Bill Clinton faces US Congress panel over Epstein ties

Former United States President Bill Clinton will be grilled by a Congressional panel on Friday, February 27, 2026, on his well-documented links to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Clinton features prominently throughout the latest Epstein files disclosures, with the former president insisting that he broke ties with him well before the disgraced billionaire’s 2008 conviction for sex offenses.

Mere mention in the files released by the US Department of Justice does not imply wrongdoing, and Clinton has not been accused of a crime or formally investigated.

He follows his wife, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who testified on Thursday, defiantly calling for President Donald Trump – who like Bill Clinton had ties with Epstein – to appear before the panel.

“If this committee is serious about learning the truth about Epstein’s trafficking crimes… it would ask (Trump) directly under oath about the tens of thousands of times he shows up in the Epstein files,” she said in an opening statement published online.

The depositions are being held behind closed doors even though the Clintons called for them to be open and televised, a move Bill Clinton denounced as akin to a “kangaroo court.”

The grilling comes with greater peril for the former president than for his wife, as he has acknowledged extensive interactions with Epstein, but said he never visited the shady financier’s private Caribbean island.

Epstein associated with the world’s rich, famous, and powerful, and was convicted in 2008 for soliciting sex from girls as young as 14.

He died in a New York jail cell in 2019 while facing trial on sex trafficking charges. His death was ruled a suicide.

UK police release ex-ambassador Mandelson after arrest over Epstein ties

The Republican-led House Oversight Committee is probing those who were linked to Epstein, particularly in light of the Justice Department’s disclosures of millions of new documents related to its investigation of him.

Hillary insisted that she had neither flown on Epstein’s plane nor visited his island, according to AFP.

The Clintons had initially rejected subpoenas ordering them to testify in the panel’s probe, but the Democratic power couple agreed to do so after House Republicans threatened to hold them in contempt of Congress.

Bill Clinton features prominently in the trove of investigative files related to Epstein released by the Justice Department but has not been accused of any wrongdoing.

Previously unseen photographs from the files include one showing the former president reclining in a hot tub, part of the image obscured by a stark black rectangle.

In another, Clinton is pictured swimming alongside a dark-haired woman who appears to be Epstein’s accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.

Clinton has acknowledged flying on Epstein’s private plane several times in the early 2000s for Clinton Foundation-related humanitarian work.

The Star