Donald Trump has urged lawmakers in his own party to vote to release files relating to the late paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
The US president wrote on Sunday night that House Republicans should do so “because we have nothing to hide”.
The reversal of his 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 fuelled 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.
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 the Senate.
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 suggested to Fox News that a vote on releasing the documents would put to rest allegations that Trump had any connection to Epstein’s abuse and trafficking of teenage children.
Trump has previously dismissed the need to release more documents. He has been photographed at social gatherings with Epstein, but has repeatedly said he severed contact with Epstein before his 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.
Some of those exchanges make references to Trump. In one email, sent in 2011, Epstein writes to Maxwell: “I want you to realize that that dog that hasn’t barked is Trump.. [VICTIM] spent hours at my house with him.”
The White House said on Wednesday that the victim referenced in the email was prominent Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre.
There is no implication of any wrongdoing by Trump in the emails.
