As the 'Epstein list' backlash continues, we examine the US President's relationship with the later-convicted sex offender
www.cosmopolitan.com
While it's not known exactly when Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump met, it's clear the pair shared a lengthy friendship. In a 2002 New York Magazine article on Epstein, Trump was quoted as saying: “I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years," and various footage of the pair partying in 1992 at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate confirms it was a friendship that spanned decades.
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Despite Trump's background as a businessman, and Epstein's in finance, it's not thought that the pair shared a professional relationship. In fact, the New York Times reports Jeffrey Epstein wasn't even a paying member of Mar-a-Lago, but instead attended numerous times as "a guest of a guest".
The pair were clearly friendly, though, as they were pictured together at Trump's Palm Beach estate on multiple occasions throughout the '90s and the early '00s. Epstein even reportedly claimed that he was responsible for introducing Donald Trump to his now-wife, Melania. This doesn't match up with the Trumps' account of how they met, however. According to a Vanity Fair profile on the First Lady in 2017, Melania is fond of telling the story of how Donald approached her at a party during Fashion Week 1998 in New York, while his own date went to the bathroom. He reportedly asked her for her number, to which she asked him for his instead - it's "a story she tells proudly", apparently.
While the accounts of Melania and Donald Trump's introduction differ, as the politician attempted to distance himself from a disgraced-Epstein during his Presidential campaigning, Trump wasn't always so shy about his friendship with the wealthy financier.
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