Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are taking a closer look at US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick’s connection to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, after the justice department’s website restored a photo showing him with the disgraced financier on his private island.
In the picture, Epstein appears front and center – and is surrounded by three other men. Lutnick, dressed in a blue shirt and white shorts, stands a few feet behind Epstein.
It has not been confirmed when the photo was taken. Lutnick has denied wrongdoing, saying he has nothing to hide about his links to Epstein.
A letter addressed to Lutnick from Democratic US senators Chris Van Hollen of Maryland and Jeff Merkley of Oregon calls on him to testify before Congress about his relationship with Epstein. They are requesting that Lutnick produce all records of meetings, phone calls, and correspondence with Epstein or his associates, as well as a complete timeline of every interaction he has had with Epstein, including after Epstein’s 2008 conviction for soliciting an underage girl for prostitution.
The senators are also calling on Lutnick to provide any information or evidence to support his former claim that Epstein “is the greatest blackmailer ever” – as said in an October interview – and for answers regarding the nanny that Lutnick employed.
“The American people and the survivors of Mr Epstein’s crimes deserve a full accounting from every public official whose statements on this matter have proven incomplete,” the letter states. “If, as you say, you have nothing to hide, then producing these records should be a straightforward matter.”
The White House did not immediately respond to comment on the calls for Lutnick to testify.
US House oversight committee chairperson James Comer, a Tennessee Republican, told reporters on Thursday that he is not ruling out the possibility that Lutnick would be issued a subpoena to testify.
In a post on X Friday morning, US House member Nancy Mace, a South Carolina Republican who serves on the oversight committee, wrote that “Howard Lutnick should take questions” from the body.
“I believe we will have the votes to subpoena him,” US House member Ro Khanna, a California Democrat and oversight committee member, said outside the Chappaqua Performing Arts Center in New York on Friday.
Khanna’s remarks came shortly before Bill Clinton testified to the House committee about his ties to Epstein.
Lutnick was a longtime next-door neighbor of Epstein in New York. He has previously claimed that he distanced himself from Epstein in 2005. However, the justice department’s release of case files showed that Lutnick had two engagements with Epstein years past that. He attended a 2011 event at Epstein’s home. And Lutnick’s family had lunch with Epstein on his private island in 2012 – four years after Epstein was sentenced to 13 months in jail for procuring a minor for prostitution.
Lutnick, a longtime ally of Donald Trump, admitted to the 2012 lunch during his 10 February testimony before the US Senate appropriations committee.
“I did have lunch with him, as I was on a boat going across on a family vacation,” Lutnick said.
In that testimony, Lutnick also insisted that he “barely had anything to do” with Epstein. “I’m glad to be here to make it clear that I met Jeffrey Epstein … when I moved to a house next door to him in New York,” he testified.
He added: “Over the next 14 years, I met him two other times that I can recall – two times. So six years later, I met him, and then a year and a half after that, I met him, and never again.”
Deviating from the majority of his Republican colleagues, US House member Thomas Massie earlier in February called for the commerce secretary to resign over his ties to Epstein.
During an appearance on CNN’s Inside Politics, Massie said: “Really, he should make life easier on the president, frankly, and just resign.”
