Along with other high-profile individuals who were associated with Jeffrey Epstein, President Donald Trump’s name was mentioned nine times across the hundreds of pages made public earlier this year in the “phase one” release of the declassified Epstein files.
The vast majority of the documents in the “phase one” release had been previously made public through the prosecution of Epstein’s associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, or through civil lawsuits, including flight logs from Epstein’s plane and a redacted version of Epstein’s so-called “black book” of contacts. Trump’s name appears in both the flight logs and the book of contacts.
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In the files, Trump’s name was listed in Epstein’s “contact book,” which is often referenced as his “black book.” The contact information listed under Trump’s entry was redacted.
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The book also included entries for the president’s first wife Ivana, his daughter Ivanka, his younger brother Robert, and Robert’s former wife Blaine.
Though Trump told New York Magazine in 2002 that Epstein was “terrific guy,” the president has since disavowed the sex offender and said they had a “falling out” in the early 2000s.
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“Well, I knew him like everybody in Palm Beach knew him,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office in 2019 after Epstein’s arrest on federal sex trafficking charges. “I had a falling out with him a long time ago. I don’t think I’ve spoken to him for 15 years. I wasn’t a fan. I was not, yeah, a long time ago, I’d say maybe 15 years. I was not a fan of his, that I can tell you. I was not a fan of his.”
In the files, Trump was also listed as a passenger on Epstein’s plane eight times between 1993 and 1997.
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Most flights were between Palm Beach, Florida, and Teterboro, New Jersey. According to the logs, Trump also traveled from Palm Beach to Teterboro with a stop in Washington, D.C.,. with Epstein, Maxwell, and his family – including Marla Trump, Tiffany Trump, and a nanny – on May 15, 1994.
In total, Trump was mentioned in the flight logs at least eight times, including:
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A flight with Epstein and one other person from Teterboro, NJ to Palm Beach, FL on April 23, 1993
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A flight with Epstein from Palm Beach, FL to Teterboro, NJ on April 26, 1993
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A flight with Epstein, Maxwell, and two others from Palm Beach, FL to Teterboro, NJ on Oct. 11, 1993
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A flight with Epstein, Maxwell, and three others from Palm Beach, FL to Teterboro, NJ on Oct. 17, 1993
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A flight with Epstein, Marla Trump, Tiffany Trump, a nanny, and one other person from Palm Beach, FL to Washington, DC on May 15, 1994
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A flight with Epstein, Marla Trump, Tiffany Trump, and a nanny from Washington, DC to Teterboro, NJ on May 15, 1994
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A flight with Epstein, Maxwell, Eric Trump, and four others from Palm Beach, FL to Teterboro, NJ on Aug. 13, 1995.
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A flight with Epstein, Maxwell, and five others from Palm Beach, FL to Newark, NJ on January 5, 1997
The “phase one” files were released by Attorney General Pam Bondi in conjunction with the FBI in late February, including 341 pages of documents related to the disgraced financier. Of those, 118 pages were duplicative of each other.
The only newly released document in “phase one” was a three-page catalog of evidence seized during the searches of Epstein’s properties in New York and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
At the time of the February release, the Justice Department said it planned to release “thousands of pages of documents related to the investigation and indictment of Epstein that were not previously disclosed” once redactions were made to protect the identity of victims.
However, in a memo released earlier this month, the Justice Department and the FBI said a review found no evidence Epstein kept a “client list” of associates or that he blackmailed prominent individuals and that no further records from the investigation would be released.
