'I've been...': Trump's BIG statement on links with 'terrific guy' Epstein amid backlash over redacted documents

US President Donald Trump has once again denied any links to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, saying he has "nothing to hide" and has been “totally exonerated.” Speaking to reporters on Air Force One, Trump repeated his stance and said, "I have nothing to hide. I've been exonerated. I have nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein." He added, "They went in hoping that they'd find it and found just the opposite. I've been totally exonerated."

Earlier in February, Trump stated that he never visited Epstein’s ‘infested’ private island and even suggested that Americans should move on from the Epstein scandal. He accused Democrats and their donors of creating fake stories and slammed author Michael Wolff for spreading lies about his links with Epstein. But, he also accepted being friends with Epstein for 17 years “Nothing came out about me other than it was a conspiracy against me,” he said to reporters in Oval Office.

This comes after Attorney General Pam Bondi said that the Justice Department has already released the final tranche of more than 3 million pages of documents late last month. Republican lawmakers accused Bondi of concealing the names of powerful associates of the late financier and convicted sex offender and she faced questions about the same at a hearing in the House of Representatives panel. Lawmakers have complained that redactions in the files appear to go beyond the limited exemptions allowed in a law Congress passed nearly unanimously in November.

Congressman Jamie Raskin, a senior Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee claimed that Trump's name appears in the Epstein Files over one million times. He made the revelations after reviewing the unredacted version of the Epstein Files. Speaking to Axios, Raskin acknowledged that "there's ton of redacted stuff," and that when he ran a search for the POTUS's name in the unredacted files, "it appears more than a million times. So it's all over the place". He later clarified that he "'Trump,' 'Donald or Don' and it came up with more than a million results." The Democrat added that he “obviously didn't have the time to review each one, and I obviously cannot guarantee that every mention of a Donald is Donald Trump as opposed to some other Donald.”

Though Trump has insisted that he was not a close friend of Epstein, past records suggest the opposite. Last year, The Wall Street Journal published Epstein's birthday album which allegedly had sexually suggestive birthday message from Trump from 2003. US president denied writing or signing the message, calling it "fake" and suing WSJ. In 2002, Trump told New York magazine that he has known Epstein for 15 years, calling him a “terrific guy.” He added, ”He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.” In 2019, Trump attempted to play down his relationship, insisting: “I knew him like everybody in Palm Beach knew him.” Trump said the pair had fallen out years earlier, and claimed: “I was not a fan of his.” There are photographs of the duo at Mar-a-Lago, Victoria’s Secret Angels event in New York. Photos also show Trump and Epstein with Melania Trump and Ghislaine Maxwell at an event in 2000.

Trump said a number of things about Epstein Files since he came to power in 2025. First, he dismissed it as ‘hoax’, then he called it fabricated lies by the "Radical Left" to frame him, then he claimed that it is a “Russia Scam” started by Democrats. He even slammed his own supporters for Epstein “obsession”, calling them “weaklings.” Amid pressure from all to release the files, Trump attempted to distance himself from Epstein and said that he cut ties with the sex offender because the disgraced financier "stole" employees who worked for him at the Mar-a-Lago spa. Trump finally signed the Epstein Files Transparency Bill in December after Congress' approval, and made it a federal law.

In one of the interview, Epstein allegedly said that he had been Trump’s “closest friend for 10 years." In a 2019 email to author Michael Wolff, Epstein claimed Trump "knew about the girls" and had allegedly asked Ghislaine Maxwell to "stop" certain activities. In a 2011 email to Maxwell, Epstein referred to Trump as “the dog that hasn't barked.” In an October 2018 text, Epstein allegedly boasted, “I am the one able to take him down.” In the files released, Wolff and Epstein were seen exchanging messages in 2015-2016 about Trump. In one exchange, Wolff referred to Epstein as the "Trump bullet" that could end his campaign and suggested Epstein should use his knowledge of Trump to create a "debt" or "political currency." Trump also called him a "sleazebag" and "third-rate writer" and threatened to sue him for defamation.