0
• Exhaustive NYT report finds Epstein was president’s ‘wingman’ at events
• Casino boss recalls Trump saying Epstein ‘likes them young’
• Likes of Gates, Chomsky feature in newly released images
• Justice Department races to meet deadline for files’ release
WASHINGTON: Even as the US Justice Department faces a Friday deadline to release a massive trove of documents from its investigations into the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, The New York Times has revealed in a new investigation that he and Donald J. Trump were at one time an inseparable pair.
For nearly two decades, the two moved through the worlds of New York and Florida high society, in a relationship so intense that some observers believed each man was the other’s closest friend.
Based on interviews with more than 30 former Epstein employees, victims of his abuse and others who encountered the two men, alongside new documents and court records, the NYT report suggests their relationship was far closer and more complex than Trump has acknowledged.
However, the investigation found no evidence implicating Trump in Epstein’s criminal abuse and trafficking of minors.
From the late 1980s through the mid-2000s, Epstein was perhaps Trump’s most reliable wingman, a constant presence at his parties and properties. The two men, who did not drink or use drugs, bonded over a shared pursuit of women.
Their friendship played out at Epstein’s Manhattan mansion, Trump’s Plaza Hotel, his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida and at least one of his Atlantic City casinos. Former Epstein employees said they visited each other’s offices and often spoke by phone.
“I just think it was trophy hunting,” Stacey Williams, a Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition model from the 1990s, told NYT. Williams, who briefly dated Epstein, described how Trump groped her at Trump Tower in 1993, as Epstein looked on.
Responding to questions, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt dismissed the reporting as “a stale regurgitation of decades-old false allegations”.
‘Jeffrey likes them young’
Jack O’Donnell, who ran the Trump Plaza casino in Atlantic City, recalled an incident in 1989 when Trump arrived after midnight with Epstein and three young women.
A gambling inspector later told O’Donnell that the women looked “very young” and identified one as the 19-year-old tennis star Gabriela Sabatini, who was under the legal gambling age.
When O’Donnell raised the issue with Trump, he recalled Trump replying: “Yeah, Jeffrey likes them young. Too young for me.”
The White House has called O’Donnell’s account a fabrication.
Maria Farmer, an artist who has said Epstein and his partner Ghislaine Maxwell sexually assaulted her, told NYT in 2019 that Epstein once summoned her to meet Trump at his office, where she said Trump leered at her before Epstein told him: “She’s not for you.”
A Trump spokesman has denied the president ever visited Epstein’s office. However, Mark Epstein, Jeffrey’s brother, said his brother told him Trump “was in the office all the time back then”.
‘Donald’s closest friend for years’
Their social lives frequently intersected at parties where young women and models were plentiful. NBC footage from a 1992 television special shows Trump and Epstein together at Mar-a-Lago, surrounded by cheerleaders from the Miami Dolphins and Buffalo Bills.
In the video, Trump whispers in Epstein’s ear, causing him to double over laughing as they appear to point toward women on the dance floor.
The friendship soured sometime in the mid-2000s, around the time allegations against Epstein first emerged.
The reason remains unclear, and Trump has offered varying explanations, from claiming Epstein was inappropriate with a masseuse to describing him as a “creep”.
Despite the estrangement, Epstein remained fixated on Trump. Emails released by Congress show Epstein alternately deriding Trump and expressing anger at his efforts to distance himself. In a 2017 interview with Michael Wolff, Epstein claimed: “I was Donald’s closest friend for 10 years.”
Fresh releases
A day earlier, Congressional Democrats released dozens of new images from the Epstein estate. The release came just a day before the US Justice Department is required by law to release unclassified files from its probe into the disgraced financier.
The latest batch of images includes Microsoft founder Bill Gates, professor and political activist Noam Chomsky and former Trump aide Steve Bannon, as well as SpaceX owner Elon Musk.
DP World CEO Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, Google co-founder Sergey Brin, and NYT columnist David Brooks are also among those pictured in the images.
It remains unclear how, or when, fresh files will be released on Friday, but they will likely not represent all unclassified records held by the agency. The law allowed the Justice Department to withhold personal information about Epstein’s victims as well as any material that would jeopardize an active investigation.
Published in Dawn, December 20th, 2025
