Epstein Victims Tear Into Kash Patel Over His Trafficking Claim
Janna Brancolini
Fri, September 19, 2025
DAILY BEAST
A group of survivors who were victimized by Jeffrey Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell slammed FBI Director Kash Patel’s “shocking” testimony that the late sex offender only trafficked young girls to himself.
Patel faced two days of grilling this week before the Senate Judiciary Committee and the House Oversight Committee, becoming combative in response to bipartisan questions about President Donald Trump’s connections to Epstein.
He repeatedly deflected and tried to blame previous administrations—including officials who served during Trump’s first term—for the current administration’s failure to provide new revelations in the case.
President Trump and Jeffrey Epstein were close friends for more than a decade. / Davidoff Studios Photography / Getty Images
During an exchange Tuesday with Republican Sen. John Kennedy he also insisted there was “no credible information, none… that [Epstein] trafficked to other individuals,” a claim he repeated Wednesday in response to questioning from Rep. Thomas Massie.
In a joint statement provided to CNN’s Jake Tapper, 12 of Epstein and Maxwell’s victims said they were “shocked” by Patel’s testimony and were “struggling” to understand its meaning.
“Even the limited information that has been made public includes accounts such as Virginia Giuffre’s report that Epstein trafficked her to other individuals besides himself,” the statement said.
Giuffre, who died by suicide at age 41 in April, was one of Epstein’s most prominent victims. She said that Epstein introduced her to Prince Andrew, who sexually abused her. The prince has denied the claims, and reached an out-of-court settlement with her in 2022 that contained no admission of liability or an apology.
In their statement, the survivors noted that during witness interviews with the FBI, Epstein and Maxwell’s victims named at least 20 other men they were trafficked to, as Massie pointed out during Wednesday’s hearing.
During Patel’s testimony, the FBI director seemed to suggest that the reports naming other men were real, but that officials in previous administrations had deemed them not credible, the survivors continued.
“He has not read the reports himself; he has not spoken to the victims himself; and yet he plans to defer to unnamed officials from prior administrations who treated the reports as not credible?” the statement said.
“Those previous administrations are the ones that Kash Patel spent years accusing of a cover-up. Now he will pass the buck to them to decide that information about other men in the Epstein-Maxwell trafficking ring is not even worth following up on?”
Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who was one of Epstein's most high-profile accusers, met the late sex offender while working at President Trump's Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. / Miami Herald / TNS/Getty ImagesMore
There are victims and witnesses in the case who still have not even been interviewed, the survivors added.
The FBI declined to comment on the statement. The Daily Beast has also reached out to the Department of Justice for comment.
Trump was good friends for more than a decade with Epstein, who died in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. Officials ruled the death a suicide, but MAGA loyalists have claimed for years that Epstein was murdered to protect his powerful friends and clients.
During his re-election campaign, Trump vowed to release the FBI’s files in the case, only for the administration to announce in July that the evidence showed there was no “client list” and that Epstein had in fact died by suicide.
During Kash Patel's Senate testimony this week, Sen. Jaime Raskin (D-MD) displayed a birthday letter that President Trump allegedly wrote to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein in 2003. / Annabelle Gordon / REUTERSMore
The findings sent Trump’s supporters into a tailspin and launched a new, bipartisan effort to release the files.
It also led to new scrutiny about Epstein’s relationship with Trump, who allegedly contributed a graphic drawing and poem to a book of letters that Maxwell assembled for Epstein’s 50th birthday.
Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence for luring, grooming and sexually abusing young girls for Epstein. In late July, Maxwell was moved to a minimum-security prison facility after she told the Department of Justice that Trump had never done anything “inappropriate”.
Kash Patel’s weird week
Kelli Wessinger, Sean Rameswaram
Sat, September 20, 2025
FBI Director Kash Patel arrives to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on September 16, 2025, in Washington, DC. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Kash Patel has had a long week.
The FBI director and frequent social media poster faced scrutiny for how he handled the Charlie Kirk assassination investigation, including from members of his own party. Conservative activist Chris Rufo posted on X: “We would be wise to take a moment and ask whether Kash Patel has what it takes to get this done.”
