We Got 18,000 of Jeffrey Epstein’s Emails

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1:14And with their 360-degree guarantee, you can be 4imprint certain your order will show up just right, right on time. Explore more at 4imprint.com. 4imprint. 4certain. Bloomberg News has seen what's in Jeffrey Epstein's email. 18 ,000 messages to and from the disgraced financier and convicted sex offender from one of his personal email accounts. There are messages that cover a wide range of topics and subjects. You have messages about his Amazon shopping habits, messages about his finances. There's even a message about moving a 40-pound tortoise to and from Epstein's private island. That's Bloomberg senior investigative reporter Jason Leopold.

2:08We really get a sense of what was going on in Epstein's life during these critical years. These are messages dating back to 2002, but most of them are from 2005 to 2008. Bloomberg reporters and data analysts spent the last month pouring over these emails to better understand how Epstein built and sustained his vast influence machine and sex trafficking operation. We're reading Jeffrey Epstein in his own words, and you're sort of like a fly on the wall. You get a look into his wealth. You get a look into how he emotionally, psychologically manipulated and abused his victim. You get to see how he worked behind the scenes trying to beat back these criminal allegations, his indignation as he's being investigated.

3:01Really, though, to me, what stands out is his callousness toward these young women, these young girls, as they were brought into his world. One picture that emerges from these messages is that Jelaine Maxwell, Epstein's one-time girlfriend, had a more involved and enduring role than she said previously. In 2021, a jury found Maxwell guilty of recruiting and grooming women for Epstein to sexually abuse. Recently, she sought to downplay how close she was to him. Some of these emails appear to contradict that. It certainly adds to questions about her credibility. and truthfulness. Bloomberg legal reporter Ava Benny Morrison.

3:47I think it certainly poses more questions than it answers about what the true nature of their relationship was and also comes for a critical time for Maxwell. Her lawyers have indicated that they would welcome any relief from the Trump administration, whether that looks like a pardon or a commutation of her 20-year sentence for sex trafficking.

4:10I'm David Gura, and this is The Big Take from Bloomberg News. Today on the show, Jeffrey Epstein's emails. What 18 ,000 never-before-seen messages reveal about Epstein himself and his relationships with Ghislaine Maxwell and powerful people all over the world?

4:30This is an incredible trove of email messages. and I'm curious sort of what you can tell us about how you got them. Sure. I'm going to give you a really short answer. I cannot discuss anything related to sources or methods. I sound like the CIA now, but yeah, I really can't go into anything related to how we were able to obtain this. When they did get their hands on this collection of emails, Jason Leopold and Ava Benny Morrison wanted to see what they reveal about the relationship. between Jeffrey Epstein and Jelaine Maxwell. Over the years, we've only really heard Maxwell describe that relationship in her own words on a few occasions, in a 2016 deposition, and then most recently in a two-day interview with a top DOJ official.

5:20And I'm Jelaine Maxwell. Good morning, Ms Maxwell. How are you? In July, Maxwell sat for an interview with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. The Justice Department later released the recordings. And it happened as the Trump administration sought to quiet an uproar over its refusal to release the so-called Epstein files. The conversation started with Blanche explaining the terms of the interview. Whatever you talk about today, you have what's called immunity. So that means that the words that you say today, we cannot use against you in a case in chief if we were ever to bring one. OK? Thank you.

5:59There's exceptions to that, the most meaningful one of which is that if you say something today that's not true, that's a lie, we can bring a prosecution against you for what's called false statements. One of the first things Blanche asked Maxwell about was how she and Jeffrey Epstein met. In 1991, I met him at his offices in Madisonville. and I think the most memorable thing I can think about is he was wearing a tie, which he didn't often do. He had a giant tomato ketchup stain on it. So I was like, wow, OK. She really described herself as a one-time girlfriend of Epstein, someone who was then hired to become his property manager and look after his luxury homes all over the world, but was drifting away from him as she entered into a long-term relationship with someone else.

6:53She has said that her role in his life was very, very diminished by about 2008 when he reported to jail in Florida. So when he's going to go to jail, he says, can you stay around and manage everything? Yeah. And do you do that? I do. OK. And then we'll come back to that. We'll not manage everything, no. I mean, there are other people at this point. My specific role then was very, very diminished. But these emails seem to call into question the truthfulness of some of those statements. You know, in 2008 alone, as he was preparing to report to prison, they were exchanging emails at a rate of almost one per day.

7:32She was helping wind down his affairs, his properties all around the world. He was going to her for advice on, you know, the minutiae of the state charges that he might plead guilty to. So it shows a real consistency of communication that contrasts, I think, and conflicts with some of her statements publicly about when they ceased contact. There's also correspondence that shows the two of them remained incredibly close personally. On two occasions in 2005 and 2007, they are discussing a shared fertility procedure. The first time was in October 2005, just days after police showed up at Epstein's home with a search warrant.

