The family of deceased Jeffrey Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre is urging US President Donald Trump not to grant clemency to Ghislaine Maxwell.
Giuffre’s family also said it was “shocking” to hear Trump say earlier this week that Epstein had poached the then teenager from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, where she worked at the spa in 2000.
The family said Trump’s comment raised questions about whether Trump was aware of Epstein’s sexual abuse at the time.
Trump has not been accused of wrongdoing. Giuffre has said she was a victim of Epstein’s sex trafficking from 2000 to 2002, starting when she was 16.
She took her own life in Western Australia in April aged 41.
The family’s statement on Thursday (US time) came as Trump has faces continued pressure to make public documents from the federal investigations into Epstein. The disgraced financier took his own life in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.
His long-time girlfriend Maxwell was convicted of sex trafficking in 2021 and is serving a 20-year prison sentence.
Deputy US Attorney-General Todd Blanche, Trump’s former personal lawyer, last week met Maxwell to see if she had any information about others who had committed crimes. Maxwell’s lawyer David Markus has called on Trump to grant her relief, but Trump has said he has not thought about whether to pardon her.
“The government and the President should never consider giving Ghislaine Maxwell any leniency,” Giuffre’s family said.
“Maxwell destroyed many young lives.”
A senior Trump administration official said no leniency for Maxwell was being given or discussed.
“That’s just false,” the official said.
Markus did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump and Epstein socialised in the 1990s and 2000s, before what Trump has called a falling out.
Aboard Air Force One returning from Scotland on Tuesday, Trump said he told Epstein to “stay the hell out” of Mar-a-Lago after finding out Epstein was poaching Trump’s workers, including Giuffre.
“He stole her,” Trump said.
Giuffre’s family said Maxwell recruited her from Mar-a-Lago in 2000. They said it was years before Epstein and Trump fell out, pointing to a 2002 New York magazine article in which Trump was quoted calling Epstein a “terrific guy” who liked women “on the younger side”.
“It makes us ask if he was aware of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal actions,” Giuffre’s family said, referring to Trump’s Air Force One comments.
Asked on Thursday if he knew why Epstein was taking his employees, Trump said he did not.
“I didn’t really know really why. But I said if he’s taking anybody from Mar-a-Lago, if he’s hiring or whatever he’s doing, I didn’t like it and we threw him out,” Trump said.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said earlier on Thursday that Trump had been responding to a reporter’s question about Giuffre and did not raise the topic.
“President Trump kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club for being a creep to his female employees,” Leavitt said.
At Maxwell’s trial in 2021, Juan Alessi, the former manager of Epstein’s Palm Beach home, testified that he drove with Maxwell to meet Giuffre at nearby Mar-a-Lago. He said he then saw Giuffre at Epstein’s home for the first time that night, and again many times thereafter.
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-AAP
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