Ghislaine Maxwell, Who Wants A Pardon, Says She Never Saw Trump ‘in Any Inappropriate Setting’

Convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell, who is seeking a pardon from Donald Trump, told top Justice Department officials during an interview last month that she never witnessed the president “in any inappropriate setting” with girls introduced to him by disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Maxwell, Epstein’s co-conspirator who is serving a 20-year federal prison sentence, makes unfailingly flattering references to Trump, according to transcripts of the conversation released by the Justice Department on Friday. She says she “never” observed Trump receive a “massage,” which is the term prosecutors have said Epstein and Maxwell used as code language to describe sexual encounters with the girls and young women they recruited.

“I actually never saw the president in any type of massage setting,” she said in a hastily arranged interview that took place in Florida over the course of two days last month. “I never witnessed the president in any inappropriate setting in any way. The president was never inappropriate with anybody. In the times that I was with him, he was a gentleman in all respects.”

The Justice Department released the interview materials around the same time it delivered a tranche of the so-called Epstein files to Capitol Hill in response to a congressional subpoena. The information in those files is not yet public. The moves are part of the department’s continued efforts to quell the uproar from Trump’s MAGA base over the administration’s handling of the Epstein files.

The transcripts provide few fresh details about the Epstein saga, which has been meticulously documented in criminal and civil trials for decades. When Maxwell was pressed on newly reported information about Trump’s relationship with Epstein — including his purportedly raunchy submission to a book compiled for Epstein’s 50th birthday — Maxwell said she could not recall specifics. Trump has denied he wrote the submission and POLITICO has not independently verified it.

“It's been so long,” Maxwell said when asked to recall the names of contributors to the book. “I want to tell you, but I don't remember.”

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche interviewed Maxwell, and the two were joined in the room by Diego Pestana, the acting associate deputy attorney general, an FBI special agent, a deputy U.S. marshal and three of Maxwell’s attorneys.

In February, DOJ released what it called the “first phase” of documents related to the Epstein investigation, which has been a fixation of some of the president’s supporters. But the limited materials it disclosed to far-right influencers only further infuriated Epstein conspiracy theorists who pressed the administration to release more documents related to the deceased sex trafficker.

It has long been public that Trump — along with other prominent figures — had a relationship with Epstein and was referenced in documents released in court cases involving him. Trump hasn’t been accused of any wrongdoing tied to Epstein. A spokesperson for the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the release of the transcripts.

Maxwell was convicted at a jury trial in 2021 of having aided and participated in Epstein’s sex trafficking ring, which the government has said victimized more than 1,000 young women and girls. Epstein died in jail by suicide in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. Prosecutors have called Maxwell a serial liar and also charged her with perjury but dropped those counts after her conviction on other charges.

Maxwell describes Epstein’s behavior

Maxwell’s denials of inappropriate behavior went well beyond Trump. She told DOJ officials in their interviews that she never witnessed any misconduct by any men who visited or traveled with Epstein — contradicting both what Justice Department officials have concluded and mountains of evidence presented at her criminal trial and in numerous civil cases.

“I never, ever saw any man doing something inappropriate with a woman of any age. I never saw inappropriate habits,” she said.

Maxwell insisted she was unaware of any sexual contact between Epstein and minors or any other type of “non-consensual” sexual activity. But she said she now recognizes some of those things may have happened outside her presence.

“I'm not saying that Mr. Epstein did not do those things,” she said. “I don't feel comfortable saying that today, given what I now know to be true. So I am not here to defend him. But what I can say is that I did not participate in that activity.”

Maxwell also acknowledged Epstein’s interest in women changed over time, moving toward younger women and even teenagers.

“I never understood that change to encompass children. I did see from when I met him, he was involved … however you want to characterize it, with women who were in their 20s. And then the slide to, you know, 18 or younger looking women. But I never considered that this would encompass criminal behavior,” she said.

While not taking responsibility for any criminal conduct, Maxwell said she and others close to Epstein accepted his obsessive tendencies involving massages and young women.

“I don't think he did hide it. … And I think that the people around him, I think, myself included obviously normalized his behavior on a number of fronts,” she said. “I own

my side of that fence that I was there and that I saw his behavior with women and didn't challenge him or do something.”

Trump admin tries to control the narrative

Trump and his allies fueled conspiracy theories about Epstein for years, hinting that the government was sitting on a trove of evidence of powerful people participating in Epstein’s sex trafficking operation, perhaps included on an incriminating client list Epstein supposedly kept. They also suggested Epstein’s death may have been the result of foul play. And Trump aides, including Attorney General Pam Bondi, fueled speculation further when they suggested in February that a massive release of files was coming soon.

