A senior Trump administration official stated Thursday that President Donald Trump is not currently considering clemency for Jeffrey Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell after the president has repeatedly left the door open on the matter in recent weeks.
“No leniency is being given or discussed. That’s just false. The President himself has said that clemency for Maxwell is not something he is even thinking about at this time,” the official told CNN.
The remark comes as the family of Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre is speaking out against any possibility of Trump giving clemency to Maxwell. The family was spurred to comment after the president told reporters earlier this week that Epstein “stole” Mar-a-Lago employees, leading to the two men’s falling out in the early 2000s. He acknowledged, when asked by a reporter, that one of those employees may have been Giuffre, who died by suicide earlier this year.
“I think she worked at the spa,” Trump said. “I think that was one of the people, yeah. He stole her.”
Asked about the president’s comments, Giuffre’s family expressed shock and raised questions about Trump’s relationship with Epstein in a statement to CNN. The comments were first reported by The Atlantic.
“It makes us ask if he was aware of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal actions, especially given his statement two years later that his good friend Jeffrey ‘likes women on the younger side … no doubt about it,’” said the statement from Giuffre’s two brothers and her sisters-in-law. They called Maxwell a “monster” and a “predator.”
“If our sister could speak today, she would be most angered by the fact that the government is listening to a known perjurer. A woman who repeatedly lied under oath and will continue to do so as long as it benefits her position,” they continued, adding: “The government and the President should never consider giving Ghislaine Maxwell any leniency.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told CNN in a statement that Trump was “directly responding to a question posed by a reporter about Ms. Guiffre — he did not bring her up.”
“The fact remains that President Trump kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club for being a creep to his female employees,” Leavitt added.
The president has been noncommittal when asked about the possibility of a pardon or commutation for Maxwell amid mounting calls for transparency around Epstein. Trump has not been accused of any wrongdoing in connection with Epstein.
“Well, I’m allowed to give her a pardon, but nobody’s approached me with it. Nobody’s asked me about it,” Trump told reporters earlier this week. He added that it was “inappropriate to talk about it.”
Maxwell has offered to testify before Congress, but with major conditions, including immunity, according to a list of her demands sent to the House Oversight Committee by her attorneys. A spokesperson for the panel has said they would not consider immunity.
This article has been updated with additional reporting.
CNN’s Kerry Rubin, Rashard Rose, Aaron Blake and Kaitlan Collins contributed to this report.
For more CNN news and newsletters create an account at CNN.com
