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Claim: Trump served as FBI informant in Epstein probe
The claim can be traced back to House Speaker Mike Johnson, who told CNN’s Manu Raju that Trump “was an FBI informant to try to take this stuff down.”That eyebrow-raising remark came as Johnson defended Trump’s recent “hoax” comments, which dismissed bipartisan calls to release more Epstein files as a political hit job.
“What Trump is referring to is the hoax that the Democrats are using to try to attack him,” Johnson said on-air. “He has never said or suggested or implied—I’ve talked to him about this many times, many times. He is horrified. It’s been misrepresented."
“He’s not saying that what Epstein did is a hoax. It’s a terrible, unspeakable evil. He believes that himself. 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,” the Speaker added.
Fact Check: False, no evidence to back the viral claim
After the comment blew up, Johnson’s office quickly walked it back.
His team clarified that he wasn’t actually claiming Trump had a badge and a wire, but rather that he was echoing something Epstein victims’ attorney Brad Edwards had said.
“The Speaker is reiterating what the victims’ attorney said, which is that Donald Trump — who kicked Epstein out of Mar-a-Lago — was the only one more than a decade ago willing to help prosecutors expose Epstein for being a disgusting child predator,” Johnson’s office explained in a statement to The Washington Post.
While Trump wasn’t moonlighting as an FBI informant, he did assist Edwards in some capacity back in the day.
Once friends, later foes: Trump’s ties to Epstein resurface in new scrutiny
Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein were not strangers. They were once pals, until things soured in 2004 when they both went after the same Palm Beach oceanfront property. Trump won that real estate battle. In late 2007, Epstein was reportedly banned from Mar-a-Lago for alleged inappropriate behavior toward a club member’s teenage daughter.Now, Democrats — and even a few Republicans — are pushing the “Epstein Files Transparency Act,” which would require Trump’s administration to hand over more documents about Epstein’s trafficking operation.
Last week, about a dozen of Epstein’s accusers stood outside the US Capitol to testify about their abuse at the hands of Epstein and his longtime associate, Ghislaine Maxwell. Brad Edwards, the victims’ attorney, shared some telling details about Trump’s role years ago. Edwards said that back in 2009, Trump was cooperative and “friendly” to the victims’ plight, noting that Trump “did not think that it was a hoax and was trying to help.”
But Edwards believes something has shifted. “And now it seems like all of a sudden somebody is in his ear, and he’s not. So I’m hoping he’ll come back to where he was back in 2009, be on the side of the victims and stand with us,” he said.
Pressed on whether Trump officially worked with investigators at the time, Edwards would not say. But he noted that the future president “got on the phone, he told me things that were helping our investigation. Our investigation wasn’t looking into him, but he was helping us then.”
White House insists Trump aided victims
The White House, meanwhile, insists Trump has always been on the side of justice.“Trump has always been committed to justice and transparency for these victims. That’s why the Trump Administration is releasing thousands of pages of documents and complying with Oversight requests,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement on September 7.
She further alleged that Democrats were the ones who “ignored Epstein’s victims for years and are now only interested in them as a way to attack President Trump.”
