Mar-a-Lago Was Key to Jeffrey Epstein’s Criminal Enterprise

On Christmas Day, Donald Trump delivered the most bizarre Christmas message ever offered by an American president. Complaining about being unfairly linked to the late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, Trump posted a lengthy speech on Truth Social that began, “Merry Christmas to everyone, including the many sleazebags who loved Jeffrey Epstein.” Trump then lamented being blamed for his ties to Epstein, protesting that he was “actually the only one who abandoned Epstein, and long before it became fashionable.”

Trump’s claim that he dumped Epstein is partly true, but obscures a crucial fact: that he and Epstein were close friends from the 1980s until their breakup in 2003. Epstein had been barred from the spa at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in 2003, and the two appeared to have a more definitive breakup in 2004. The exact circumstances of the breakup remain mysterious, since Trump has offered conflicting versions, sometimes claiming that he was crazy that Epstein “robbed” a Mar-a-Lago employee and sometimes referred to the competition the two men had in real estate in 2004.

The nature of Epstein’s relationship with Donald Trump has been clarified by a damning report released by The Wall Street Journal Tuesday. The report makes clear that Mar-a-Lago played a crucial role in Epstein’s sexual predation, a fact that was well known to Trump’s inner circle long before Epstein was charged with any crime. A reasonable conclusion from the report is that Epstein was protected by a plausible deniability system at Mar-a-Lago that allowed him to use the resort to harvest victims. Trump only initiated a break with Epstein once a formal complaint filed by a Mar-a-Lago employee made it impossible to maintain plausible deniability.

According to the Newspaper:

Jeffrey Epstein was not only a frequent visitor to Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The club also sent spa employees, usually young women, to Epstein’s nearby mansion for massages, manicures and other spa services, according to former Mar-a-Lago and Epstein employees.

The home visits continued for years, even as spa employees warned each other about Epstein, known among staff for being sexually suggestive and exposing himself during appointments, according to former Mar-a-Lago employees.

The spa occasionally made house calls for members. Epstein was not a dues-paying member of the club, but Trump instructed staff to treat him as such, employees said. Epstein had an account at the spa where his partner, Ghislaine Maxwell, made appointments on his behalf.

Based on this report, the question becomes: what did Donald Trump know about Jeffrey Epstein’s predations and when did he know it? Trump was married to Marla Maples from 1993 to 1999. Maples, according to the Newspaper“In the mid-1990s, she warned her husband and others that there was something “weird” about Epstein. »

In 2000, Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s most important accomplice, recruited Virginia Giuffre, a Mar-a-Lago employee, to work with Epstein. Giuffre was raped by Epstein, who also sexually trafficked her to his friends.

In 2002, Trump said new York magazine, “I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Great guy. He’s a lot of fun to be around. They even say he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and a lot of them are younger.” In January of the following year, Trump sent Epstein a birthday card full of sexual innuendo.

A crisis in the Epstein-Trump relationship began soon after. Like the Newspaper More details, Mar-a-Lago’s deal ended “after an 18-year-old beautician returned to the club after a house call to Epstein and reported to managers that he had pressured her to have sex, former employees said.” THE Newspaper reported that former employees said a manager then faxed the allegations to Trump and urged him to ban Epstein, which Trump did.

While Trump and his supporters will argue that Trump’s barring Epstein from the Mar-a-Lago spa in 2003 exonerates the president, the facts of the case make Trump’s culpability much more obvious.

Trump had every reason to know before 2003 that Epstein was sexually abusing Mar-a-Lago employees, some of whom were under the legal age. The beautician’s 2003 letter created a problem for Trump: He could no longer plausibly deny Epstein’s misconduct. There was now a paper trail that could be used against Trump. Her breakup with Epstein was completely opportunistic. Trump may not be criminally culpable in this situation. It would certainly be difficult to prove that he is guilty of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. But when judging politicians, criminal guilt is not the only criterion to use. On reasonable moral grounds, Trump’s behavior was atrocious. Mar-a-Lago was key to Epstein’s criminal enterprise. Trump’s critics should not hesitate to emphasize this fact.