Democrats demand Trump release transcript of Ghislaine Maxwell interview

WASHINGTON (CN) — House Democrats this week urged the Trump administration to give lawmakers a transcript of a top Justice Department official’s interview with Ghislaine Maxwell, which they argued raised “staggering concerns” about political conflicts of interest and witness tampering.

The lawmakers also drew a connection between the Justice Department’s July meeting with Maxwell and her subsequent transfer to a minimum-security prison — a move they suggested was aimed at coaxing her into “favorable testimony or strategic silence” on her involvement in the late Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking crimes.

Maxwell, the onetime partner and co-conspirator of the disgraced New York financier and convicted pedophile, was convicted in 2022 for her role in Epstein’s yearslong underage sex ring. Until late last month, she was serving her 20-year sentence in a Florida prison but was abruptly moved to a low-security facility in Texas soon after she met with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche for a closed-doors interview.

The transfer came as the House Oversight Committee issued a congressional subpoena to Maxwell, demanding that she sit for a deposition at the Tallahassee, Florida, correctional facility. Her interview with lawmakers was supposed to take place this week, before she was moved to the Texas prison.

And in a Tuesday letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi and Bureau of Prisons director William Marshall, House Democrats argued that the circumstances surrounding Blanche’s meeting with Maxwell demonstrate that the White House “may now be attempting to tamper with a crucial witness.”

“His actions raise staggering concerns about political conflicts of interest, witness tampering and suborning of false testimony,” wrote the lawmakers, led by Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin.

Democrats have seized on the Epstein case in recent weeks as their latest line of attack against the Trump administration. They’ve accused the White House of concealing documents related to a federal investigation of the late financier’s crimes, pointing to reports that the so-called “Epstein files” reference the president several times.

Blanche’s July meeting with Maxwell, House Democrats told Bondi, added to the “strong appearance” that the administration is attempting to cover up the extent of Trump’s relationship with Epstein. They pointed out that the deputy attorney general interviewed Maxwell with no line prosecutors present — and that he met with her days after the Justice Department fired Maurene Comey, a federal prosecutor on the Epstein and Maxwell cases.

Ahead of his meeting with Maxwell, Blanche explained he intended to determine whether Epstein’s co-conspirator had any information about other people who “committed crimes against victims.” But the Democrats contended that the White House’s own approach to the Epstein case “undercut” that goal.

The Justice Department in July said that it would not publish the much-vaunted Epstein files, adding that it had uncovered no evidence warranting further investigation of any “uncharged third parties.”

The Democrats also questioned the timing of Maxwell’s transfer to a minimum-security prison, an all-women facility which lawmakers argued gave its inmates freedom to interact with one another and provided access to programs that would have been unavailable at the Florida prison where Maxwell had been incarcerated.

“The transfer of Ms. Maxwell to a lower-security and more comfortable facility heightens the appearance that the Trump administration is seeking to coax favorable testimony or strategic silence from Ms. Maxwell,” the lawmakers said.

Further, the Democrats argued that the transfer violated the Bureau of Prisons’ policy for people convicted of sex trafficking.

According to the agency’s inmate classification guidelines, there are nine “Public Safety Factor” designations given to inmates who can’t be incarcerated in facilities that give them access to the community, such as minimum-security prisons. Sex offenders are one such category. There is a process for waiving the public safety risk designation, but it involves multiple steps, which Democrats pointed out would take months to complete.

“Neither DOJ nor BOP has provided anything like a satisfactory explanation for providing Ms. Maxwell this uniquely favorable treatment,” they wrote.

The House Democrats demanded that the Trump administration turn over all its information related to the decision to transfer Maxwell to the low-security Texas prison, as well as a list of all White House officials who were involved in the move. The lawmakers also requested transcripts, recordings and other documents from Blanche’s interview with her.

“It is imperative that the administration come clean regarding the full scope of Mr. Blanche’s interview of Ms. Maxwell and the sudden decision to transfer her to a minimum-security prison camp,” they said, adding that lawmakers should be able to assess whether the Justice Department or the president have “abused prosecutorial and law enforcement resources.”

Following the Justice Department’s July memo shutting the book on the Epstein files, Trump was initially dismissive of backlash from lawmakers and some of his own supporters, urging them to drop the issue. But the president has since walked back those comments, saying that he would like to see the documents published and attempting to unseal grand jury testimony related to the federal case against Maxwell.

A federal judge this week rejected the Justice Department’s petition to release such information, arguing that the American public would learn nothing new if the court unsealed its documents on the Maxwell case.

In Congress, Democrats have leaned hard on the Epstein files. Following pressure from Democrats, the House Oversight Committee last week issued a tranche of subpoenas to former President Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton and a group of former White House officials from several presidential administrations.

Republican leaders, though, have been skeptical of the focus on Epstein. House Speaker Mike Johnson has accused Democrats of using the case as a “political battering ram” and said that Congress should give the Trump administration space to review and publish documents related to the case.

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