BERLIN — Former first lady Hillary Clinton has accused President Donald Trump’s administration of a “cover-up” over its handling of files on the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“Get the files out. They’re slow going,” the former US secretary of state told the BBC in Berlin, where he was attending the annual world forum.
The White House claimed that by releasing the files, it was doing “more for victims than Democrats ever have before.”
Millions of new files related to the late sex offender Epstein were released by the US Department of Justice earlier this month.
At the time, the deputy attorney general said 3 million pages had not been released because of the presence of private medical files, graphic depictions of child abuse or other material that would jeopardize the investigation.
A vote that had initially been scheduled to hold the Clintons in contempt of Congress for refusing to appear in court was shelved after both men agreed to testify. He will be the first former US president to testify before a Congressional committee since Gerald Ford in 1983.
Bill Clinton will appear on February 27th, and Hillary Clinton the day before.
Hillary Clinton reiterated the couple’s request that Congressional committee hearings be held in public rather than behind closed doors.
The couple have been ordered to testify privately to the House Oversight Committee, which is investigating the late financier’s relationships with powerful people and how criminal information was handled.
“We will be there, but we think it’s better to do it in public,” Hillary Clinton said.
Hillary Clinton told the BBC: “We will be there, but we think it’s better to do it in public.”
Republican Committee Chairman James Comer accused the Clintons of being “retarded” and said they had “succumbed” as a contempt vote loomed.
“I just want it to be fair,” Hillary Clinton said. “I want everyone to be treated the same.”
“We have nothing to hide. We have repeatedly asked for the full release of these files. We believe that sunlight is the best disinfectant.”
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The former presidential candidate claimed that she and her husband were being used to draw attention away from Trump.
“Look at this shiny object. We’re hosting the Clintons. Even Hillary Clinton, who has never met the man.”
Hillary Clinton said she met Epstein’s convicted colleague Ghislaine Maxwell “a few times.”
Bill Clinton, who appears in the Epstein files, said he knew Epstein but stopped communicating with him 20 years ago.
Clinton has also not been accused of wrongdoing by survivors of Epstein’s abuse.
Millions of new files on Epstein were released by the U.S. Justice Department earlier this month after Congress passed a law requiring the agency to release materials related to the Epstein investigation.
The Justice Department now says it has released all of the files required by the Epstein File Transparency Act, but lawmakers argue that not enough has been released.
Epstein died in his New York prison cell on August 10, 2019, with no chance of bail on sex trafficking charges. The sentence came more than a decade after he was convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor and registered as a sex offender.
Trump, who is mentioned in the Epstein files, has consistently denied any wrongdoing related to Epstein, saying he stopped communicating with him decades ago and has not been accused of any crimes by Epstein’s victims.
Asked about Hillary Clinton’s comments in an interview, Trump said he had nothing to hide.
“I was acquitted. I had nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein. They went in expecting to be found, and what they found was quite the opposite,” he said aboard Air Force One.
“They’re being dragged in. And that’s their problem…Clinton and a lot of other Democrats are being dragged in.” — Agency
