Donald Trump says that he was not behind the order directing Ghislaine Maxwell’s transfer from a prison facility in Florida to a minimum security facility in Texas dubbed “Club Fed”.
The president claimed on Tuesday that he’d only learned about the prison transfer in news reports. Maxwell remains in prison on a 20-year sentence for crimes committed with Jeffrey Epstein, her former boyfriend. Epstein died in federal custody in 2019 while awaiting charges for sex trafficking children.
“I didn’t know about it at all. I read about it just like you did,” Trump told a reporter who asked him if he’d personally approved the transfer. He added: “It’s not a very uncommon thing.”
Trump went on to defend the private meeting between his former personal attorney, Deputy Attorney Todd Blanche, and Maxwell — something he also insisted wasn’t “unusual”.
The meeting was heavily scrutinized, as the Department of Justice did not explain why Maxwell would have information that the FBI and federal prosecutors didn’t uncover during her prosecution, or Epstein’s. Blanche met with Maxwell for nine hours over two days, releasing only a short statement on Twitter with no details from the meetings. He hasn’t commented publicly on the matter since.
Trump has been criticized for his handling of the so-called Epstein files and their non-release by his administration, both among the president’s typical critics as well as among members of Trump’s own MAGA base.
Maxwell, adding fuel to that fire, offered to testify to the bipartisan House Oversight Committee only if she were to receive a clemency deal for her testimony from the government. Trump has repeatedly been asked if he’ll pardon Maxwell; the president has hedged that he’s “allowed” to, without indicating whether he was specifically considering it.
“I’m allowed to do it, but nobody’s asked me to do it,” said Trump during a Newsmax interview on Friday. “I know nothing about it. I don’t know anything about the case, but I know I have the right to do it. I have the right to give pardons. I’ve given pardons to people before, but nobody’s even asked me to do it.”
Inmates at Maxwell’s new digs include Theranos fraudster Elizabeth Holmes and “Real Housewives of Salt Lake City” star Jen Shah. Nicknamed “Club Fed,” it’s described as a relatively low-security facility with a sports field, a program where inmates can participate in training service animals, and generally does not house offenders with sex crimes on their records, absent a federal waiver.
Trump and his administration have now been battling the firestorm over the Epstein investigation for a full month. In early July, the Department of Justice and FBI released a joint memo stating that a list of Epstein’s alleged co-conspirators or other evidence linking the powerful men rumored to have taken part in the sexual abuse of minors did not exist within the agencies’ files. The memo also concluded that Epstein’s 2019 death in federal custody was by suicide.
At the same time, the Justice Department told Americans that no further releases of files of the investigations would occur. This infuriated MAGAworld and reignited conversations about the topic across social media and the podcasting spheres, as Trump’s associates spent months and in some cases years ginning up speculation around the Epstein case and adding fuel to conspiracy theories involving Joe Biden and the so-called “Deep State”.
Right-wing influencers were even called to the White House at one point this year to receive binders titled “Phase One” of the administration’s Epstein document release plan. Phase two never materialized.
The furor proved impossible for Republican members of Congress to ignore, and a number have called on the administration to provide more transparency. House Speaker Mike Johnson called the August recess early to avoid a forced vote on a measure to compel the Justice Department to release documents from the case, but that measure is expected to be a fight Congress wages in September once lawmakers return.
