US President Donald Trump has urged lawmakers in his own party to vote to release files relating to the late convicted paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.
Trump wrote on Sunday night that Republicans in the House of Representatives should do so “because we have nothing to hide”.
The reversal of his recent position follows a slow drip feed of documents concerning the disgraced financier by House Democrats, some of which reference Trump, who has always denied any link to Epstein’s sex abuse and trafficking.
But details of his and other prominent figures’ past relationship with Epstein have fueled speculation and led to a public spat with one of Trump’s staunchest supporters.
Potentially dozens of Republicans have now signalled they are willing to break ranks and vote in favour of a bill that would compel the US government to publish all the documents on Epstein and the criminal investigations into him that it holds.
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Supporters of the bill appear to have enough votes for it to pass the House this week, though it is unclear whether it would pass in the Senate, the other chamber of the US Congress.
Epstein was found dead in his New York prison cell in 2019, in what a coroner later ruled a suicide. He was being held on charges of sex trafficking, having previously been convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor in 2008.
Trump repeated White House dismissals of the attention over the Epstein files as a Democrat-led “hoax” to “deflect” attention away from his party’s work.
“The Department of Justice has already turned over tens of thousands of pages to the Public on ‘Epstein,’ are looking at various Democrat operatives (Bill Clinton, Reid Hoffman, Larry Summers, etc.) and their relationship to Epstein, and the House Oversight Committee can have whatever they are legally entitled to, I DON’T CARE!,” he wrote on his Truth social platform.
He added that he wanted Republicans to “get BACK ON POINT”.
Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson made a similar point on Sunday, saying calls to release the files were the “entire game plan” for opposition Democrats.
“Trump has clean hands,” Johnson told Fox News. “He’s not worried about it. I talk to him all the time. He has nothing to do with this. He’s frustrated that they’re turning it into a political issue.”
Since returning to the White House, Trump has dismissed the need to release more documents, despite this being a key demand of many of his supporters and some of his key allies.
Trump was historically photographed at social gatherings with Epstein, but has repeatedly said he severed contact with the financier years before Epstein’s 2008 conviction, and was unaware of his criminal activity.
The US president’s change of position on the matter comes after Democrats on the House Oversight Committee published three email exchanges, including correspondence between Epstein and his long-time associate Ghislaine Maxwell, who is currently serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex trafficking.
