White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt continued to insist that Donald Trump did not sign a birthday letter to Jeffrey Epstein, a copy of which was published by The Wall Street Journal.
Speaking to reporters at Tuesday’s press briefing, Leavitt said that Trump “did not write that letter. He did not sign those documents. He maintains that position, and that position will be argued in court by his lawyers. The president is very confident he is going to win this case.”
The case is Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the Journal, Rupert Murdoch and others. The Journal has published comparisons of Trump’s signature in the Epstein letter to letters sent to George Conway and Hillary Clinton around the same time. Among other things, the Journal noted that, as in the Epstein letter, Trump signed just his first name in the other letters, and they used “a similar signature and bold serif lettering.”
The letter was part of a book given the Epstein in 2003 to mark his 50th birthday, and included other message from figures including Alan Dershowitz and former President Bill Clinton. The letter with Trump’s signature features typewritten-text within a drawing of a woman’s body. The name “Donald” is in the spot to mimic public hair.
When the Journal reported on the letter in July, it included Trump’s denial, but he still filed a lawsuit, claiming even that the letter was “non existent.” Democrats from the House Oversight Committee released the letter after it was included in material turned over by the Epstein estate in response to a subpoena.
Democrats also have pointed to another page from “birthday book,” an entry featuring a photo of Epstein and a member of Mar-a-Lago holding up an oversized check for $22,500 with Trump’s name in the signature line. In contrast to the other letter, this signature is printed, and Leavitt said that it was not his. The entry talks about selling a “fully depreciated” woman to Trump for that sum.
Leavitt was asked by The New York Times’ Maggie Haberman about her comment that the “Epstein documents are a hoax that Democrats are perpetrating against the president. You said he didn’t sign that check. You said that he didn’t sign the birthday card that he allegedly sign. So what is the theory? The documents came from the Epstein estate. Who is, I guess in your view, faking?”
Leavitt responded, “I didn’t say the documents are a hoax. I said the entire narrative surrounding Jeffrey Epstein right now that is absorbing many of the liberal cable channels on television is a hoax that is being perpetuated by opportunistic Democrats.” She named Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) who, along with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), held a press conference last week with Epstein’s victims calling for a full release of Epstein documents.
“What exactly is the hoax? I am trying to understand what is fake. What’s fake is not the document?”
“The hoax is the Democrats pretending to care about victims of crime when they do not care about victims of crime,” she said, accusing Democrats of trying to use victims as “political props to try and smear the president of the United States and drag on this bad story about him.”
Leavitt said that the White House would support having a professional handwriting expert review the signature.
Leavitt opened the briefing by trying to turn reporters’ attention to the murder of a Ukrainian refugee, Iryna Zarutska, on a public transit train in Charlotte, NC, in a case that has drawn new attention following the release of video footage of the attack. The suspect, Decarlos Brown, has been charged with first-degree murder.
Leavitt accused media outlets of ignoring the story, but it was covered by national outlets including CNN, PBS and CBS News, among others, in recent days.
