WASHINGTON — U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday urged his fellow Republicans in Congress to vote for the discharge of recordsdata associated to the late convicted intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein, reversing his earlier resistance to such a transfer.
Trump’s publish on his Reality Social got here after Home Speaker Mike Johnson stated earlier that he believed a vote on releasing Justice Division paperwork within the Epstein case ought to assist put to relaxation allegations that Trump had any connection to Epstein’s abuse and trafficking of underage ladies.
“Home Republicans ought to vote to launch the Epstein recordsdata, as a result of we have now nothing to cover,” Trump wrote on Sunday night time. “And it’s time to maneuver on from this Democrat Hoax perpetrated by Radical Left Lunatics with a purpose to deflect from the Nice Success of the Republican Social gathering, together with our current Victory on the Democrat ‘Shutdown’.”
Though Trump and Epstein had been photographed collectively many years in the past, the president has stated the 2 males fell out earlier than Epstein’s convictions. Emails launched final week by a Home committee confirmed the disgraced financier believed Trump “knew in regards to the ladies,” although it was not clear what that phrase meant.
Trump, who has lately dismissed the Epstein recordsdata as a Democratic smear marketing campaign, has since instructed the Division of Justice to analyze distinguished Democrats’ ties to Epstein.
The battle over disclosure of extra Epstein-related paperwork, a topic Trump himself campaigned on, has opened a rift with a few of his allies in Congress.
Lots of Trump’s most loyal supporters imagine the federal government is withholding delicate paperwork about Epstein, a convicted intercourse offender who died by suicide in jail in 2019, that may reveal the late financier’s ties to highly effective public figures.
Trump late on Friday withdrew his assist for U.S. Consultant Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, lengthy certainly one of his staunchest supporters in Congress, following her criticism of Republicans on sure points, together with the dealing with of the Epstein recordsdata.
U.S. Consultant Ro Khanna, a California Democrat and an unique sponsor of the petition calling for a vote on the recordsdata’ launch, stated on Sunday that he anticipated greater than 40 Republicans to vote in favor.
Republicans maintain the bulk within the Home, with 219 seats, versus 214 for Democrats.
