President Donald Trump continued to rage over the Jeffrey Epstein case Friday after The Wall Street Journal published a bawdy birthday letter he allegedly wrote to the disgraced financier decades ago, prompting the president to threaten suit against the newspaper — and instruct Attorney General Pam Bondi to unseal grand jury testimony in Epstein’s case.
The Wall Street Journal report came after a week of turmoil over the Epstein case among MAGA circles, which have fractured over the Trump administration’s handling of the investigation into the convicted sex offender while the president has repeatedly sought to downplay the whole ordeal.
“If there was a ‘smoking gun’ on Epstein, why didn’t the Dems, who controlled the ‘files’ for four years, and had Garland and Comey in charge, use it? BECAUSE THEY HAD NOTHING!!!” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday morning, echoing his previous attempts to pin blame for the lack of information in the case on Democrats.
Trump on Thursday vehemently denied writing the suggestive letter to Epstein, which reportedly included lines of typewritten text and a doodle of a naked woman with Trump’s signature below her waist. The president slammed the letter’s publication Thursday as a “fake” and vowed to sue the newspaper in an angry Truth Social post.
POLITICO has not independently verified the existence of the letter.
Trump continued to attack the news outlet Friday, writing in a separate Truth Social post: “I look forward to getting Rupert Murdoch to testify in my lawsuit against him and his ‘pile of garbage’ newspaper,” adding that it “will be an interesting experience!!!”
The Wall Street Journal declined to comment on the legal threat.
Many MAGA figures were quick to jump to the president’s defense after the WSJ report — including several voices who have been critical of his administration’s handling of the case, like right-wing activist Laura Loomer and onetime Trump confidante Elon Musk.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, who had previously split with Trump on Tuesday, calling for the DOJ to release all information in the Epstein files in the name of “transparency,” decried the existence of the letter in an appearance on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Friday morning after he said he spoke with the president.
“The president and I talked about that ridiculous allegation this morning. He said it’s patently absurd. He’s never drawn such a picture. He’s never thought of drawing such a picture. And he said, ‘Did you see the language of this bogus supposed communication?’” Johnson said, adding that the president is “so frustrated by it.”
Trump has attempted to brush off scrutiny on the Epstein case by claiming the entire situation was a “hoax” pushed by Democrats, as outcry from within MAGA circles has mounted over his administration’s handling of information around the Epstein case.
Many of Trump’s supporters who had long nursed theories that evidence of a broader government conspiracy lay hidden in a “client list” among the so-called Epstein files were not convinced after an FBI-Department of Justice joint report said there was no evidence of such a list last week.
But while the White House and Bondi have repeatedly said there was no new information to release on Epstein, Trump — less than an hour after the WSJ report — ordered the attorney general to begin unsealing grand jury testimony in his case, a process that is set to face significant obstacles, as courts are often averse to lifting the strict secrecy rules that apply.
