Epstein and the Clintons: As Hillary Launched Presidential Campaign, Epstein Feared Exposure Since Jeffrey Epstein’s second arrest in 2019, the Clintons have spent considerable effort distancing themselves from the enigmatic financier, and they are currently fending off House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, who threatened contempt proceedings after the political power couple refused to testify this week regarding their relationship to Epstein. Epstein first came into public view after accompanying former President Bill Clinton on a 2002 tour of Africa, aboard Epstein’s infamous Boeing 727 plane, later dubbed “Lolita Express.” Abundant photos from that Africa trip—with Kevin Spacey and Chris Tucker—have just been released by the Justice Department. Through a spokesperson, Bill Clinton has acknowledged traveling on Epstein’s jet during a humanitarian tour of Africa in 2002, but has said he knew nothing of Epstein’s crimes, never visited Epstein’s properties, and ended contact in 2005. In a Justice Department interview in July 2025, Ghislaine Maxwell downplayed Epstein’s connection to the former president, telling Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, “President Clinton was my friend, not Epstein’s friend.” Yet as Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign ramped up, it was Epstein looking to duck the Clintons. Epstein was facing increasingly dire legal consequences in South Florida, stemming from his years-long sexual exploitation of young women and girls. The glare of a presidential campaign risked unraveling what Epstein and his friend and ally Ghislaine Maxwell had so effectively constructed over the years, as they were increasingly associated with the spectacle of “Clintonworld.” In May 2007, the news media drove a scandal around the relationship between Hillary Clinton and Vinod Gupta, an Indian technology executive accused of corrupt dealings with the Clintons related to inflated consulting fees and travel on his company’s jet. In a May 26 email, four months before signing his “sweetheart deal” to avoid federal sex trafficking charges, Epstein predicted to Maxwell that Clinton’s opponents would “attack her ‘friends’ in any way they can,” and he warned her that Clinton’s presidential run could bring unwanted attention to Maxwell. He wrote to Maxwell, “you can see the papers are starting on hillary ‘friends’ Vin gupta,” he wrote, adding, “I think you are better off, not having your name associated.”
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