Before he was President Donald Trump’s pick for FBI director, Patel was a lawyer and national security aide in Trump’s first term. Not only that, but he was a MAGA golden child, reported conspiracy theorist, and big-time critic of the FBI, wanting the headquarters shut down on day one, and reopened “the next day as a museum of the deep state.”
Patel had several stumbles early on in the Kirk investigation, posting on X that the FBI had someone in custody, only for officials in Utah to announce, around the same time, that they were still looking for the suspect. He was then called to Capitol Hill to testify in front of the Senate and the House, where he spent two days being grilled by lawmakers about the Epstein files, among other things.
To make sense of Patel’s recent blunders — and why Trump is backing him anyway — Today, Explained’s Sean Rameswaram talked to Axios White House reporter Marc Caputo.
Below is an excerpt of their conversation, edited for length and clarity. Listen to Today, Explained wherever you get podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Pandora, and Spotify.
View Link
We’ve come to you today to ask you how happy the Republicans are with the job Kash Patel is doing. Clearly, Democrats on Capitol Hill, not very happy. How about Republicans?
The most prominent voice online criticizing Kash Patel’s performance was Chris Rufo. Rufo had, like a lot of people, just really disliked the performative nature of Patel online. And there are a few other conservatives in the administration who shared the belief. They just think that Patel is a little too much on Twitter or on X or on social media and sort of not more of your traditional hang-back, don’t-say-too-much FBI director.
What do they want to see Kash Patel doing as director of the FBI?
Just catching more bad guys. The big thing that is animating the right broadly is the idea that there are a number of leftist groups and organizations who are funneling money to violent, disruptive protests and illegal activity. And those need to be investigated, busted up, and the perpetrators of these alleged crimes brought to justice.
There are those who believe that the FBI has too many deep staters and more firings need to happen. What just happened prior to the murder of Charlie Kirk, there was a lawsuit filed by three former FBI agents who alleged that their firing was illegal and unlawful [that] portrayed Kash Patel as sort of bumbling in his job and not knowing what he’s doing.
That’s the sort of downside of the mass firings. The upside of the mass firings is that is what the conservative MAGA base wants. Pam Bondi, the attorney general, had sort of leapt to the fore with that. She got in office and dismissed a lot of people. Kash Patel hasn’t done as many firings, and in the MAGA mind, that has been a mistake.
A lot of people were worried that Trump was going to remake the FBI in his image, and that of course would be an image of not only a president, but a convicted felon. Has Kash Patel yet accomplished that or is that still to come or is it unclear?
Oh no, I think a lot of these agencies, bureaus, whatever you want to call them, they have career service employees who are harder to fire, harder to dismiss. They have their own culture, history, and institutions, and perhaps none as storied and as solid as the FBI. The ability to really change that is going to be difficult.
I’m not saying it’s not happening, but I know that people in Patel’s orbit have bemoaned how difficult it is to change things. One of them told me it’s like an asylum over here. So the “deep state” — I’m putting that in air quotes — is still resisting the Trump attempt to take over.
So it sounds like Kash Patel has lots of static with various people in this administration, with various people in the base. Does he have allies?
Among the people who wanted Kash Patel to become FBI director was Charlie Kirk. He advocated for him. Kirk had a very close relationship with Donald Trump, was very involved in the transition. Really, the closest person to Patel is Rick Grinnell, who was an ambassador and then the acting director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term, who is now a special envoy, including to Venezuela.
He and Kash Patel have a very close and good relationship. That was probably the closest thing to his upper-level sponsor. I understand from one source that Trump [last week] went golfing with Kash Patel and a Newsmax personality. So there was sort of a bonding moment there on the links with the president, and from what I’m told, all went well.
And of course, it’s only that person at the top who matters in this administration. How’s Trump feeling about Kash Patel, in light of recent events in Utah, the hearings on Capitol Hill this week?