8:17Maxwell sent Epstein detailed instructions for a sperm donation. She said he could collect a sample at home, but it had to be within 90 minutes of a procedure she had scheduled. About two years later, Maxwell emailed Epstein another set of instructions at another critical moment. In 2007, one of these email exchanges occurred just as he was preparing to sign a non-prosecution agreement with federal prosecutors. So that really undercuts what Maxwell has said about the presence that she had in his life, saying that she was pretty much all but absent from his orbit by that point. Maxwell has maintained Epstein kept her in the dark about the details of his first sexual abuse case from the mid-2000s.

8:59But these emails show she not only knew about the legal issues he faced, but she also helped him strategize during his negotiations with federal prosecutors. These emails really do demonstrate her knowledge of the legal jeopardy, you know, that Epstein faced in 2006, leading up to this non-prosecution agreement that he had signed that, you know, saw him essentially escape federal charges. In exchange for immunity from those federal charges, Epstein agreed to plead guilty to two state felonies in Florida, including procuring minors to engage in prostitution. Again, he consulted with Maxwell over email while he and prosecutors negotiated that deal.

9:44So she was very much in the know. You know, he's asking her, what do you prefer, lewd and lascivious conduct or procuring minors for prostitution? And, you know, she's responding essentially by saying that she would prefer the former for the most part. But take us to 2009. So Jeffrey Epstein gets out of jail. Then he served 13 months of an 18-month sentence. Jelaine Maxwell has told the Department of Justice that back then her relationship with him was, quote, almost non-existent. What can we learn from the emails about that period of time? Well, there's a gap in the emails and the communications pick up again around 2014, when Maxwell herself was under scrutiny for conspiring with Epstein in the trafficking of young girls.

10:35One of those accusers was Virginia Giuffre. In 2014, Giuffre accused Maxwell of helping Epstein find and traffic teenagers. That same year, Maxwell sent Epstein a request, quote, can you send me the file on Virginia that your lawyers have or whatever info you have on her? And by early 2015, Maxwell wrote to Epstein. She planned to distribute that dossier to others. So the communications between Maxwell and Epstein around 2014 really shows how Maxwell went on the offensive, on the offensive in terms of her plans to attack and discredit one of the victims who had accused her of being a co-conspirator.

11:19And she's exchanging emails with Epstein over the course of a year, more or less, and disclosing what she planned to do and how she intended to be incredibly aggressive in defending her reputation. Jufre went on to sue Maxwell for defamation, for calling her a liar in a public statement. And that case was eventually settled out of court. Jufre died earlier this year. Her family says the cause of death was suicide. Ava, there's more than correspondence here. In these emails is a spreadsheet that kind of details what Jeffrey Epstein is spending money on. and that includes gifts of watches, cash transfers, gifts of lingerie.

12:08This is one of the most fascinating parts of this inbox was this spreadsheet. We had heard over the years how Epstein lavished gifts upon his victims and associates, but this spreadsheet really gives a meticulous insight into how he tracked a number of these cash transfers and gifts,$1.8 million worth over a three-year period. In many of the entries, there's a description of the item that's been purchased or the amount of money that is being wired and why it's being wired and who the recipient is and the date. Many of the recipients are young women, assistants that worked for him, women who would go on years later to accuse Epstein of abuse and even Maxwell in facilitating that abuse.

12:54For example, there is purchases from the lingerie chain Betruria Secrets. There are chocolates, there are tuition fees for massage schools, cash payments to cover rent for one particular victim. The initials GM appear next to about 250 entries, suggesting that Maxwell had a role in at least helping Epstein distribute some of these gifts. We actually spoke to one victim who received just over$75 ,000 in gifts and payments while she was being abused by Epstein. And she really described how Epstein weaponized his wealth like this and used these gifts to exert control over the young women and isolated them so they were completely dependent upon him.

13:42Jason, there are emails here with the names and ages of young women, sometimes even accompanied by photos. Can you describe those exchanges, those messages? As Ava noted, there were a number of women, young women, who were working as recruiters for Epstein. And it would seem that these recruiters would set out to find other young girls for Epstein. And there's one email here that is pretty disturbing. and it describes a 19-year-old woman who's based in Brooklyn. She may be someone that she could bring in to Epstein's orbit. And so there's a description. She's five foot eight. She's a little curvy, pretty face, long brown hair, hazel eyes.

14:31And this recruiter states that, you know, I already told her she could be rewarded for help with her girlfriends. Basically, this recruiter thinks she may have found another potential recruiter. But first, the email notes. This new girl said she, quote, needs to try herself to see what it is. And Epstein responds to this email, you know, describing her, she is too big. But if you think it important, you know, I could do it one time in the afternoon. So the emails just show how the recruiting, essentially kind of how it worked. And Epstein's response to the girls that were presented to him. After the break, the powerful people who appear in this cache of emails, including former President Clinton and the current President, Donald Trump.

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17:59Six years after Jeffrey Epstein's death, there is still intense interest in identifying who was in his network, the men and women he met with, and the friendships he had with prominent politicians and executives and celebrities. I asked Bloomberg's Ava Benny Morrison what we can learn about Epstein's relationships with those people from the 18 ,000 emails Bloomberg News has obtained. What we can see is that Maxwell actually plays a part in facilitating some of these connections. So in a couple of instances, she's passing on greetings from designer Tommy Hilfiger, from Martha Stewart. She's also urging Epstein to host Google co-founder Sergey Brin at his private island in the U.S.

