President Donald Trump says he did not know why sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein “stole” Virginia Giuffre from his Mar-a-Lago spa, as the family of the abuse survivor demands answers from the president.
Earlier this week, as the firestorm over the Epstein files continued, Trump hit out at Epstein for “stealing” young women from his Mar-a-Lago staff, including Giuffre, the sex trafficking victim who accused Prince Andrew of assaulting her.
The revelation marked the first time Trump has acknowledged that Giuffre had been recruited by the disgraced financier and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, from the grounds of his Palm Beach resort, where she worked at the spa when she was 17.
This prompted her family to release a statement on Wednesday night, saying: “It makes us ask if he was aware of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal actions, especially given his statement two years later that his good friend Jeffrey ‘likes women on the younger side … no doubt about it.’ We and the public are asking for answers; survivors deserve this.”
Asked on Thursday if he knew why Epstein had poached Giuffre from Mar-a-Lago, Trump replied. “No, I didn’t know,” before hitting out the ABC reporter who asked the question.
“But no, I don’t know, really, why,” he continued.
“But I said if he’s taking anybody from Mar-a-Lago or whatever he’s doing, I didn’t like it. We threw him out, we don’t want him at the place. I didn’t like it.”
Trump also insisted that this was “a story that’s been known for many years.”
However, in the past, stories about Trump kicking Epstein out of his club had been attributed to two other scenarios: the first was that they fell out over a property dispute; the second was that Epstein hit on a club member’s child.
The White House has also previously said the sex trafficker was thrown out because he was “a creep.”
The discrepancies have raised further questions for the president, who spent years socializing with Epstein, but insists he had nothing to do with his sex trafficking of young women and girls.
Epstein pleaded guilty in a Florida state court in 2008 to procuring a child for prostitution and soliciting a prostitute. He died by suicide in a Manhattan jail on August 10, 2019 as he was awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges involving underage girls.
In 2022, Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years prison on federal charges of sex trafficking and conspiracy for helping Epstein recruit and abuse underage girls.
Giuffre, who became one of Epstein’s most vocal survivors as she demanded justice for his victims, died by suicide in April.
In her 2016 deposition, Giuffre said she was sitting outside the women’s locker room at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago spa around 2000, reading a book on massage therapy, when Maxwell befriended her and then ultimately recruited her as one of Epstein’s sex slaves.
“She told me that she knew somebody that was looking for a traveling masseuse,” she said at the time. “If the guy likes you then, you know, it will work out for you. You’ll travel. You’ll make good money.”