But the administration reversed course last month, revealing that the unreleased evidence was largely a collection of explicit videos of girls,that there was no evidence to contradict the conclusion that Epstein killed himself in prison or a supposed “client list.” The decision led to an uproar among Trump allies that exposed some cracks among the MAGA base and prompted an extraordinary rush by Trump allies to quell the furor.

Blanche’s decision to interview Maxwell — a highly unusual task for the No. 2 official at DOJ — as well as his ill-fated decision to seek the release of grand jury transcripts connected to the case, were aimed at tamping down the anger.

His decision to interview Maxwell came despite prosecutors’ longtime description of Maxwell as a serial liar. She was charged with two counts of perjury for lying to authorities during a deposition about Epstein. Those charges were later dropped after her conviction on other counts. She declined to testify at her trial.

Maxwell, in the interviews, rejected claims by prosecutors that Epstein paid her enormous sums of money, as much as $30 million, during the course of their relationship. Prosecutors had suggested during her trial that the largesse was intended to keep her quiet about her role in recruiting underage girls to engage in sexual activity with him, but she denied that.

“That is categorically false,” she said.

Maxwell said some of the money funded investments and business deals, while other payments were moved to accounts linked to her but actually used to buy things for Epstein.

“My belief is that that money also contained money that was for a helicopter, for instance, that I never owned and I — was never mine,” she said.

Maxwell discusses Bill Clinton, Prince Andrew and RFK Jr.

The transcripts contain references to a number of prominent figures in politics and business, although in many instances Maxwell says she does not believe they ever met or knew Epstein.

Maxwell says she was friendly with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and went on multiple trips with former President Bill Clinton, including at least one on one of Epstein’s planes. But Epstein wasn’t on that trip, she said. She also sought to knock down the rumors that Bill Clinton spent time on a private island Epstein owned in the Caribbean, Little Saint James Island.

“He never. Absolutely never went. And I can be sure of that because there's no way he would've gone — I don't believe there's any way that he would've gone to the island, had I not been there. Because I don't believe he had an independent friendship, if you will, with Epstein,” she said.

Maxwell also said she didn’t sense that Bill Clinton had any particular personal connection with Epstein. “I didn't see President Clinton being interested in Epstein. He was just a rich guy with a plane,” she said.

Aides to Clinton have acknowledged that he had interactions with Epstein andused one of his planes for international travel, but say he cut ties with Epstein after he pleaded guilty to criminal soliciting charges in Florida in 2008.

Maxwell also disputes that Prince Andrew, one of the highest-profile men who is accused of having participated in Epstein’s sex trafficking ring, ever met Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who sued Prince Andrew, alleging Epstein and Maxwell trafficked her to Prince Andrew when she was a minor.

Prince Andrew and Giuffre, who died earlier this year, settled the lawsuit in 2022. He has denied the allegations against him.

The two were famously photographed alongside Maxwell in an image that became one of the most indelible from the Epstein saga. In the interview with Blanche, Maxwell said she believes the photograph is fake.

She also disputed Giuffre’s account of having a sexual encounter with Prince Andrew in the bathroom of Maxwell’s house in London, saying the bathroom was too small for it to be physically possible.

“Her description of whatever the two people were doing in the tub, that wouldn't work,” Maxwell said. “The bathroom itself is so small, you can't lie flat on the floor.”

Maxwell did confirm that Epstein knew one current Trump Cabinet member: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. She said she accompanied Epstein and Kennedy on a “dinosaur bone hunting” trip to the Dakotas several decades ago.

Maxwell said she was not aware whether or not Kennedy received a massage from any of Epstein’s masseuses on the trip, but she never witnessed anything untoward. “I never saw anything inappropriate with Mr. Kennedy,” she said.

A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Maxwell also said she disbelieves official accounts that Epstein died by suicide while in prison. But she rejected the suggestion that he was killed as part of a conspiracy to silence him. Rather, she said, she believed he may have been targeted by an inmate for “internal” reasons.

“In prison, where I am, they will kill you or they will pay — somebody can pay a prisoner to kill you for $25 worth of commissary,” Maxwell said. “That's about the going rate for a hit with a lock today.”

Justice Department officials have said — and an inspector general’s report concluded — that Epstein killed himself.