Ghislaine Maxwell is negotiating about testifying to Congress on the Jeffrey Epstein case. Photo / Getty Images
Ghislaine Maxwell is negotiating about testifying to Congress on the Jeffrey Epstein case. Photo / Getty Images
Jeffrey Epstein’s imprisoned associate Ghislaine Maxwell would be willing to testify to Congress if lawmakers offer her immunity and provide her with the questions in advance, her lawyer said in a letter obtained today by the Washington Post.
“Our initial reaction was that Ms Maxwell would invoke her FifthAmendment rights and decline to testify at this time,” her lawyer, David Oscar Markus, wrote in the letter to Representative James Comer (Republican-Kentucky), who chairs the House Oversight Committee.
“However, after further reflection we would like to find a way to co-operate with Congress if a fair and safe path forward can be established.”
In addition to immunity and questions beforehand, Maxwell said through Markus that she also wants to delay testifying until after the Supreme Court rules on her appeal of her sex-trafficking conviction.
Markus also said that if Maxwell receives clemency from the United States President, she would be willing to testify open and honestly in front of Congress.
Comer, who has subpoenaed Maxwell to give a deposition to congressional investigators on August 11, said through a committee spokesperson that he is preparing a formal response to Markus’ letter but that at least one of Maxwell’s conditions was off the table.
The committee will not grant congressional immunity for her testimony.
Comer’s request for Maxwell’s testimony comes as President Donald Trump’s Administration struggles to quell growing backlash, especially from his Republican base, over its decision not to release any further information from the FBI’s Epstein files.
Separately, the Justice Department last week interviewed Maxwell in Tallahassee, where she is serving a 20-year sentence, in the hopes of getting more information it can release to the public.
The committee said it requested testimony from Maxwell as part of a congressional review of the federal Government’s enforcement of sex-trafficking laws as well as its handling of the investigation into the prosecution of Maxwell and Epstein’s cases.
It also sought specific testimony from Maxwell to inform potential improvements to combating sex trafficking and reform plea agreements in sex-crime investigations.
The Justice Department said in a memo this month that a review of the voluminous Epstein files had produced no evidence that would “expose any additional third-parties to allegations of illegal wrongdoing”.
But as fury over the lack of new disclosures has persisted, Deputy Attorney-General Todd Blanche took the highly unusual step of personally travelling to Tallahassee to interview Maxwell over two days last week.
Both Blanche and Markus have declined to say what exactly Maxwell told Blanche during that meeting, though Markus told reporters that the deputy attorney-general had asked her about “100 different people” and that Maxwell had “answered every single question” truthfully and to the best of her ability.
