Former President Bill Clinton did not say President Donald Trump should be subpoenaed in Congress’s sprawling Jeffrey Epstein investigation, claiming he was unaware of any wrongdoing.
The House Oversight Committee deposed Bill and Hillary Clinton last week to determine their connections to and knowledge of Epstein.
The panel released the never-before-seen videos of the hours-long depositions on Monday afternoon.
When pressed by the top Democrat on the panel, Congressman Robert Garcia of California, on whether Trump should be subpoenaed to testify in the investigation, the ex-President turned the tables on the California lawmaker.
‘That’s for you to decide, but he (Trump) did know him well, and I once had a brief discussion with him about it,’ Clinton, 79, told Garcia.
It was the first time in US history that Congress had deposed a US President. Given the new precedent, Democrats have said they want to bring in Trump to testify, though Clinton refused to weigh in on whether they should or should not.
How a celebrity golf outing exposed a rift
Garcia then thanked Clinton, and the room fell silent, the video of the testimony shows.
After a pause, Clinton spoke up, offering clarifying information and noting how Garcia never asked a follow-up.
‘I hate this,’ Clinton declared after the long pause.
‘But since there was no follow-up question, he’s never, the president, never, this is 20-something years ago, never said anything to me to make me think he was involved in anything improper.’
Clinton described a conversation he had with Trump about Epstein in the early 2000s – his only discussion with the Republican on the topic.
‘It was on his golf course,’ the former President began.
Clinton said he and Trump were playing in a celebrity golf tournament for a mutual friend, Joe Torre, the former general manager of the New York Yankees.
The charity event was an annual affair that Trump would offer up his golf course for, the Democrat said.
‘And the day I was there, he would typically, Donald Trump, would come out and play a few holes with us, and he somehow knew I had flown on Jeffrey Epstein’s aircraft,’ Clinton testified.
‘And he said, you know, we had some great times together over the years, but we fell out all because of a real estate deal. And he said, I’m sorry, it happened. That’s all.’
The ‘big’ hot tub
Hours later, Clinton again clarified again that Trump didn’t do anything wrong as far as he knew.
‘You know, as I said earlier, the only conversation I had with President Trump about this was in the early 2000s, and I have no information who had that he did anything wrong.’
Clinton was grilled by lawmakers after photos in the newly released Epstein files showed him swimming with Maxwell and lounging in a hot tub with an unidentified woman.
Asked about others in the hot tub, Clinton said: ‘I don’t think there’s anybody in the hot tub. I don’t even – I had forgotten that there was anybody in the hot tub, but it was big.’
Secret service at the pool
Clinton said the photo was from a hotel where their group was staying during a work trip for his charitable foundation, adding that a member of his Secret Service detail was present at the pool.
The former president denied knowledge of Epstein’s crimes, stating: ‘There’s nothing that I saw when I was around him that made me realize he was trafficking women.’
Asked whether he felt that Epstein and Maxwell fooled powerful people, he responded: ‘I really don’t know. I’ve thought about it a lot, but if you can figure it out I’d like to know.’
Trump has also defended Clinton during the Congressional investigation.
‘I don’t like seeing him deposed, but they certainly went after me a lot more than that,’ Trump said last week.
‘Look, I like him, and I don’t like seeing him deposed.’
Trump told NBC News in early February: ‘It bothers me that somebody is going after Bill Clinton.’
The statement stood in stark contrast to a November Truth Social post in which Trump called on Attorney General Pam Bondi to probe Clinton’s ties to Epstein.
‘I will be asking A.G. Pam Bondi, and the Department of Justice, together with our great patriots at the FBI, to investigate Jeffrey Epstein’s involvement and relationship with Bill Clinton, Larry Summers, Reid Hoffman, J.P. Morgan, Chase, and many other people and institutions, to determine what was going on with them, and him,’ Trump wrote on November 14.
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