Donald Trump likes a winner, and in Trump’s mind, they got the guy [who killed Charlie Kirk]. Kash Patel has made a good argument as to him owning a share of the responsibility or being able to claim credit for catching the suspect by releasing his photo early. And one of the things that you’ll look at and notice in conservative or right-wing press is a very clear and very smart campaign by Kash Patel and the various people at the FBI and his orbit to make sure that he’s getting credit for that. And who reads conservative media, conservative publications, and pays attention to conservative influencers? Donald Trump!
What is Kash Patel doing that Donald Trump likes? It certainly can’t just be that he raised his voice a bunch of times at Adam Schiff and Cory Booker this week on Capitol Hill.
Donald Trump likes his people engaged and active in the fight. When [New Jersey Democratic Sen.] Cory Booker comes out there and says, “Oh, you’re not going to be here much longer. You’re gonna get fired.” When Donald Trump hears something like that, “Oh, Cory Booker thinks he should go. Well, I guess I’m going to keep him.”
And then secondly, when Patel and Booker went at it, and there was a sort of shouting match and going back and forth, and he held his own. … Donald Trump likes that stuff. He wants people engaged in the fighting; he wants them to mix it up. He wants them to go after Democrats, counterpunch, and hit hard. And Kash Patel does that.
Kelli Wessinger, Sean Rameswaram
Sat, September 20, 2025
VOX
FBI Director Kash Patel arrives to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on September 16, 2025, in Washington, DC. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Kash Patel has had a long week.
The FBI director and frequent social media poster faced scrutiny for how he handled the Charlie Kirk assassination investigation, including from members of his own party. Conservative activist Chris Rufo posted on X: “We would be wise to take a moment and ask whether Kash Patel has what it takes to get this done.”
Before he was President Donald Trump’s pick for FBI director, Patel was a lawyer and national security aide in Trump’s first term. Not only that, but he was a MAGA golden child, reported conspiracy theorist, and big-time critic of the FBI, wanting the headquarters shut down on day one, and reopened “the next day as a museum of the deep state.”
Patel had several stumbles early on in the Kirk investigation, posting on X that the FBI had someone in custody, only for officials in Utah to announce, around the same time, that they were still looking for the suspect. He was then called to Capitol Hill to testify in front of the Senate and the House, where he spent two days being grilled by lawmakers about the Epstein files, among other things.
To make sense of Patel’s recent blunders — and why Trump is backing him anyway — Today, Explained’s Sean Rameswaram talked to Axios White House reporter Marc Caputo.
Below is an excerpt of their conversation, edited for length and clarity. Listen to Today, Explained wherever you get podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Pandora, and Spotify.
View Link
We’ve come to you today to ask you how happy the Republicans are with the job Kash Patel is doing. Clearly, Democrats on Capitol Hill, not very happy. How about Republicans?
The most prominent voice online criticizing Kash Patel’s performance was Chris Rufo. Rufo had, like a lot of people, just really disliked the performative nature of Patel online. And there are a few other conservatives in the administration who shared the belief. They just think that Patel is a little too much on Twitter or on X or on social media and sort of not more of your traditional hang-back, don’t-say-too-much FBI director.
What do they want to see Kash Patel doing as director of the FBI?
Just catching more bad guys. The big thing that is animating the right broadly is the idea that there are a number of leftist groups and organizations who are funneling money to violent, disruptive protests and illegal activity. And those need to be investigated, busted up, and the perpetrators of these alleged crimes brought to justice.
There are those who believe that the FBI has too many deep staters and more firings need to happen. What just happened prior to the murder of Charlie Kirk, there was a lawsuit filed by three former FBI agents who alleged that their firing was illegal and unlawful [that] portrayed Kash Patel as sort of bumbling in his job and not knowing what he’s doing.
That’s the sort of downside of the mass firings. The upside of the mass firings is that is what the conservative MAGA base wants. Pam Bondi, the attorney general, had sort of leapt to the fore with that. She got in office and dismissed a lot of people. Kash Patel hasn’t done as many firings, and in the MAGA mind, that has been a mistake.
