WASHINGTON — The Republican chair of the House Oversight Committee said some of its members would support a presidential pardon for convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell in exchange for her assistance in the committee’s investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.
But good luck getting any of them to admit it.
Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) told Politico Wednesday that “a lot of people” support the idea of Maxwell receiving a pardon from President Trump in exchange for her cooperation in the committee’s investigation.
Although Comer said he opposed a pardon himself — “other than Epstein, the worst person in this whole investigation is Maxwell” — he offered that his committee was “split” on the issue.
Rep. Robert Garcia of Long Beach, the top Democrat on his committee, condemned the idea of a Maxwell pardon and said Democrats on the committee uniformly oppose it.
“It’s outrageous that Republicans on the Oversight Committee are considering a pardon for Ghislaine Maxwell,” Garcia said in a statement. “She is a sexual abuser who facilitated the rape of women and children.”
The Times reached out to all 26 Republicans on the committee to see who, if anyone, supported the idea of a pardon.
Although most didn’t respond, the few who did expressed outrage at the idea.
“I am absolutely not supporting a pardon for her nor have I heard that from anyone else,” said Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.).
“Never in a thousand years,” said Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.).
Maxwell declined to answer the committee’s questions during a video deposition in February from the Texas federal prison where she is serving her 20-year prison sentence.
She is still challenging her 2021 conviction on five counts related to the sex trafficking of minors for her role in recruiting and grooming girls for Epstein to abuse. She was accused at trial of also participating in the abuse of one victim.
At the time of her February deposition, Maxwell’s attorney David Oscar Markus said she would offer the “unfiltered truth” if granted clemency by Trump.
Attorneys who have represented victims abused by Epstein and Maxwell strongly opposed the idea of a pardon.
“This is a woman who belongs behind bars for the rest of her life for what she did to women,” said Spencer Kuvin, who has represented numerous Epstein victims.
Sigrid McCawley, a managing partner at Boies Schiller Flexner, questioned the value of information Maxwell could provide.
“Ghislaine Maxwell is a proven self-serving liar,” McCawley said in a statement. “There is nothing credible that she will offer the government, and the assertion that she would provide information is simply a smoke screen.”
Trump has not said he is considering a pardon but when asked by reporters he has declined to rule it out.
Epstein abused more than 1,000 girls and young women over the span of decades. He negotiated a lenient deal nearly two decades ago with federal prosecutors in south Florida that allowed him to serve 13 months in a Palm Beach County jail where he was allowed to come and go freely to settle claims that he had abused dozens of high school girls.
Following investigative reporting on that deal by the Miami Herald, federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York brought new sex charges against Epstein in July 2019. He died in federal custody one month later.
Epstein and Maxwell counted members of the British royal family, multiple presidents and business titans among their friends.
They have been accused of forcing some of their victims to have sex with some of those men. But Maxwell is the only other person who has ever been charged in connection with Epstein’s crimes.
The committee has deposed numerous people who knew Epstein, including Ohio billionaire Les Wexner, who hired Epstein to manage his finances, and former President Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
The committee has not, however, deposed Trump, who once famously called Epstein a “terrific guy” and said, “I just wish her well,” when told of Maxwell’s arrest in 2020.
The Department of Justice has also released millions of pages of documents from its investigations into the deceased sex offender in response to the bipartisan Epstein Files Transparency Act, which was signed into law last year.
The release of the files has led to criminal inquiries in the United Kingdom into Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the former prince, and Peter Mandelson, the former British ambassador to the United States, over allegations that they provided secret government information to Epstein.
So far, the files have not led to any publicly known criminal investigations in the United States.
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