House Democrats have demanded that the Department of Justice come clean over its prison transfer for convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell, accusing the Trump administration of potential conflicts of interest and witness tampering.
In a stinging letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, members of the powerful Judiciary Committee also said the sweetheart deal may have violated the Department of Justice’s own policies and have urged the administration to release all documents related to the controversial transfer.
Maxwell was only three years into a 20-year sentence for her role in helping sex trafficker and former Trump associate Jeffrey Epstein abuse young girls.
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But as the political scandal over the Epstein files escalated last month, she was moved, without explanation, from her jail in Florida to a minimum security prison camp in Texas, which has been listed by industry publications as one of the “Best Jails in America to Serve Time.”
The transfer came days after Maxwell met with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, Trump’s former personal lawyer, where the pair discussed more than 100 people connected to Epstein—including the president himself.
However Maxwell, Democrats wrote, “appears to have short-circuited the entire review process and jumped the queue, receiving a place in Federal Prison Camp (FPC) Bryan within a matter of days. Neither DOJ nor BOP has provided anything like a satisfactory explanation for providing Ms. Maxwell this uniquely favorable treatment.”
“These actions raise substantial concerns that the Administration may now be attempting to tamper with a crucial witness, conceal President Trump’s relationship with convicted sex offenders, and coax Ms. Maxwell into providing false or misleading testimony in order to protect the President,” says the letter, signed by ranking member Jamie Raskin and other Democrats on the committee.
The letter asked for a trove of documents related to why Maxwell was transferred from Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) Tallahassee to the Federal Prison Camp.
It also seeks a list of any administration officials who “were aware of, were involved in, or approved” of the transfer, as well as a transcript and recording of Maxwell’s meeting with Blanche.
The meeting took place days after DOJ leadership fired Maurene Comey, who was one of the chief prosecutors who helped convict Maxwell.
Comey, the daughter of former FBI director James Comey was also one of the prosecutors who sought to convict Epstein, who he died in a Manhattan prison in 2019 while awaiting trial.
“Maurene Comey was undoubtedly the most knowledgeable person in the Department of Justice of Ghislaine Maxwell and her crimes,” former DOJ pardon attorney Liz Oyer told the Daily Beast.
“She’s the person they would want in the room with Ghislaine Maxwell if the goal were really to get to the truth of the matter.
“So the fact that she was fired, and the fact that Todd Blanche—who’s not somebody who had worked on this case previously—was handling it, raises questions about whether there’s really any interest in the truth of the matter.”
The Epstein files have been an ongoing headache for Trump, ever since the DOJ and FBI issued a joint statement effectively trying to kill the issue.
This enraged the president’s MAGA base, who have long believed that “Deep State” elites were trying to cover up the crimes of rich and powerful people who may have been part of Epstein’s networks.
Trump came to office promising to release the Epstein files but now insists the issue is a Democratic hoax. He also has not ruled out the possibility of pardoning Maxwell, something that will anger his base even further.
