President Donald Trump said he had no knowledge of Ghislaine Maxwell’s recent prison transfer and didn’t personally approve it.
“I didn’t know about it at all, nope, I read about it just like you did,” Trump said Tuesday.
The president was asked about Maxwell during an event tied to the upcoming 2028 Olympic Games, which will be held in Los Angeles. A reporter first asked whether he had signed off on the transfer.
Then came a follow-up, “Do you believe Maxwell is credible?”
Trump didn’t answer that directly. Instead, he defended Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche — his former personal attorney — who met with Maxwell one-on-one just before the transfer.
“Very highly thought of person,” Trump said. “Respected by everybody.”
Blanche questioned Maxwell for hours in connection to the ongoing federal investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, Newsweek reported. Maxwell, convicted in 2021 on federal sex-trafficking charges, is lobbying to overturn her sentence on appeal.
Trump recently said he hadn’t thought about pardoning Maxwell but reminded reporters that he has “the power to do so.”
On Tuesday, Trump added: “I didn’t talk to [Blanche] about it, but I will tell you that whatever he asked would be totally appropriate. And it’s not an uncommon thing to do that and I think he probably wants to make sure that people who should not be involved, or aren’t involved, are not hurt by something that would be very, very unfortunate, very unfair to a lot of people.”
He doubled down on Blanche’s reputation.
“Anything he talked about with her or the fact that he did that — not unusual, number one, and most importantly, is something that would be totally aboveboard,” Trump said.
The White House referred reporters back to those remarks when asked directly whether Trump believes Maxwell is credible.
Maxwell had been serving her 20-year sentence at a low-security prison in Tallahassee, Florida. She was recently transferred to a minimum-security facility in Bryan, Texas.
Legal experts have raised serious concerns.
Claire Finkelstein, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, told NPR, “It is very concerning when you have someone who was formerly the president’s personal lawyer then getting involved to possibly assist the president in protecting his own image in this — when he should be acting in a disinterested way for the Justice Department to ensure that justice is done here and that the interests of the American people are served.”
Sarah Krissoff, a former federal prosecutor who worked under Blanche in New York, also spoke out.
She told NPR it was “enormously unusual” for the deputy attorney general to personally conduct the interview without other law enforcement in the room.
“You generally would never conduct an interview of a cooperating witness without law enforcement personnel in the room,” she said.
Maxwell had been serving time in Florida when she was found guilty in 2022 of committing a multi-year plot with Epstein to seduce and sexually assault minors, which resulted in a 20-year sentence in federal prison. Maxwell has continued to appeal her conviction.
Earlier this week, a House committee responded to Maxwell’s request for immunity in exchange for her testimony regarding the late financier and convicted pedophile.
The House Oversight Committee on Tuesday rejected a request from Maxwell’s legal team seeking immunity in exchange for her testimony before Congress.
In a letter, Maxwell’s attorneys stated that she would be willing to testify about her association with Epstein, provided she was granted formal immunity and certain additional conditions were met.
