OAN Staff Katherine Mosack
2:05 PM – Thursday, February 26, 2026
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testified before the House Oversight Committee about her knowledge of the late pedophile sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes — notably utilizing the probe as an opportunity to accuse Republicans of “partisan political theater.”
Clinton made a statement ahead of her deposition at the Chappaqua Performing Arts Center on Thursday, calling the investigation an “abdication of duty and an insult to the American people,” while addressing the Oversight Committee Chair, Representative James Comer (R-Ky.), directly.
“The Committee justified its subpoena to me based on its assumption that I have information regarduing the investigations into the criminal activities of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghoslaine Maxwell. Les me be as clear as I can. I do not,” the former secretary stated.
“Like every decent person, I have been horrified by what we have learned about their crimes,” Clinton continued. “It’s unfathomable that Mr. Epstein initially got a slap on the wrist in 2008, which allowed him to continue his predatory practices for another decade.”
Clinton lambasted the committee for having held, so far, zero “public” hearings in their investigation, including her own, arguing that this does not ensure transparency for victims. She claimed that Republicans’ “institutional failure” was meant to protect their party, including “one public official,” rather than seeking truth and justice.
“My heart breaks for the survivors,” said Clinton. “And I am furious on their behalf.”
Clinton went on to list her prior efforts to protect women and girls from sex trafficking throughout her service as a former first lady. She also referenced her firsthand accounts of meeting with survivors of commercial sexual exploitation and their families across Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe, and other global regions.
“Sex trafficking and modern slavery should have no place in America. None,” she declared.
Clinton then criticized the Trump administration’s management of the State Department’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, pointing to leadership vacancies and what she described as a deprioritization of its mission.
“The message from the Trump Administration to the American people and the world could not be clearer: combatting human trafficking is no longer an American priority under the Trump White House,” Clinton argued. “That is a tragedy. That is a scandal. It deserves vigorous investigation and oversight.”
The Trump White House cut the Trafficking in Persons (TIP) office’s staff by about 70%, based on 2025 reports, as part of President Donald Trump’s agenda to reduce unnecessary government spending on single-issue offices. In turn, the administration ramped up immigration enforcement to protect women and children from being smuggled and trafficked across the border and declared January 2026 “National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month.”
“The brave men and women of DHS (Department of Homeland Security) are the best in the world at going after traffickers. They are always able to track down those who are trafficking individuals, find the ringleaders, and rip that evil off by its head,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said last month. “I’m so thankful that I get the chance to lead individuals like that and agents who get up every day to help save our children and to save women and men from the kind of slavery that we’ve seen.”
In a last-ditch effort to shift the blame off herself and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, she also berated the House Committee for calling her to testify in general, labeling it a “distraction.” The former first lady’s deposition comes just one day before her husband’s.
“You have compelled me to testify, fully aware that I have no knowledge that would assist your investigation, in order to distract from President Trump’s actions and to cover them up,” she said, arguing that if the committee is “serious about learning the truth,” it would ask Trump “directly under oath about the tens of thousands of times he shows up in the Epstein files.”
Here is my opening statement to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee today. pic.twitter.com/NZSF2epcI5
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) February 26, 2026
In January, U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche confirmed that the Justice Department determined that nothing in the years of Epstein’s correspondence documented in the files criminally implicates the president.
“In none of these communications, even when doing his best to disparage President Trump, did Epstein suggest President Trump had done anything criminal or had any inappropriate contact with any of his victims,” Blanche told Fox News.
In one of many of Epstein’s disparaging emails, he wrote to journalist Michael Wolff in 2019 of Trump, “of course he knew about the girls as he asked Ghislaine to stop.”
Wolff further encouraged Epstein during the 2016 election to be “anti-Trump” as a “counter-narrative” to James Patterson’s book about him, titled “Filthy Rich: A Powerful Billionaire, the Sex Scandal that Undid Him, and All the Justice that Money Can Buy.”
Wolff’s reasoning, as he explained it, was that Epstein could reinvent himself as a knowledgeable critic of Trump’s character to “gain” social or media currency.
“You do need an immediate counter narrative to the book. I believe Trump offers an ideal opportunity. It’s a chance to make the story about something other than you, while, at the same time, letting you frame your own story,” Wolff wrote. “Also, becoming anti-Trump gives you a certain political cover which you decidedly don’t have now.”
In 2018, Epstein sent an email to Wolff calling Trump “dopey Donald or demented Donald.” The same year, former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, whom Trump fired in 2017, emailed a link to an article from the left-wing news publication The Daily Beast with the headline, “How close is Donald Trump to a psychiatric breakdown?” Epstein replied, “sums it up well. Needs to add Melania.”
Clinton told lawmakers on Thursday that she “had no idea about their criminal activities” at Epstein’s property.
“I do not recall ever encountering Mr. Epstein. I never flew on his plane or visited his island homes or offices. I have nothing to add to that,” she claimed.
🚨 BREAKING: Hillary Clinton Speaks to the Press: “I never met Jeffrey Epstein, never had any connection or communication with him.”
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) February 26, 2026
“I knew Ghislaine Maxwell casually as an acquaintance, but whatever they asked me, I did my very best to respond.”
pic.twitter.com/dB42EvXvS9
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