Portrait of American financier Jeffrey Epstein, left, and Donald Trump as they pose together at the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, in 1997.
Davidoff Studios Photography | Archive Photos | Getty Images
House Democrats on Monday released a screenshot of what appears to be a letter signed by President Donald Trump, which was included in a collection of notes sent to notorious sex offender Jeffrey Epstein for his 50th birthday in 2003.
The letter features a cryptic conversation between Trump and Epstein inside an apparently hand-drawn outline of a woman’s torso.
Trump’s signature is located just below the hips of the drawing.
The letter is publicly visible for the first time since its existence was first reported by The Wall Street Journal in mid July. Trump has not only denied writing the letter, but he sued the newspaper for defamation.
CNBC has requested comment from a spokesman for Trump’s legal team.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt asserted that the publication of the drawing “PROVES this entire ‘Birthday Card’ story is false.”
“As I have said all along, it’s very clear President Trump did not draw this picture, and he did not sign it,” Leavitt said in an X post.
“President Trump’s legal team will continue to aggressively pursue litigation,” she added.
Taylor Budowich, the deputy White House chief of staff, claimed on X that the signature on the letter to Epstein is not Trump’s. Budowich shared a series of pictures of documents Trump has recently signed in order to suggest that the 2003 signature was not a match.
But a review of Trump’s signature over time reveals that it has evolved significantly. A New York Times report from 2016 about Trump’s letters included several with signatures that much more closely resemble the one in the Epstein letter.
Both Democrats and Republicans on the Oversight panel are investigating records related to Epstein, the wealthy and well-connected financier who killed himself in prison in 2019 while facing federal sex trafficking charges.
Epstein’s estate provided the entire “birthday book” and other documents in response to a subpoena from the committee.
Later in the day, the Republican committee majority released a full set of documents totaling more than 350 pages.
In a statement, GOP committee chair Rep. James Comer of Kentucky said it was, “appalling Democrats on the Oversight Committee are cherry-picking documents and politicizing information received from the Epstein Estate today.”
The committee “will pursue additional Epstein bank records based on this new information,” he added.
Epstein was formerly Trump’s friend, but had a falling out with him in the mid-2000s. Since Trump took office in January, Epstein has become a massive liability for the White House, and its response has drawn harsh criticism from both the far right and the left.
Trump, who stoked an array of conspiracy theories on the campaign trail, signaled that he would be open to releasing all the undisclosed criminal records in Epstein’s case, known as “the Epstein files.” But after one paltry disclosure, his Department of Justice said in a July memo that nothing further was warranted, prompting outrage from some of his own supporters.
The screenshot released Monday afternoon shows the letter exactly as it was described by The Wall Street Journal, which first uncovered the existence of the “bawdy” message on July 17.
Trump furiously denied writing that letter at the time, claiming, “These are not my words, not the way I talk.”
He promptly filed a $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the newspaper and media mogul Rupert Murdoch.
After the letter was released Monday afternoon, Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the top-ranking Democrat on the Oversight panel, said the document shows Trump is “involved in a cover up” of Epstein.
Comer, meanwhile, said Trump “is not accused of any wrongdoing and Democrats are ignoring the new information the Committee received today.”
Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for conspiring with Epstein to procure young women for him to abuse, helped compile the book of birthday wishes.
Maxwell, in an interview in July with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, said she could not recall the names of anyone who contributed to the birthday book.
“It’s been so long,” said the British ex-socialite, who has asked the Supreme Court to take her appeal of her conviction.
— CNBC’s Dan Mangan contributed to this report.
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