Elon Musk’s deleted tweets about Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein are drawing fresh scrutiny after the release of emails on Wednesday that suggest Trump was aware of Epstein’s misconduct.
The posts, originally shared in June and removed soon after, have resurfaced across social media as users revisit Musk’s remarks in light of the newly released emails.
One email quoted the convicted the sex offender as saying, “of course [Trump] knew about the girls”, while another claimed Trump “spent hours” with one of the victims at Epstein’s home.
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released three emails on Wednesday that could put pressure on the White House to make the full “Epstein files” public. These documents include correspondence and records related to Jeffrey Epstein, who died in 2019, and some of them reference Trump. While they provide context about Epstein’s network and associations, they do not constitute proof of wrongdoing by Trump.
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The committee’s Republican majority responded on Wednesday by releasing 23,000 documents of their own, accusing Democrats of “cherry-picking” emails “to generate clickbait.”
Trump, meanwhile, posted on Truth Social that Democrats “are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax again” to distract from their handling of the government shutdown and other issues.
Back in June, Trump’s former buddy Elon Musk shared critical tweets about the president in relation to the Epstein files.
The posts suggested Trump’s name appeared in the Epstein files, a collection of court documents, investigative records, and other materials related to Epstein’s crimes.
Musk posted without evidence a claim that the Department of Justice hasn’t released its files into its investigation of Epstein because Trump is in them.
"Time to drop the really big bomb: @realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files," he wrote. "That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!"
The post was removed shortly after it was shared.
Musk’s apparent decision to delete the Epstein post came just hours after he had posted another critical message in which he said he would apologize to Trump “as soon as there is a full dump of the Epstein files.” That post was also later removed.
Trump dismissed Musk’s comments in an interview with NBC News days later. "That's called 'old news.' That's been old news. That has been talked about for years. Even Epstein's lawyer said I had nothing to do with it — it's old news," he said.
"It's old news. This has been talked about for years and years. And as you know, I was not friendly with Epstein for probably 18 years before he died. I was not at all friendly with him," the president added.
Trump has denied having knowledge of Epstein’s activities. Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, called the release of the emails, “a manufactured hoax by the Democratic party”, to distract from the reopening of the government.