“Quiet! Quiet piggy,” said President Donald Trump to a reporter last Friday while speaking to the press aboard Air Force One. She was asking about the ongoing controversy around the Jeffrey Epstein files.
“If there’s nothing incriminating in the files, sir, why not…” said the off-camera reporter’s voice. Trump’s admonition cut her off. People magazine said the journalist has been identified as a reporter for Bloomberg.
Trump is a vocal critic of the media – often calling reporters and sources he doesn’t like “fake news” – and he is also known to like combative nicknames, such as “Sleepy Joe” for former President Joe Biden and “Tiny D” for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Epstein – a convicted sex offender and financier who made connections with several wealthy and powerful people before his downfall – died in prison six years ago, during Trump’s first term in office. Since then, there has been much speculation about the official narrative that he died by suicide and about what files on Epstein might reveal about his high-profile contacts and what they knew of his sexual offenses, including those involving minors.
This year the Epstein files were thrust into the limelight following a joint memo from the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation indicating further files would not be made public. It was a move that upset both Republicans and Democrats. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have conducted investigations regarding Epstein.
For example, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released an alleged “birthday book” for Epstein that included messages from both Trump and former President Bill Clinton. Trump has denied that the message in that book was from him. He has admitted to knowing Epstein, but they reportedly stopped speaking in the early 2000s.
“Jeffrey Epstein and I had a very bad relationship for many years,” Trump said last Friday during that Air Force One flight after a reporter asked what Epstein meant when he said Trump “knew about the girls” in a 2019 email to author Michael Wolff. “But he also saw a strike, because I was president. So, he dictated a couple of memos to himself? Give me a break.”
Survey results released Tuesday by Morning Consult indicate that three in five respondents believe Trump was at least aware of Epstein’s sexual abuse, including 38% who think he participated in it.
According to CBS News, Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein’s victims and a key witness, worked at the spa at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida. Giuffre, who died by suicide this year, did not accuse the president of any wrongdoing and CBS reported that Epstein’s letter to Wolff said Trump asked Ghislaine Maxwell, a woman now serving a 20-year prison sentence for helping Epstein with sex trafficking minors, to “stop.”
Trump also said: “I don’t know anything about that,” to the question regarding Epstein’s writing to Wolff. “They would have announced that a long time ago.”
While speaking to reporters on Air Force One, Trump deflected attention from himself, instead mentioning Clinton and former Harvard president Lawrence H. Summers – currently a paid columnist at Bloomberg News and serves on the board of directors at Open AI, per the Harvard Crimson. Both are also reported Epstein contacts.
In a Sunday Truth Social post, Trump said: “As I said on Friday night aboard Air Force One to the Fake News Media, House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide,” and went on to add that he wanted to focus on the economy instead.
Audacy has reported on how the Epstein issue has contributed to some rifts on the right, including a public spat between Trump and former MAGA faithful Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.).
“Nobody cared about Jeffrey Epstein when he was alive and, if the Democrats had anything, they would have released it before our Landslide Election Victory,” Trump said. “Some ‘members’ of the Republican Party are being ‘used,’ and we can’t let that happen. Let’s start talking about the Republican Party’s Record Setting Achievements, and not fall into the Epstein ‘TRAP,’ which is actually a curse on the Democrats, not us.”
The Hill noted that the “quiet piggy” statement, came before Trump shifted his position on the Epstein files. According to the outlet, “it became clear the House legislation would easily be passed following the success of a discharge petition on the matter.”
House members gathered Tuesday to discuss legislation to compel the Justice Department to release their files on Jeffrey Epstein. They overwhelmingly passed it, with Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) a staunch Trump ally, the only person to vote against the bill.