The House committee charged with investigating Jeffrey Epstein has released more than nine hours of video footage from last week’s closed-door depositionswith Bill and Hillary Clinton.
The former president and secretary of State testified in compliance with congressional subpoenas to members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, where they were grilled at a performing arts center in Chappaqua, New York, over what they recall about Epstein and his longtime co-conspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell.
The committee asked Bill Clinton,who testified last Friday, about the photos he appeared in as part of the Justice Department’s Epstein files release and the relationship Epstein had with the Clinton Global Initiative.
Asked about President Donald Trump’s relationship with Epstein, Bill Clinton told the committee he recalled Trump saying the two had “a falling out over a land-deal, property deal.”
“He said, ‘I’m sorry it happened,’ that’s all,” the former president said, referring to Trump.
Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the top Democrat on the panel, asked whether he believed Trump should answer the committee’s questions, Bill Clinton responded, “That’s for you to decide.”
He added: “But he did know him well, and I once had a brief discussion with [Trump] about it.”
Trump has denied the accusations and has insisted he cut off ties with Epstein years before the convicted sex offender was put in jail.
Bill Clinton has maintained he had no knowledge of Epstein’s sex crimes and that he severed ties with the disgraced financier years prior to his arrest in 2019. Hillary Clinton, whose interview was the day before, insisted she didn’t recall ever meeting Epstein and considered Maxwell a casual acquaintance.
Neither of the Clintons have been accused of wrongdoing in connection with Epstein.
But Republicans considered their testimonycritical to their probe. Bill Clinton has been featured heavily in the Epstein files released by the Justice Department, and some in the GOP have sought to make him an alternative bogeyman to Trump, who also had a rapport with Epstein.
Their depositions also came just as Democrats on the Oversight panel announced an investigation into whether the DOJ withheld or took down materials from its database around allegations that Trump sexually assaulted a minor.
