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\n President Donald Trump<\/a> did something Tuesday that he almost never does: He no-commented.\n <\/p>\n \n Asked about the newly released image of a lewd birthday letter signed in Trump\u2019s name<\/a> for Jeffrey Epstein\u2019s 50th birthday in 2003 \u2013 a letter Trump denied was legitimate \u2013 the president said he\u2019s done talking about it.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI don\u2019t comment on something that\u2019s a dead issue,\u201d Trump told NBC News<\/a> in a brief phone interview. \u201cI gave all comments to the staff. It\u2019s a dead issue.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n He might be done talking about this issue. But that doesn\u2019t mean this issue is done with him.\n <\/p>\n \n And that\u2019s in large part Trump\u2019s own doing. Over and over again, he and his administration have prolonged the controversy by saying things that don\u2019t add up, reversing themselves and otherwise seeding legitimate questions about their handling of the matter.\n <\/p>\n \n It almost looks at times like they\u2019ve been trying to keep it going.\n <\/p>\n \n Below are some of the most curious facets of the administration\u2019s response, and the questions they engender.\n <\/p>\n \n It would be difficult to prove with absolute certainty that Trump wrote the birthday letter. But what we do know is his denials haven\u2019t added up.\n <\/p>\n \n The Wall Steet Journal first reported in July on the birthday letter<\/a>, which features a strange imagined conversation between Trump and Epstein typed inside the outline of a female body.\n <\/p>\n \n Immediately after the story published, Trump said, \u201cI never wrote a picture in my life\u201d and \u201cI don\u2019t draw pictures.\u201d Except he clearly did<\/a> draw pictures around the period in question. He said later that month that \u201csomebody could have written a letter and used my name.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n But then his lawsuit against the Journal\u2019s parent company claimed the letter didn\u2019t even exist, calling it the \u201cnonexistent letter<\/a>.\u201d We now know the letter not only existed, but it was in Epstein\u2019s estate. That would sure suggest this wasn\u2019t just a fake created recently to make Trump look bad; it was something that had been in Epstein\u2019s possession.\n <\/p>\n \n And finally, shortly after the image of the letter was released Monday, the White House claimed the signature was so different from Trump\u2019s that it was obviously not his. Except it closely matched his signatures<\/a> on personal letters from the same time period.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump doesn\u2019t face any accusations of wrongdoing in relation to Epstein. But he\u2019s repeatedly made false claims<\/a> about the convicted sex offender and his relationship with him that make it increasingly hard to take his strained denials about the letter seriously.\n <\/p>\n \n It has been 40 days since we learned Epstein\u2019s accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell had been transferred to a minimum-security prison camp<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n That was stunning for a couple reasons. One is that the news dropped around the time she granted an interview to Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche (one of the administration\u2019s early efforts to quell the backlash over its reversal on releasing all the Epstein files). The other is that, as a sex offender, she didn\u2019t appear eligible for such a transfer, unless someone granted her a waiver.\n <\/p>\n \n But despite releasing transcripts from that interview, the administration still hasn\u2019t explained how and why the transfer happened. The White House said in July that Trump<\/a> wasn\u2019t considering clemency for Maxwell, but Trump for weeks repeatedly left the door open to it.\n <\/p>\n \n Appearing on CNN on Monday night, an attorney who has represented Maxwell, Arthur Aidala, didn\u2019t exactly downplay the idea that Maxwell got a concession for talking to Blanche.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cAnybody who\u2019s represented by a lawyer who knows what they\u2019re doing, goes in and meets with the government, there\u2019s always a quid pro quo,\u201d Aidala told CNN\u2019s Abby Phillip<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n Aidala said he didn\u2019t know the details of how the transfer went down and didn\u2019t organize the meeting. But he said getting \u201ca benefit\u201d is part of the process.\n <\/p>\n \n That doesn\u2019t put the issue to bed. But if this prison transfer was innocent and not connected to Maxwell\u2019s interview with Blanche, why hasn\u2019t the administration explained that?\n <\/p>\n \n The name of the game in crisis communications is generally to get anything potentially bad out as soon as possible.\n <\/p>\n \n That is decidedly not the approach Trump took to Virginia Giuffre.\n <\/p>\n \n Giuffre, who died by suicide earlier this year, is perhaps Epstein\u2019s most well-known victim. She\u2019s also the most significant nexus between Epstein\u2019s victims and Trump. That\u2019s because she testified that Maxwell recruited her while she worked as a minor at Mar-a-Lago.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump ultimately acknowledged last month that he was aware in real time that Maxwell had recruited Giuffre from his property; he even suggested it was a source of his and Epstein\u2019s falling out decades ago.\n <\/p>\n \n But that admission didn\u2019t come before he spent days \u2013 years, really \u2013 falling short of full disclosure.\n <\/p>\n \n Asked in 2019 about why he and Epstein had a falling out, Trump said, \u201cThe reason doesn\u2019t make any difference, frankly.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n By July, the White House was tracing their falling out to Epstein being a \u201ccreep,\u201d<\/a> without saying precisely how so.\n <\/p>\n \n On July 28, Trump cited how Epstein had \u201chired help\u201d and \u201cstole people that work for me<\/a>,\u201d but without going into detail about who.\n <\/p>\n \n That led to speculation that he was talking about Giuffre, given her account matched Trump\u2019s description. And sure enough, the next day, Trump acknowledged the employees were young women who worked in the spa<\/a> \u2013 and that Giuffre was one of them.\n <\/p>\n \n Even in acknowledging that, Trump seemed reluctant to completely admit it.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d he said at first when asked if he had been referring to Giuffre. \u201cI think she worked at the spa. I think so. I think that was one of the people. Yeah, he stole her.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n It\u2019s not hard to surmise why the president might not have wanted to admit knowing about Maxwell recruiting Giuffre at the time. It might suggest he knew something untoward was happening, especially given other evidence he was aware<\/a> of Epstein\u2019s affinity for young women.\n <\/p>\n \n Giuffre\u2019s family said Trump\u2019s comments raised questions about whether he was \u201caware of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell\u2019s criminal actions.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n The administration still hasn\u2019t done a good job explaining precisely why it suddenly reversed course on releasing the Epstein files.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump and his allies built this up as a major initiative and promised full transparency, right before the Justice Department said in early July that it wouldn\u2019t release anything further.\n <\/p>\n \n The stated reason was that the administration wanted to protect victims and innocent people whose names might be in the files. But it shouldn\u2019t have been any secret that the files would contain information on victims and the innocent.\n <\/p>\n \n And perhaps the most conspicuous aspect of that reversal is the timeline.\n <\/p>\n \n In fact, the administration began downplaying the Epstein files right around the time Attorney General Pam Bondi told Trump his name was in the files, in May. (You can see the whole timeline here<\/a>.)\n <\/p>\n \n Trump was told that sometime in May<\/a>, and on May 18, FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino went on Fox News and suddenly disowned conspiracy theories about Epstein they had both once promoted. They said Epstein had indeed died by suicide<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n There\u2019s also the fact that Trump initially denied having been told his name was in the files \u2013 another example of his denials later being contradicted.\n <\/p>\n \n All of which has contributed to some Epstein victims and allies suggesting there\u2019s a cover-up afoot<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/maxwell-tx-prison-camp-split.png\")
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