White Home Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Tuesday abruptly reduce quick a briefing with reporters after a reporter requested about Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
The query got here hours after Lutnick, responding to questions from congressional lawmakers over paperwork launched by the Justice Division, revealed that he misled the general public concerning the extent of his ties to the convicted pedophile intercourse trafficker, who killed himself in jail whereas awaiting trial.
Leavitt was roughly 20 minutes into certainly one of her common briefings with the White Home press corps when a reporter requested whether or not President Donald Trump would stand behind Lutnick, who earlier within the day had admitted to members of the Senate Commerce Committee that he’d visited Epstein’s infamous non-public island, Little Saint James.
She replied that Trump “totally helps” Lutnick and described him as “a vital member of President Trump’s workforce.”
However as a substitute of permitting reporters to probe additional into Trump’s views on Lutnick, or ask every other additional questions, Leavitt launched right into a monologue chastising reporters for not asking about varied optimistic statistics touted by the administration on problems with significance to the president.
White Home Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt leaves after chastising reporters Tuesday for asking probing questions on an administration member’s ties to Jeffrey Epstein (Getty)
“I’ll simply level out that there are a variety of wins within the information this week that folks on this room haven’t requested about — you proceed to ask questions on the identical topic — so let me level them out for you once more,” she stated.
Leavitt then began rattling off an inventory of days-old subjects, together with inventory market outcomes from this previous Friday, a medical group asserting opposition to performing gender transition surgical procedure on minors, or current reductions within the nationwide crime charge.
“So we will get again to enterprise. The president may be very busy tonight, and you will see him all tomorrow on the occasion within the East Room touting his administration’s power coverage,” she stated.
She then turned and walked out of the room with a gaggle of aides in tow.
Leavitt additionally answered a query about one other doc launched by the administration which relayed a secondhand report alleging that Trump had spoken to a Palm Seashore, Florida police chief about Epstein and claimed that “everybody” knew concerning the pedophile’s unlawful actions with minors.
The Commerce Secretary admitted to visiting Epstein’s island in 2012, practically a decade after he claimed to have reduce off contact with him (Getty)
Though she wouldn’t affirm whether or not the alleged 2006 cellphone name really occurred, she claimed Trump has at all times been “sincere and clear” about his relationship with Epstein, who was as soon as amongst certainly one of his closest buddies earlier than the 2 males had a falling-out within the early 2000s.
Lutnick, a longtime pal of the president who had pushed to develop into Treasury Secretary after serving because the finance chief for Trump’s 2024 marketing campaign, has not been equally “sincere and clear” about his ties to the useless rapist.
Whereas he had instructed the New York Publish in October that he’d reduce off contact with Epstein — his onetime subsequent door neighbor — after a 2005 encounter that he claimed had left him so unsettled that he’d vowed to “by no means be within the room with that disgusting individual ever once more,” paperwork launched by the Justice Division confirmed that Lutnick not solely maintained ties with Epstein as late as 2018 — the yr earlier than he was indicted on federal intercourse trafficking expenses and lengthy after he’d hung out in jail for state-level offenses associated to his preying on younger women — however even organized a go to to Epstein’s so-called “rape island” in 2012.
The commerce secretary admitted to visiting the notorious landmass, which is a part of the U.S. Virgin Islands, on Tuesday below questioning from Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen.
“I did have lunch with him, as I used to be on a ship going throughout on a household trip. My spouse was with me, as had been my 4 kids and nannies,” he stated.
“We had lunch on the island, that’s true, for an hour, and we left with all of my kids with my nannies and my spouse … I don’t recall why we did it.”
Lutnick additionally claimed in his testimony that he “didn’t have any relationship with” Epstein and “barely had something to do with that individual.”