By Zachary Stieber
Contributing Writer
Former President Bill Clinton told federal lawmakers on Friday that he did not know about crimes carried out by the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“My brief acquaintance with Epstein ended years before his crimes came to light, and … I never witnessed during our limited interactions any indication of what was truly going on,” Clinton, 79, who was president from 1993 to 2001, told members of the House of Representatives Oversight Committee in Chappaqua, New York.
He added, “I had no idea of the crimes Epstein was committing.”
Clinton said that he was answering questions “to offer what little I know so that it might prevent anything like this from ever happening again.”
Epstein, in 2008, pleaded guilty to procuring a minor for prostitution. Epstein was arrested in 2019 on federal sex trafficking charges and died in prison that year while awaiting trial. A medical examiner ruled the death a suicide.
The Department of Justice in January released a tranche of files on Epstein, including emails between him and others, and photographs. Some pictures showed Clinton with Epstein. At least three depicted Clinton with unidentified females.
An FBI document stated that a person whose name was redacted and was not an Epstein victim reported that she was invited to an orgy with Clinton, but did not attend. Law enforcement emails said that an Epstein victim said she met Epstein through another victim who had traveled with Epstein and Clinton to Africa.
Clinton flew on Epstein’s plane in 2002 and 2003, according to previously known flight logs and photographs. He has said previously through a spokesperson that those trips involved work for the Clinton Foundation and that he never went to Epstein’s island, although he briefly went to Epstein’s home in New York and logs showed Epstein went to the White House while Clinton was president.
Clinton had also not spoken to Epstein for “well over a decade,” the spokesperson said in 2019, after Epstein was arrested.
Clinton said Friday that he had long stopped associating with Epstein when the guilty plea came to light. “No matter how many photos you show me … I saw nothing, and I did nothing wrong,” he said.
The deposition was taking place one day after Hillary Clinton, 78, Bill Clinton’s wife, spoke to lawmakers.
Hillary Clinton said during her deposition on Thursday that she knew nothing of Epstein’s crimes. She said after the deposition that she never met Epstein and had no connection with him.
Hillary Clinton said she only knew Ghislaine Maxwell — a longtime associate of Epstein’s who was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2022 after being convicted of conspiring with Epstein to sexually abuse young girls — “casually, as an acquaintance.”
Maxwell attended the wedding of Chelsea Clinton, the couple’s daughter, as a plus one, she also said.
Maxwell told Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche in 2025 that she met Hillary Clinton at the Clintons’ home in New York state on multiple occasions for work related to the Clinton Global Initiative. She said that Epstein did not have a relationship with Hillary Clinton, but that he gave money to the initiative and spent time with Bill Clinton.
Maxwell said she was friends with Bill Clinton, who did not mention her in his opening statement.
Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., chairman of the House Oversight Committee, told reporters after sitting with Hillary Clinton that she answered most questions but repeatedly directed lawmakers to Bill Clinton.
“The number of times that she said, ‘I don’t know, you’ll have to ask my husband,’ was more than a dozen,” he said.
Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., said that some specific questions could only be answered by Bill Clinton.
