U.S. Vice President JD Vance has hit out at America’s “incestuous elites” after the latest release of the Epstein files.
High profile figures who appeared in the three million documents shared by the Department of Justice last Friday include Bill Gates and Bill Clinton.
However, Vance has insisted that despite appearing thousands of times in the files, billionaire President Donald Trump is not part of that “elite” group.
“I think that it just shows there's an incestuous nature to America's elites, and it's pretty gross,” he said in an interview with the Daily Mail.
“And, a lot of people, I think, it reflects very poorly on them. Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, a lot of others.”
Clinton and his wife Hilary have agreed to testify to Congress over their ties to Epstein, while Gates issued a statement rubbishing allegations made against him in the files. Inclusion in the Epstein files is not a suggestion of wrongdoing.
While highlighting Democrats in his comments, Vance was quick to spare the president the same judgment.
“President Trump is very much outside of the social circle,” Vance insisted. “He knows a lot of these people. He certainly has similar wealth and power.
“But he never really was friendly with Epstein in a way that a lot of these other people were.”
Trump, meanwhile, appears keen to move on from the scandal.
Responding to the latest release of documents, the U.S. president told reporters on Air Force One on Saturday: “I was told by some very important people that not only does it absolve me, it’s the opposite of what people were hoping.”
Trump has consistently denied any knowledge of Epstein’s crimes but the issue has dogged him for months as he promised to release the documents as part of his 2024 presidential campaign.
But when asked about the files by a reporter on Tuesday, he said: “I think it's really time for the country to get onto something else, really.”
Vance also backed calls for British royal Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to appear before Congress to answer for his ties to pedophile billionaire Epstein. The former prince has always denied any wrongdoing.
“I saw Keir Starmer said something about this,” the vice president said, referring to the British prime minister. “I'm certainly open to it.”
He said he would let congressional Republicans “determine whether they should talk to Prince Andrew”, adding: “I’d certainly be open to it. But it’s their call, not mine.”
The latest tranche includes three million pages, 180,000 images and 2,000 videos, the largest number of documents shared by the government since a law mandated their release last year.
Trump ally and Tesla boss Elon Musk, who discussed visiting Epstein’s now-infamous parties at his Caribbean island compound, is also mentioned in the documents but it is unclear whether these visits took place. He has maintained he consistently refused Epstein’s invitations.
Other figures mentioned in the files include British politician and former U.S. ambassador Lord Peter Mandelson, who insists he was not aware of Epstein’s crimes. Mandelson now faces a police investigation in the U.K. and calls to have his title and peerage removed.
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