Bill Clinton says White House is using him as scapegoat after Epstein files release

A spokesperson for Bill Clinton accused the White House late on Friday of using him as a scapegoat after pictures of the former president with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, as well as with a young woman in a pool, were included as part of congressionally ordered release of government files.

“The White House hasn’t been hiding these files for months only to dump them late on a Friday to protect Bill Clinton,” the spokesperson said in a statement on X.

“This is about shielding themselves from what comes next, or from what they’ll try and hide forever. So they can release as many grainy 20-plus-year-old photos as they want, but this isn’t about Bill Clinton. Never has, never will be,” the statement added.

It continued: “Even Susie Wiles said Donald Trump was wrong about Bill Clinton,” it said, referring to comments made by White House chief of staff to Vanity Fair in which Wiles acknowledged that Clinton had not been on Epstein’s Caribbean island despite repeated claims by Trump to the contrary.

Clinton has long maintained that he cut ties with Epstein around 2005, before the disgraced financier plead guilty to solicitation of a minor in Florida.

In the statement, Clinton’s spokesperson Angel Ureña said: “There are two types of people here. The first group knew nothing and cut Epstein off before his crimes came to light. The second group continued relationships with him after. We’re in the first. No amount of stalling by people in the second group will change that. Everyone, especially MAGA, expects answers, not scapegoats.”

The photographs released on Friday show Clinton in an underground swimming pool with Maxwell and a woman whose facial features have been redacted, as well as on a plane with Michael Jackson and Diana Ross, and at a dinner with Mick Jagger, Epstein and other public figures.

The picture of Clinton in a swimming pool was later posted on X by the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, with the caption “Oh my!” and a red-faced emoji.

“Slick Willy! @BillClinton just chillin, without a care in the world. Little did he know… ,” Steven Cheung, the White House communications director, posted to X.

Epstein visited the White House at least 17 times during the early years of Clinton’s presidency, according to White House visitor records cited in news reports. He later travelled with Epstein on the financier’s private jet in the years after he left office in 2001, including to Asia and Africa, on trips related the Clinton Global Initiative. Clinton has never been formally accused of any wrongdoing in connection with Epstein.

But Trump has repeatedly made insinuations about the relationship between Clinton and Epstein. Last month, he called for the justice department and the FBI to “investigate Jeffrey Epstein’s involvement and relationship with Bill Clinton”, part of a long-running campaign to characterize the Epstein scandal as an issue uniquely connected to Democrats.

The justice department photo dump comes as both Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state and presidential candidate, are scheduled to give depositions to the House oversight committee over their ties to Epstein.

The depositions, originally scheduled for last week, have been pushed to 13 and 14 January. The committee’s chair, James Comer, has threatened to hold contempt proceedings if the couple do not sit for depositions on those dates, Politico reported.