A lot of people were worried that Trump was going to remake the FBI in his image, and that of course would be an image of not only a president, but a convicted felon. Has Kash Patel yet accomplished that or is that still to come or is it unclear?
Oh no, I think a lot of these agencies, bureaus, whatever you want to call them, they have career service employees who are harder to fire, harder to dismiss. They have their own culture, history, and institutions, and perhaps none as storied and as solid as the FBI. The ability to really change that is going to be difficult.
I’m not saying it’s not happening, but I know that people in Patel’s orbit have bemoaned how difficult it is to change things. One of them told me it’s like an asylum over here. So the “deep state” — I’m putting that in air quotes — is still resisting the Trump attempt to take over.
So it sounds like Kash Patel has lots of static with various people in this administration, with various people in the base. Does he have allies?
Among the people who wanted Kash Patel to become FBI director was Charlie Kirk. He advocated for him. Kirk had a very close relationship with Donald Trump, was very involved in the transition. Really, the closest person to Patel is Rick Grinnell, who was an ambassador and then the acting director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term, who is now a special envoy, including to Venezuela.
He and Kash Patel have a very close and good relationship. That was probably the closest thing to his upper-level sponsor. I understand from one source that Trump [last week] went golfing with Kash Patel and a Newsmax personality. So there was sort of a bonding moment there on the links with the president, and from what I’m told, all went well.
And of course, it’s only that person at the top who matters in this administration. How’s Trump feeling about Kash Patel, in light of recent events in Utah, the hearings on Capitol Hill this week?
Donald Trump likes a winner, and in Trump’s mind, they got the guy [who killed Charlie Kirk]. Kash Patel has made a good argument as to him owning a share of the responsibility or being able to claim credit for catching the suspect by releasing his photo early. And one of the things that you’ll look at and notice in conservative or right-wing press is a very clear and very smart campaign by Kash Patel and the various people at the FBI and his orbit to make sure that he’s getting credit for that. And who reads conservative media, conservative publications, and pays attention to conservative influencers? Donald Trump!
What is Kash Patel doing that Donald Trump likes? It certainly can’t just be that he raised his voice a bunch of times at Adam Schiff and Cory Booker this week on Capitol Hill.
Donald Trump likes his people engaged and active in the fight. When [New Jersey Democratic Sen.] Cory Booker comes out there and says, “Oh, you’re not going to be here much longer. You’re gonna get fired.” When Donald Trump hears something like that, “Oh, Cory Booker thinks he should go. Well, I guess I’m going to keep him.”
And then secondly, when Patel and Booker went at it, and there was a sort of shouting match and going back and forth, and he held his own. … Donald Trump likes that stuff. He wants people engaged in the fighting; he wants them to mix it up. He wants them to go after Democrats, counterpunch, and hit hard. And Kash Patel does that.
Rex Huppke, USA TODAY
Sun, September 21, 2025
It’s possible President Donald Trump should’ve picked a better podcaster to head up the FBI.
The current one, Kash Patel, has spent two days this week embarrassing himself in congressional testimony, childishly hollering at Democratic lawmakers like Sen. Adam Schiff and helping make Trump’s Jeffrey Epstein problem considerably worse.
During a Sept. 17 congressional hearing, Patel was pressed on the administration’s unwillingness to release the Epstein files, something Patel himself demanded when he wasn’t director of the FBI. Rather than give a direct answer, the former podcaster and longtime right-wing conspiracy theorist deflected, dissembled and hurled insults at Democrats on the committee.
Patel can't answer a simple yes-or-no question on Epstein files
FBI Director Kash Patel testifies in front of the House Judiciary Committee in Washington, DC, on Sept.17, 2025.
Asked by Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-California, whether he had ever told “the attorney general that Donald Trump’s name is in the Epstein files,” Patel refused to give a yes-or-no answer and eventually started reciting the alphabet, mocking Swalwell and saying he calls “bulls--t on your entire career in Congress.”
Classy, and just the kind of sober, respectful behavior Americans should expect from the director of the FBI.
