According to his former attorney general, Donald Trump was surprised to hear that child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein had died by suicide in prison while awaiting prosecution and thought conspiracy theories would undoubtedly surface.
Bill Barr, who was in Trump’s first administration when Epstein passed away in 2019, said that he contacted the president to deliver the news and warned him, “You better brace for this,” in testimony recently made public with House investigators.
Barr’s deposition transcript and many documents from Epstein’s estate were made public by the Republican-led House Oversight Committee as the controversy surrounding the Epstein files followed Trump to the United Kingdom on Tuesday, with pictures of the Trump couple projected onto Windsor Castle.
And there it is.
Trump admits that Jeffrey Epstein “stole” young girls from him at Mar-a-Lago’s “spa” and brought them into his child sex trafficking ring. This includes Virginia Giuffre who died by suicide in April. pic.twitter.com/b4oWRVTMYj
— No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen (@NoLieWithBTC) July 29, 2025
“He had the same reaction I did, which was: ”How the hell did that happen? He’s in federal custody?” said Barr. “The last everyone knew, he was being carefully watched precisely for that reason. And I think I conveyed to him that it was appalling and that we were going to investigate it vigorously… and he had the same reaction I did, which is: this is going to certainly generate a lot of conspiracy theories.”
They included photocopied pages from Epstein’s contact book listing Christy Turlington, a model, media tycoon Rupert Murdoch, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Trump was listed as a contact, along with his late brother Robert, daughter Ivanka, and ex-wife Ivana.
Two more pages from a book Ghislaine Maxwell put together for Epstein’s 50th birthday in 2003 were also made public in the most recent batch of documents.
One was titled “Contents” and included some of the book’s contributors, such as private equity tycoon Leon Black, lawyer Alan Dershowitz, and former President Bill Clinton. The other was a letter from acquaintance Coco Brown to Epstein, referring to him as “Degenerate I” and herself as “Degenerate II.” It says something like, “(so many girls, so little time)? And there you are, Jeffrey, smiling like the enigmatic, naughty boy you are.
Amid mounting calls for greater openness in Epstein’s case, the committee subpoenaed Barr in August. Barr served as the head of Trump’s Justice Department from February 2019 until December 2020.
He said in his deposition that he spoke with Trump about Epstein twice: once after learning of the suicide and again when Epstein was in the news, either at the time of his arrest or his passing.
Trump on Epstein: “You’re talking about many years ago, but he took people and because he took people I said, ‘Don’t do it anymore.’ You know, they work for me and he took, ah, beyond that, he took some others. And once he did that, that was the end of him. When they steal people… pic.twitter.com/aqOWXhVeE9
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 29, 2025
The evidence supports Trump’s prior statements to reporters this year that he and Epstein had a falling out because his old pal “stole” ladies who had worked at his Mar-a-Lago spa. Among them was Virginia Giuffre, who would later accuse Prince Andrew of assaulting her after being enlisted by Maxwell as a member of their corrupt sex trafficking organization.
While awaiting trial in what was supposed to be a highly guarded federal jail in Manhattan, Epstein passed away in 2019. Trump, who entered office pledging complete transparency and stoking MAGA’s conspiracy theories, is still plagued by his death six years later.
Barr’s testimony, however, confirmed that he was not directly aware of any incriminating connections between Trump and Epstein.
