Former US president Bill Clinton has lashed out after a deluge of new photos in the Epstein files were released to the public.
The most recent images cache of images – numbering in the hundreds of thousands – was released by the Department of Justice on Friday, December 19 in accordance with a congressional mandate.
President Donald Trump was notably absent from the files (this despite his known ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein) but there were other high-profile individuals who did feature multiple times in the pictures.
Among them was Bill Clinton, another political figure rumored to have had a relationship with the notorious Epstein.
The former president is seen in images including one with Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, and a blurred-out woman in a pool. It didn’t take long before his detractors began the finger-pointing and speculating.
Yet Clinton himself had a fiery response, with a spokesperson for the 79-year-old didn’t slamming the White House for using Clinton as a “scapegoat” in a statement posted to X.
“The White House hasn’t been hiding these files for months only to dump them late on a Friday to protect Bill Clinton,” the spokesperson wrote.
“This is about shielding themselves from what comes next, or from what they’ll try and hide forever. So they can release as many grainy 20-plus-year-old photos as they want, but this isn’t about Bill Clinton. Never has, never will be.”
One of the most viral photos of the thousands of images released last week shows Clinton swimming in an underground pool alongside Maxwell and a woman whose face has been blacked out.
Another image sees the former president sitting at dinner with Epstein and rock legend Mick Jagger. Further images show Clinton lounging in a hot tub.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt posted the pool photo on X, along with the caption “Oh my!” and a red-faced emoji.
It’s important to note that though many celebrities feature in the released images, they are not currently accused of any crimes. The release came as part of the recently-imposed Epstein Files Transparency Act – a law forcing the DOJ to start releasing nearly 600,000 pages of redacted documents, including photos, videos, police records, and early victim reports tied to Epstein in a bid to uncover the truth.
But Clinton’s spokesperson Angel Ureña didn’t hold back upon the release of the aforementioned photos.
“There are two types of people here,” he said. “The first group knew nothing and cut Epstein off before his crimes came to light. The second group continued relationships with him after. We’re in the first.”
“No amount of stalling by people in the second group will change that. Everyone, especially MAGA, expects answers, not scapegoats,” he added.
According to the Guardian, former president Clinton has insisted that he severed ties with Epstein around 2005 – before the financier pleaded guilty to soliciting a minor in Florida.