18:43Virgin Islands. Representatives for Hilfiger, Stewart and Brin did not respond to requests for comment. In another example, in an email from Maxwell in September 2006, just a couple of months after news broke about Epstein's arrest on prostitution charges in Florida, She sends through a list of 51 names, politicians, Wall Street power brokers and business executives, including the likes of former CEO of Bear Stearns, Jimmy Cain and the former Barclays CEO, Jess Staley. Cain died in 2021. Staley did not respond to a request for comment. She asked him to review the list and remove or add any names that he sees fit.

19:23Epstein replies and tells her to remove Donald Trump's name. The email has no subject line or additional commentary. So it's impossible to know whether they were planning an event, preparing a list of holiday card recipients or something else. Jason, picking up on that, how often does Donald Trump appear in these emails? Great question. He only appears a few times in the emails. Trump's name surfaces again around the time where, you know, Epstein and his legal team were trying to get federal prosecutors to drop the case against him. And this time, it's in an email that Maxwell sends Epstein in August of 2007, and just a month before he signed this controversial non-prosecution agreement.

20:10And she says in the email, you have to assume they went to Donald Trump. And she references other individuals and also notes documents in West Palm Beach. It's possible that Maxwell may have been referring to reporters who are covering Epstein, you know, at the time, but it's not entirely clear. And, you know, we did reach out to the White House and ask them to comment on this. And they provided us with a statement that they called this fake news. Ava says that spreadsheet we talked about earlier, which included information about gifts Jeffrey Epstein sent to girls he abused, also included details about payments Epstein made and presents he sent to his employees and apparently intended to send to some high-profile people.

21:03For example, there is a line item for a$35 ,000 watch purchase for DB. And when we've dug into the emails, we've found some correspondence between Maxwell and Epstein talking about purchasing a very nice watch for Doug Band, who was a former aide to President Bill Clinton and the architect of his post-presidency. In those emails, they're discussing the payment of it and making sure he gets it for Christmas and whether the note should be just from Epstein or from Maxwell or from both of them. And I think the Doug Band reference is particularly interesting because it is a window into Maxwell's relationship with the Clinton world.

21:47I will point out that when we went to Doug Band for comment about the watch, a spokesperson for him said that he never received a watch from Maxwell. There's also an entry for a$71 ,000 purchase at a Lexus dealership for Alan Dershowitz. Alan Dershowitz is a very well-known lawyer. He's a Harvard Law professor, and he was representing Jeffrey Epstein during his negotiations with prosecutors in Florida. And when we spoke to Alan about it, he said, yes, my wife drove the car mostly. I didn't really like it. Dershowitz told Bloomberg that when they'd pick up Epstein on visits to Martha's Vineyard, he didn't like the fact that their old car didn't have air conditioning.

22:30So he bought them a new one. Dershowitz says it was part of his legal fees. Bill Clinton's name came up during that interview in July between Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche and Jelaine Maxwell. She said the former president was actually her friend, not Epstein's. It's interesting because she seems to kind of lay claim over that connection. And in the emails, there's several references to her updating Epstein on having lunch with Clinton today. I'm in Mumbai waiting for Clinton. I'm somewhere else waiting for Clinton. She doesn't specify in the emails which Clinton she is referring to, but it's very clear from the emails that she did have her own relationship with the Clinton world.

23:13And this adds to the public reporting out there already that she also had a close relationship with Chelsea Clinton. A spokesperson for Bill Clinton said the Clintons knew nothing about Epstein's horrific crimes and, quote, learned about them when the rest of the world did. Jason, let me close with a big picture question. So as you've noted, we get a sense of Jeffrey Epstein's voice through these emails kind of lays bare this contradiction between what Jelaine Maxwell has said about her relationship with him and what it seems like it actually was. How do you think about the significance of this corpus of emails, especially on that note of that contradiction, that her relationship with him might have been closer and more enduring than she's said publicly?

23:54I think these emails are hugely significant and incredibly important as it relates to a narrative around Jeffrey Epstein, Jelaine Maxwell, and what their world looked like. It adds so much to this narrative because even with all the books and news stories and court documents and the fights that are taking place within the administration right now about releasing Epstein files, it underscores that there is still so much to learn about their relationship. There is still so much to learn about the way in which Epstein operated this network that resulted in the abuse of, according to the Justice Department, more than 1 ,000 girls, young women.

24:50And the emails add so much now to that narrative. There's quite a bit more that we now understand about his operation. their partnership as a result.

25:08This is The Big Take from Bloomberg News. I'm David Gurra. To get more from The Big Take and unlimited access to all of Bloomberg.com, subscribe today at Bloomberg.com slash podcast offer. If you liked this episode, make sure to follow and review The Big Take wherever you listen to podcasts. It helps people find the show. Thanks for listening. We'll be back tomorrow.

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