Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has added an unexpected twist in the ongoing Jeffrey Epstein scandal that is rocking the White House, telling CNN's Manu Raju that Donald Trump had been an FBI informant against the prolific pedophile and human trafficker.
The comment came in response to Raju challenging Johnson on Trump's repeated claim throughout the week that the scandal is a "hoax." The Louisiana congressman answered that Raju had it wrong: "What Trump is referring to is the hoax that the Democrats are using to try to attack him." Johnson then explained that the president was just as upset at the "unspeakable evil" of Epstein's actions as anyone else, and listed the actions Trump had taken in the past that demonstrated as much. "When he first heard the rumor, he kicked him out of Mar-a-Lago. He was an FBI informant to try to take this stuff down," Johnson said, marking the first time that anyone has ever credited Trump with participating in the investigation against Epstein, including the president himself.
Trump's "hoax" comment first came this week during an Oval Office press conference on Wednesday during a meeting with Polish President Karol Nawrocki. A reporter asked for his reaction to press conferences being held that day in the capital by Epstein's victims, who were asking for the law enforcement files pertaining to the Epstein case be released to the public so that those who took part in his sex-trafficking operation could be brought to justice. The president answered that "thousands and thousands of documents" had already been released, and that the continued calls for more information were "Democrat hoax," which he was apparently finding tiresome, adding, "really, I think it's enough."
He repeated the claim on Friday morning in a lengthy social media message on the matter, where he accused his opposition of seeking to distract from his political successes. "The Department of Justice has done its job, they have given everything requested of them," Trump wrote on Truth Social, a platform which he owns. "It's time to end the Democrat Epstein Hoax, and give the Republicans credit for the great, even legendary job that they are doing."
Epstein's victims have grown frustrated with the government's apparent reluctance to release files that would likely reveal the international sex criminal's accomplices. On the same day as Trump's comments in the Oval Office, Epstein victim Lisa Phillips took part in one of the multiple press conferences in Washington DC that day, announcing that she and others were looking into a new strategy rather than waiting for action from the authorities. "Several of us Epstein survivors have been discussing creating our own list of names," she announced, later telling NBC News of victims' intent to "seek justice on our own."