear how the club responded. But the document requested information about a former Mar-a-Lago employee.
Just as they did on Friday, Trump appointees went out of their way to make clear that these disclosures also contained unverified tips about Trump, releasing the same statement that the files contained “untrue and sensationalist claims made against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election.”
A lot of the new material further enhanced the public’s understanding of Epstein’s ties to a wide array of Democratic figures, celebrities, and businesspeople. The files also made clear that Epstein closely followed news stories about Trump – and that he was in much more regular contact with former Trump adviser Steve Bannon than previously known.
FBI interview notes discuss Trump
Included among the millions of pages of documents released Friday were new details from the FBI’s interview notes with Epstein’s victims. While there was no smoking gun that many of Trump’s critics had hoped for, the documents brought new attention to Trump’s longstanding ties to a sexual predator.
One FBI memo from an Epstein victim contained allegations that Maxwell once “presented” her to Trump at a party in New York and later made clear to Trump that she was “available,” telling her, “Oh I think he likes you. Aren’t you lucky. This is great,” according to the document. The woman told federal investigators that “nothing happened” between her and Trump.
Another FBI memo contained notes from an apparent 2021 interview with Virginia Giuffre, one of the most outspoken Epstein survivors, who died by suicide in April 2025. The partially redacted memo indicates that Giuffre told investigators about working as a teenager at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, how she was recruited from there to work for Epstein, and about the sexual abuse she says she was later subjected to by Epstein.
The files also included an FBI form that details a complaint from a woman who accused Trump of raping her when she was 13 years old.
This anonymous accuser, Jane Doe, previously launched lawsuits against Trump and dropped them, the last right before the 2016 election.
The FBI document details multiple instances where she alleged abuse by Trump, including rape. It also says Epstein was allegedly “angry that Trump was the one to take Doe’s virginity” and also raped Doe. These descriptions mirror the allegations that Jane Doe made in her 2016 lawsuit.
Trump had previously denied the woman’s allegations.
When the lawsuit was dropped in 2016, Epstein emailed stories about the development to multiple associates, which were included in the files released Friday. There are also emails Epstein forwarded to Trump’s friend Tom Barrack in April 2016 when a Reuters reporter reached out to Epstein for comment after the lawsuit was filed.
“Nuts but i thought you guys should know,” Epstein wrote.
Insight into Epstein’s views on Trump
Beyond the FBI notes, the Epstein documents contain multiple emails that offer a glimpse into the convicted sex offender’s view of his former friend after he was elected president in 2016.
Epstein emails with a range of associates, including journalists, executives and others, with plenty of commentary about Trump.
In December 2018, Epstein asked journalist and author Michael Wolff for help pushing back against a story. Their exchange came just days after the Miami Herald published a deep investigation with interviews with dozens of women who said they were victims of Epstein’s abuse.
“Im thinking what would trump do,” Epstein wrote to Wolff as they bounced ideas off each other.
“He never tries to explain. He denies, blames media, denigrates someone else,” responded Wolff, who had written a salacious book about Trump’s White House that year.
“All about Donald Trump, the real villain,” Wolff followed up.
When asked about the overall release of the files on Saturday, Trump singled out Epstein’s exchanges with Wolff.
“This guy Wolff was a writer, was conspiring with Epstein to do harm to me,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One, adding that he would “certainly sue” the author.
There are multiple emails between Epstein and Larry Summers, the former US treasury secretary and Harvard University president, discussing Trump’s presidential campaign and first term. Summers previously told CNN he is “deeply ashamed” of his correspondences with Epstein and took leave from teaching at Harvard in November.
In October 2016, Summers asked Epstein: “How plausible is idea t=at trump is real cocaine user?”
“Zero,” Epstein replied.
While discussing Trump’s foreign policy in July 2017, Summers wrote to Epstein: “I think your friend is mentally ill.”
“Not my friend,” Epstein responded, “and i ve told you that before.”
CNN’s MJ Lee, Hannah Rabinowitz and Sarah Owermohle contributed to this report.
What have we learned from the newly released Epstein files?
Latest documents indicate high-profile figures continued friendships with financier after child sex abuse convictions
Millions of files related to the late child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have been released by the US justice department, the largest disclosure by the government since a law passed last year ruled that the documents should be published.
The disgraced financier was convicted of child sex offences in 2008 but the files indicate that many high-profile figures, including the former prince, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, continued friendships with him after this point.