Patel dissembled and distracted, but gave no clarity on the Epstein files
With the backdrop of social media posts by FBI Director Kash Patel, House Judiciary Committee Democratic leader Jamie Raskin questions the director at a hearing in Washington, DC, on Sept.17, 2025.
Throughout the hearing, Patel kept falling back on a claim that the Justice Department was limited in what it could release because of recent court orders.
“I’m not going to break the law to satisfy your curiosity,” Patel smugly told Rep. Jamie Raskin, the Democratic leader on the House Judiciary Committee.
Of course, Patel’s claim is not true. There have been court orders relating to grand jury testimony from the Epstein case, but those orders have nothing to do with the evidence in the hands of the FBI.
Judge says it's up to Washington to 'better inform the public' on Epstein
Protesters project an image of President Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein onto Windsor Castle on Sept. 16, 2025, after his arrival to the United Kingdom for a state visit.
In August, U.S. District Judge Richard Berman wrote: “The Government is the logical party to make comprehensive disclosure to the public of the Epstein Files.”
He wrote that the administration’s attempt to unseal grand jury materials “appears to be a ‘diversion’ from the breadth and scope of the Epstein files in the Government’s possession,” adding: “The Government’s complete information trove would better inform the public about the Epstein case.”
Oops. That’s not going to help Trump extinguish the Epstein scandal. And neither is Patel’s performative rudeness.
Patel calls Schiff a buffoon in a classless display of arrogance
Sen. Adam Schiff, D-California, questions FBI Director Kash Patel at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, DC, on Sept. 16, 2025.
During his equally contentious Sept. 16 hearing before a Senate committee, Patel went off the rails, labeling Schiff “a political buffoon at best” and saying, “You are the biggest fraud to ever sit in the United States Senate.”
(Close your eyes and imagine a Democratic president’s FBI director speaking that way to a Republican lawmaker. You can hear the volcanic outrage from Fox News and the GOP calls for his immediate firing.)
Republicans know the Epstein issue is not going away
The bottom line is this: Americans want the files released on Epstein, a convicted sex offender who died in prison while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. Even Republicans subjected to Patel’s insolent testimony admit that.
“Gotta release the files,” Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, told CNN. “Just release everything that ‒ release everything you can.”
Sen. John Kennedy, R-Louisiana, said of Patel’s testimony, “I have no way of evaluating his answers because we haven’t seen the files.” Kennedy also said he'd like “to remind him that at least in one senator’s opinion, this issue isn’t going away.”
Prices, unemployment up:
That is correct. And the more Trump has Patel out there running interference on Epstein, the worse things will be for the president.
Epstein birthday card, allegedly from Trump, makes perfect trap
Consider this genius strategy by Patel during the Sept. 17 hearing. Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Florida, led the FBI director directly into a trap regarding the lewd Epstein birthday note that bears Trump’s signature, recently released by Epstein’s estate. Trump has claimed the note is fake.
A birthday note to Jeffrey Epstein purportedly written by President Donald Trump is displayed during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Sep. 17, 2025, as FBI Director Kash Patel testifies.
Moskowitz asked the FBI’s top podcaster if he would open "an investigation into the Epstein estate for putting out a fake document with the president’s signature linking him to the world’s largest pedophile ring?”
Patel responded: “On what basis?”
Moskowitz said, “They literally put out a fake document, according to the president, with a fake signature. It’s a forgery of the president of the United States’ signature. That’s the basis.”
“Sure, I’ll do it,” Patel said.
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Maybe 'podcaster' isn't the best qualification to run the FBI
Smooth move. I’m sure the No. 1 thing Trump wants right now is an FBI investigation that draws more attention to the creepy note he allegedly sent his good friend Epstein.
You’d think the head of the FBI would know a thing or two about subterfuge.
Trump really needs to find higher-quality podcasters to run the government.
Follow USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on Bluesky at @rexhuppke.bsky.social and on Facebook at facebook.com/RexIsAJerk
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Patel can't insult his way out of Trump's Epstein mess | Opinion
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