Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told a House panel she knows nothing about Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking crimes and accused the GOP of conducting a cover-up for others who may have been involved, including President Trump.
Mrs. Clinton’s opening statement, which she released Thursday ahead of a closed-door deposition, called on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee to depose Mr. Trump, a onetime Epstein friend.
“If this committee is serious about learning the Truth about Epstein’s trafficking crimes,” she said, “it would not rely on press gaggles to get answers from our current president on his involvement; it would ask him directly under oath about the tens of thousands of times he shows up in the Epstein files.”
House lawmakers are questioning Mrs. Clinton under oath in the performing arts center of Chappaqua, New York, where she lives.
The committee will hear sworn testimony from her husband, former President Bill Clinton, a former Epstein friend, on Friday.
Panel Chairman James Comer, Kentucky Republican, said he wants to ask Mrs. Clinton questions about Epstein’s financial contributions to the Clinton Foundation and about her relationship with Epstein associate and convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell.
Maxwell is in prison, and Epstein died in 2019.
Mrs. Clinton’s four-page opening statement reiterated her sworn declaration, which she provided to the panel earlier this year.
“As I stated in my sworn declaration on January 13, I had no idea about their criminal activities, I do not recall ever encountering Mr. Epstein, I never flew on his plane or visited his island, homes or offices. I have nothing to add to that,” she said.
Mrs. Clinton appears to have had a relationship with Maxwell, who was a guest at daughter Chelsea Clinton’s wedding.
Mrs. Clinton’s statement did not address that relationship. She said the panel has done little to hold accountable those whose names appear the most prominently in the Epstein files, and she pointed out no GOP lawmaker showed up for the testimony earlier this month of Les Wexner, the retail billionaire who for many years handed over the handling of his finances to Mr. Epstein. Republican staffers were present for that interview.
“You have held zero public hearings, refused to allow the media to attend them, including today, despite espousing the need for transparency on dozens of occasions,” Mrs. Clinton said in the statement.
The panel has released videos and transcripts of the closed-door depositions and will do so when Mrs. Clinton is done testifying, Mr. Comer said Thursday.
Mr. Clinton said the committee and Trump administration have done little to combat human trafficking and that the president continues to withhold some of the Epstein files to protect wealthy and powerful people.
She called on the panel to “demand testimony” from Florida and New York prosecutors about their 2007 sweetheart deal that let Epstein plead guilty to soliciting prostitution from a minor.
“If the majority is serious, it would not waste time on fishing expeditions,” she said. “There is too much that needs to be done.”
Mr. Comer said Thursday ahead of Mrs. Clinton’s deposition that Mr. Trump has answered many questions from reporters about his relationship with Epstein.
The two were friends into the early 2000s, but Mr. Trump cut him off after Epstein started luring away female employees from Mar-a-Lago.
Mrs. Clinton agreed to provide the deposition to avoid a contempt of Congress vote against the former first couple for defying interviews the panel ordered under subpoenas.