Epstein killed himself in a Manhattan jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial on new child abuse charges. His accomplice, the British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, is serving a 20-year sentence in the US for child sex trafficking.
Here is what we learned from the latest Epstein files release on Friday.
Former prince Andrew invited Epstein to Buckingham Palace after release from house arrest
Released emails appear to show that Mountbatten-Windsor invited Epstein to Buckingham Palace after Epstein’s house arrest ended.
In 2019, the former prince gave a disastrous interview to the Newsnight presenter Emily Maitlis in which he tried to claim he distanced himself from Epstein after his 2008 conviction for abusing a 14-year-old girl in Florida. However, the files suggest the pair remained close.
In September 2010, emails between Epstein and “The Duke” – believed to be Mountbatten-Windsor as the then Duke of York – show Epstein requested “private time” on a planned visit to London.
Mountbatten-Windsor appears to have responded: “We could have dinner at Buckingham Palace and lots of privacy.” Two days later, he followed up by saying: “Delighted for you to come here to BP [Buckingham Palace]. Come with whomever and I’ll be here free from 1600ish.”
It is unclear if the meeting took place, but Epstein and Mountbatten-Windsor were pictured walking together in New York’s Central Park three months later. Mountbatten-Windsor previously claimed he had travelled to the US to end his friendship with Epstein in person in light of his conviction.
The documents also suggest that, the previous month, Epstein had offered to arrange for Mountbatten-Windsor to have dinner with a “clever, beautiful and trustworthy” Russian woman, who was 26. Mountbatten-Windsor apparently responded that he would be “delighted” to see the woman. He also asked Epstein if it was “good to be free” from house arrest.
Sarah Ferguson described Epstein as the ‘brother’ she always wanted
Mountbatten-Windsor’s former wife, Sarah Ferguson, thanked Epstein for being the “brother” she “always wished for” in an email sent a year after his child sex abuse conviction.
In the August 2009 exchange, Ferguson appears to suggest she and her daughters, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, met the disgraced financier, saying: “I have never been more touched by a friends [sic] kindness than your compliment to me in front of my girls.”
Epstein was under house arrest when the email was sent, but Ferguson implies that the pair had lunch the previous week. It has not been confirmed if she visited him while he was confined to his home.
In the emails, Ferguson also discusses conversations she has had with retailers regarding her “Sarah Ferguson brand”.
Epstein gave Ferguson at least £15,000 to help pay off debts, but some reports have suggested he bankrolled her to a much greater extent. In 2011, Ferguson said her relationship with Epstein had been a “gigantic error of judgment” but later emailed him privately to apologise.
Epstein sent money to Peter Mandelson’s husband
Epstein sent £10,000 to Lord Mandelson’s husband, Reinaldo Avila da Silva, in the year after his conviction. The emails suggest this was to fund an osteopathy course.
In another set of emails, Mandelson asks to stay at one of Epstein’s properties while he is serving his jail term. The terms of Epstein’s sentence allowed him to work from his office during the day and return to jail each night.
Mandelson told the Guardian on Friday that he had been “wrong” to continue his association with Epstein after his conviction, but said he was “never culpable or complicit” in his crimes.
Mandelson was sacked as the UK’s ambassador to the US last September when it emerged he had sent supportive messages to Epstein after he was convicted.
The FBI received allegations about Donald Trump’s links to Epstein
The new documents contain a list, compiled by the FBI, of allegations made against Trump through its National Threat Operations Center hotline. Many appear to be unsubstantiated claims of sexual abuse relating to Trump, Epstein and other public figures.
Although the US president is mentioned hundreds of times in the files, he has always denied any wrongdoing or knowledge of Epstein’s sexual abuse. He has admitted having a friendship with Epstein but the pair appear to have fallen out at some point in the mid-noughties, before Epstein was jailed.
The US justice department said: “Some of the documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election. To be clear, the claims are unfounded and false, and if they have a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponised against President Trump already.”
Elon Musk asked Epstein about parties on his island
The tech billionaire Elon Musk discussed travelling to Epstein’s island in November 2012, the files show. He sent the financier an email in which he asked: “What day/night will be the wildest party on your island?” Musk and Epstein continued to discuss the possibility of Musk visiting his island in late 2013.
Musk has not been accused of wrongdoing and it is unclear if he ultimately made the trip. He has not addressed the revelations in detail but said on X that it was “false” to suggest he planned to visit Epstein on another occasion, in 2014.
