'She's looking for a pardon': skepticism over DOJ officials' Maxwell meeting

The Jeffrey Epstein files scandal swirling around Donald Trump and his administration continued to escalate yesterday as officials from the Department of Justice reportedly met with the late sex offender's longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell.

- Anna Betts

Todd Blanche, the US deputy attorney general, arrived yesterday at the office of the US attorney in Tallahassee, Florida, to meet Maxwell, ABC News reported. The state prosecutor's office is based in the federal courthouse in the Florida capital and Maxwell's lawyers were seen entering the building.

The US justice department had announced on Tuesday that the meeting would take place "in the coming days." Maxwell is currently serving a 20-year sentence for sex trafficking and other crimes at a federal prison in Florida, after being convicted in New York in late 2021.

The meeting comes amid political and public pressure on the Trump administration to release more details about the Epstein investigation – something Trump had promised before his election as president.

Mark Epstein, the brother of the disgraced financier, said if he had the opportunity he would ask Maxwell "what she and Jeffrey might have known what the dirt was on Donald Trump." "Jeffrey said he had dirt on Trump. I don't know what it was but years ago he said he had dirt on Trump."