The president says disgraced financier repeatedly hired his spa workers, including young women, despite warnings, leading to the end of their friendship.
President Donald Trump revealed Tuesday that his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein ended after Epstein repeatedly hired female staffers from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago spa, despite explicit instructions not to. The President made the comments to reporters aboard Air Force One.
Trump stated that Epstein’s actions, which included hiring young women from the spa, were “the end” of their association. He confirmed that some of those hired by Epstein were young women, including then-17-year-old Virginia Giuffre.
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“Everyone knows the people that were taken and it was the concept of taking people that work for me is bad,” Trump said. “But that story has been pretty well out there, and yes, they were [young women] … People were taken out of the spa, hired by [Epstein]. In other words, gone. And other people would come and complain ‘this guy is taking people from the spa,’ I didn’t know that. And when I heard about it, I told him, ‘listen, we don’t want you taking our people, whether it was spa or not [the] spa.’ I don’t want him taking people, and he was fine. Then not too long after that, he did it again and I said, ‘[you’re] out of here.’”
When asked directly if Giuffre was one of the individuals hired from the spa, Trump responded, “I don’t know. I think she worked at the spa. I think so, I think that was one of the people, yeah. He stole her. And by the way, she had no complaints about us, as you know. None whatsoever.”
The President reiterated that Epstein’s hiring spree was the final straw. “I don’t want to say any number, you’re talking about a number of years ago. But yeah, he took people and I said ‘don’t do it anymore, they work for me.’ And he took beyond that, he took some others. And once he did that, that was the end of him,” Trump concluded.
Virginia Giuffre, a prominent accuser of Epstein, alleged Ghislaine Maxwell recruited her to perform sexual acts. She had also alleged in a December 2019 interview with the BBC that Prince Andrew sexually abused her three times when she was 17, an allegation the prince denied. Giuffre died by suicide in April at the age of 41.
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Trump’s latest explanation for the severing of ties with Epstein differs from previous accounts. The New York Times previously reported that Trump stated their friendship ended in 2004 over Epstein’s purchase of a property in Palm Beach, Florida.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt had also told The New York Times that Trump barred Epstein from Mar-a-Lago “for being a creep.” Other reports have suggested Trump banned Epstein for making advances toward another member’s teenage daughter.
During a joint press conference with United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Monday, President Trump had stated that the previous administration would have already released any incriminating evidence against him in the Epstein files to aid Democrats in the 2024 election.
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