The China Mail - Top Justice Dept official meeting Epstein accomplice Maxwell

The former British socialite is serving a 20-year sentence after being convicted in 2021 of recruiting underage girls for Epstein, who died in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial in his own sex trafficking case.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche -- Trump's former personal lawyer for his hush money trial and two federal criminal cases -- was interviewing Maxwell at a courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida, CNN, NBC and the Tallahassee Democrat newspaper said.

"If Ghislaine Maxwell has information about anyone who has committed crimes against victims, the FBI and the DOJ will hear what she has to say," Blanche said on Tuesday. "No one is above the law -- and no lead is off-limits."

Trump, 79, was once a close friend of Epstein and The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that the president's name was among hundreds found during a DOJ review of the so-called "Epstein files," even if there was no indication of wrongdoing.

Trump spokesman Steven Cheung called the report "fake news" and said Trump had long ago broken with Epstein and "kicked him out of his (Florida) club for being a creep."

Trump filed a $10 billion defamation suit against the Journal last week after it reported that he had penned a sexually suggestive letter to Epstein for his 50th birthday in 2003.

Maxwell, 63, is the only former Epstein associate convicted in connection with his activities, which right-wing conspiracy theorists allege included trafficking young models for VIPs.

The meeting with Maxwell marks another attempt by the Trump administration to defuse anger among the Republican president's own supporters over what they have long seen as a cover-up of sex crimes by Epstein, a wealthy financier with high-level connections.

- 'A Trump-friendly tale?' -

Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse said Blanche's meeting with Maxwell raises a number of troubling questions.

"Is he really going as (deputy attorney general) or is he going de facto as Trump's personal criminal attorney, Tom Hagen style?" the senator said in a reference to the Corleone family lawyer in "The Godfather."

"Will he promise her a pardon for silence, or for a Trump-friendly tale?" Whitehouse asked. "Who will be in the room? What records will be kept?"

Many of the president's core supporters want more transparency on the Epstein case, and Trump -- who has long fanned the conspiracy theories -- had promised to deliver that on retaking the White House in January.

But he has since dismissed the controversy as a "hoax" and a "witch hunt" and the DOJ and FBI released a memo this month claiming the so-called Epstein files did not contain evidence that would justify further investigation.

Epstein committed suicide while in jail and was not murdered, did not blackmail any prominent figures, and did not keep a "client list," according to the July 7 FBI-DOJ memo.

Seeking to redirect public attention, the White House has promoted unfounded claims in recent days that former president Barack Obama led a "years-long coup" against Trump around his victorious 2016 election.

The extraordinary narrative claims that Obama had ordered intelligence assessments to be manipulated to accuse Russia of election interference to help Trump.

Yet it runs counter to four separate criminal, counterintelligence and watchdog probes between 2019 and 2023 -- each of them concluding that Russia did interfere and did, in various ways, help Trump.

Epstein was found hanging dead in his New York prison cell in 2019 while awaiting trial on charges that he sexually exploited hundreds of victims at his homes in New York and Florida.

Among those with connections to Epstein was Britain's Prince Andrew, who settled a US civil case in February 2022 brought by Virginia Giuffre, who claimed he sexually assaulted her when she was 17.

Giuffre, who accused Epstein of using her as a sex slave, committed suicide at her home in Australia in April.

Z.Huang--ThChM