Andrew Kerr on July 24, 2019
Accused child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein visited the White House during former President Bill Clinton’s administration at least four times, the Daily Beast reported Wednesday.
Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, the woman who has been described as his “madam,” attended a Bill and Hillary Clinton-hosted donors’ reception in the White House in September 1993 after he donated $10,000 to the White House Historical Association that same month, according to documents from the Clinton Presidential Library obtained by the Daily Beast.
A former executive vice president of the White House Historical Association, Bernard Meyer, sent a letter to Epstein in October 1993 thanking him for the donation, which he said would be put toward refurbishing the Oval Office and areas of the Executive Residence.
Epstein also met Clinton aide Mark Middleton at least three times in the White House around 1993 and 1994, the Daily Beast reported, citing an unnamed source with knowledge of the situation.
The revelation that Epstein’s relationship with Bill Clinton began in the early 1990s casts doubt on the narrative put forth by the former president that their relationship began after he left the White House.
The former president said he “knew nothing” of the financier’s “terrible crimes” in a statement in July after authorities arrested and charged Epstein with sex trafficking.
Bill Clinton acknowledged in the statement that he had taken multiple trips on Epstein’s airplane in 2002 and 2003 for work related to the Clinton Foundation, but he neglected to acknowledge Epstein’s visits to the White House during his time in office.
Statement on Jeffrey Epstein. pic.twitter.com/98ha9YYd1l
— Angel Ureña (@angelurena) July 8, 2019
Epstein said he helped conceive an arm of the Clinton Foundation in a 2007 letter to federal prosecutors designed to boost his public image during the plea negotiations that ultimately led to his highly criticized 2008 sweetheart deal where he served 13 months in prison for pleading guilty to soliciting an underage girl for sex.
Former Italian model Elisabetta Tai said Epstein’s friendship with Bill Clinton was invoked by a member of his entourage when she tried fleeing from his Manhattan mansion in 2004 after the financier stripped naked and handed her a vibrator during a business meeting.
“She told me that I couldn’t just leave,” Tai told the New York Post a woman resembling Epstein’s alleged madam Maxwell told her as she was leaving his house. “She said that this man is important, that he is a friend of President Clinton.”