What Epstein Said About Melania and His ‘Lolita Express’
The first lady fiercely denied having a relationship with the convicted sex offender on Thursday.

Photo Illustration by Victoria Sunday/The Daily Beast/Getty Images/Reuters
First lady Melania Trump on Thursday gave a jaw-dropping statement from the White House denying she ever had a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
“The lies linking me to the disgraceful Jeffrey Epstein need to end today,” the first lady declared. “I have never been friends with Epstein.”
However, in recordings obtained exclusively by the Daily Beast and published on the eve of the 2024 election, the convicted sex offender was heard bragging about his close friendship with the president and first lady.

First Lady Melania Trump said in a spoken statement from the White House that she was never friends with pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and blasted what she called "lies."
Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
Epstein even claimed that the first time Trump slept with his now wife was on his plane, dubbed the Lolita Express. In her statement, Melania said she had never been on his plane.
The pedophile spoke extensively with author Michael Wolff in August 2017 for his bestseller Fire and Fury, two years before he was found dead in his New York jail cell in 2019. Authorities say he died by suicide.
In the recordings, Epstein described himself to Wolff as Trump’s “closest friend for 10 years.”
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Speaking on Thursday, Melania Trump denied she had ever been on the so-called Lolita Express.
“I have never had any knowledge of Epstein abuse of his victims. I was never involved in any capacity. I was not a participant, was never on Epstein’s plane and never visited his private island,” she said.

In 2017, Epstein was free to travel between his properties on a choice of two planes—this Gulfstream, and his Boeing 727, dubbed the “Lolita Express,” on which he claimed Melania and Donald Trump first had sex. The first lady denied she was ever on his plane on Thursday.
U.S. Department of Justice
In her statement, the first lady also insisted her email to Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving 20 years in prison for sex trafficking, were nothing more than casual correspondence.
“I never had a relationship with Epstein or his accomplice Maxwell. My email reply to Maxwell cannot be categorized as anything more than casual correspondence. My polite reply to her email doesn’t amount to anything more than a trivial note,” she said.

Trump in 2000 with future wife Melania, Epstein, and Epstein's associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence for sex crimes.
Davidoff Studios Photography/Getty Images
However, the email revealed in a batch of Epstein files released in January showed the first lady gushing to Maxwell in 2002. She claimed it was a reply, but the subject line “HI!” indicated she initiated the exchange. She also signed it “Love, Melania.”
In her own response, Maxwell’s subject line showed it was a reply. In it, she referred to then-Melania Knauss as “Sweet pea.”

This decades-old email from the first lady was part of a January dump of documents in the Epstein files.
Justice Department
Another email released in the Epstein files from a redacted sender to Epstein right after the 2016 election also mentioned Melania Trump’s first meeting with Trump, suggesting there was an Epstein link.
“I remember flying back with Donald on his plane the first weekend I went to visit you in Florida was the weekend he met Melania and he kept on coming out of the bedroom saying, ‘wow what a hot piece of a--,’” the unknown sender wrote.

An image of Ghislaine Maxwell, Donald Trump, and Melania Trump in Tatler magazine.
Department of Justice
However, in her statement on Thursday, the first lady denied that Epstein introduced her to Trump.
“Epstein did not introduce me to Donald Trump. I met my husband by chance at the New York City party in 1998,” she said.
The first lady claimed the first time she crossed paths with the pedophile was in 2000 at an event she attended with her now-husband.
She denied having any knowledge of Epstein’s criminal activities and said she was not a witness to any of his crimes.
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