Democrats in the US House of Representatives have released a birthday letter allegedly written by US President Donald Trump to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein more than 20 years ago. The White House quickly denied its authenticity.
The letter, circulated on Monday and appearing to have been signed by Trump, was first reported by the Wall Street Journal in July. At the time, Trump denied the existence of the missive. Now the White House claims the signature is not his.
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The birthday letter contains the sketch of a woman’s body and the text of an ostensible dialogue in which Trump calls Epstein a “pal” and says, “May every day be another wonderful secret.”
US lawmakers also released a copy of a “birthday book” given to the late convicted paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in 2019 while awaiting trial in prison on sex-trafficking charges.
What documents did the House Oversight Committee release?
The letter, which was turned over by lawyers for Jeffrey Epstein’s estate in response to a subpoena from the House Oversight Committee, was released on Monday. It was included in a set of notes sent to Epstein for his 50th birthday, in 2003.
The leather-bound volume contained dozens of letters and sexually explicit images, including drawings by former girlfriends of Epstein receiving massages, as well as photos of zebras and lions having sex.
Contributors include former US President Bill Clinton, the Harvard Law School professor and onetime Trump lawyer Alan Dershowitz, and the now British ambassador to the US Peter Mandelson, among others.
Along with the book, lawmakers also released a 2007 agreement between Epstein and federal prosecutors at the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, and almost 30 years of entries in his personal address book.
That comes after the release of 33,295 pages of Epstein-related documents on September 2, mostly provided by the Department of Justice in response to a subpoena issued by House Oversight Committee Chairperson James Comer.
But Democratic lawmakers had criticised that release, noting that the new records were already publicly available. On September 3, Anouska De Georgiou, an Epstein-abuse survivor, urged US lawmakers to come to a bipartisan resolution to release all the Epstein files.
Through the Epstein Files Transparency Act, House Democrats are trying to get the government to release all unclassified records in the possession of the Justice Department, including those held by the FBI, US attorneys’ offices and other federal agencies.
What has the White House said?
Trump has not commented on the note’s release. On Monday, the White House denied that the president had produced anything for the birthday book and said the signature on the letter did not match Trump’s.
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Taylor Budowich denounced the release, denying the veracity of the signature and alluding to Trump’s lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal and its parent company, News Corp, which first reported on the letter on July 17.
“Time for @newscorp to open that checkbook, it’s not his signature. DEFAMATION!” Budowich posted on X.
Elsewhere, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said “President Trump’s legal team will continue to aggressively pursue litigation” against the Wall Street Journal.
Trump filed a lawsuit on July 18 against the paper’s reporters and executives, including News Corp’s owner Rupert Murdoch. He is seeking $10bn in damages.
At the time, Trump denied drawing the figure or writing the note to Epstein, saying “The supposed letter they printed by President Trump to Epstein was a FAKE.”
In response, a Dow Jones spokesperson said: “We have full confidence in the rigor and accuracy of our reporting.”
What are Democrats saying?
Epstein’s victims and some Democratic members of Congress remain unsatisfied with the latest slew of document releases.
Referring to Trump, House Democrats took to their official X account on Monday to note, “What is he hiding? Release the files!”
Robert Garcia, the top-ranking Democrat on the Republican-led House Oversight Committee, said Trump had “claimed that his birthday note didn’t exist … Now we know that Donald Trump was lying and is doing everything he can to cover up the truth”.
After long suggesting the files contained damaging information on Democrat politicians, Trump reversed course after returning to the White House in 2025. He has repeatedly labelled the matter a Democrat-led “hoax”.
What are MAGA figures saying?
For months, the Trump administration has been grappling with an escalating backlash over its handling of the Epstein files, after top Justice Department officials backtracked on a promise to release all of the revealing material about the case.
Indeed, conspiratorial factions within Trump’s right-wing base were angered by the apparent reversal, opening a rift within the Republican Party, which has been stonewalling the Democrats’ Epstein Files Transparency Act.
After the Wall Street Journal story, however, Trump’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement has coalesced behind the president. On August 25, Jack Posobiec, an alt-right activist, said on X, “We’re so back. The MAGA movement is completely united.”
Meanwhile, Benny Johnson, a prominent conservative podcaster, took to X to cast doubts over the validity of the signature of the letter: “Is this really the best they could do? Trump has the most famous signature in the world. Time to sue them into the oblivion.”
