{"id":1442,"date":"2025-08-07T17:24:34","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T17:24:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/?p=1442"},"modified":"2025-08-07T17:24:37","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T17:24:37","slug":"trump-defends-doj-official-over-ghislaine-maxwell-meeting-prison-transfer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/?p=1442","title":{"rendered":"Trump Defends DOJ Official Over Ghislaine Maxwell Meeting, Prison Transfer"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>President Donald Trump said he had no knowledge of Ghislaine Maxwell\u2019s recent prison transfer and didn\u2019t personally approve it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI didn\u2019t know about it at all, nope, I read about it just like you did,\u201d Trump said Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The president was asked about Maxwell during an event tied to the upcoming 2028 Olympic Games, which will be held in Los Angeles. A reporter first asked whether he had signed off on the transfer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then came a follow-up,&nbsp;\u201cDo you believe Maxwell is credible?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trump didn\u2019t answer that directly.&nbsp;Instead, he defended Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche \u2014 his former personal attorney \u2014 who met with Maxwell one-on-one just before the transfer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cVery highly thought of person,\u201d Trump said. \u201cRespected by everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Also Read : <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/states-news.com\/?p=810\">\u2018Shut Up!\u2019: Democrat Senator Goes Off on Ocasio-Cortez<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Blanche questioned Maxwell for hours in connection to the ongoing federal investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, Newsweek&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsweek.com\/ghislaine-maxwell-moved-prison-texas-donald-trump-epstein-2109387\">reported<\/a>.&nbsp;Maxwell, convicted in 2021 on federal sex-trafficking charges, is lobbying to overturn her sentence on appeal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">President Trump denied knowing about Ghislaine Maxwells transfer prior to it happening:<br><br>&quot;I didn\u2019t know about it at all, no. I read about it just like you did.&quot; <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/BrvayJOENd\">pic.twitter.com\/BrvayJOENd<\/a><\/p>&mdash; Trending Politics (@tpbreaking) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/tpbreaking\/status\/1952868869569429846?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">August 5, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Trump recently said he hadn\u2019t thought about pardoning Maxwell but reminded reporters that he has \u201cthe power to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On Tuesday, Trump added:&nbsp;\u201cI didn\u2019t talk to [Blanche] about it, but I will tell you that whatever he asked would be totally appropriate. And it\u2019s not an uncommon thing to do that and I think he probably wants to make sure that people who should not be involved, or aren\u2019t involved, are not hurt by something that would be very, very unfortunate, very unfair to a lot of people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He doubled down on Blanche\u2019s reputation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cAnything he talked about with her or the fact that he did that \u2014 not unusual, number one, and most importantly, is something that would be totally aboveboard,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The White House referred reporters back to those remarks when asked directly whether Trump believes Maxwell is credible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Maxwell had been serving her 20-year sentence at a low-security prison in Tallahassee, Florida. She was recently transferred to a minimum-security facility in Bryan, Texas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Legal experts have raised serious concerns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Claire Finkelstein, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, told NPR, \u201cIt is very concerning when you have someone who was formerly the president\u2019s personal lawyer then getting involved to possibly assist the president in protecting his own image in this \u2014 when he should be acting in a disinterested way for the Justice Department to ensure that justice is done here and that the interests of the American people are served.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sarah Krissoff, a former federal prosecutor who worked under Blanche in New York, also spoke out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She told NPR it was \u201cenormously unusual\u201d for the deputy attorney general to personally conduct the interview without other law enforcement in the room.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cYou generally would never conduct an interview of a cooperating witness without law enforcement personnel in the room,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Maxwell had been serving time in Florida when she was found guilty in 2022 of committing a multi-year plot with Epstein to seduce and sexually assault minors, which resulted in a 20-year sentence in federal prison. Maxwell has continued to appeal her conviction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Earlier this week, a House committee responded to Maxwell\u2019s request for immunity in exchange for her testimony regarding the late financier and convicted pedophile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The House Oversight Committee on Tuesday rejected a request from Maxwell\u2019s legal team seeking immunity in exchange for her testimony before Congress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a letter, Maxwell\u2019s attorneys stated that she would be willing to testify about her association with Epstein, provided she was granted formal immunity and certain additional conditions were met.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>President Donald Trump said he had no knowledge of Ghislaine Maxwell\u2019s recent prison transfer and didn\u2019t personally approve<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1443,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1442","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1442"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1444,"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442\/revisions\/1444"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/states-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}