Emails show Ghislaine Maxwell helped kick off Clinton Global Initiative, arranged $1m funding

Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime companion, Ghislaine Maxwell, played a substantial role in supporting the creation of the Clinton Global Initiative, one of President Bill Clinton’s signature post-White House endeavours, new documents released by the justice department show.Maxwell took part in budget discussions related to the first Clinton Global Initiative conference; talked through challenges about it with both Clinton aides and Publicis Groupe, the company that produced the inaugural event; and arranged to wire $1 million to pay Publicis for its work on “the Clinton project,” according to emails in the massive cache of documents collected as part of the government’s investigations of Epstein.The source of the money is unclear, including whether Epstein provided the funds. However, the emails show that he was aware of the payment. Ask him to tell you why 1 million now and where will it be going,” Epstein wrote to Maxwell after she received the wiring instructions from Publicis.Maxwell’s involvement in the launch of the Clinton Global Initiative took place in 2004, before Epstein’s 2006 indictment and 2008 guilty plea for solicitation of prostitution with a minor, and long before Maxwell, a daughter of the media baron Robert Maxwell, was sentenced in 2022 to two decades in prison for conspiring with Epstein to sexually exploit underage girls.

The emails support an assertion Maxwell made last year in an interview with the justice department that she played a key role in helping set up the global conference.Clinton has said he stopped speaking with Epstein sometime before his 2006 indictment. In a statement, Angel Ureña, a spokesman for the Clintons, said the former president had “called for the full release of the Epstein files” and “has nothing to hide.” “He knew nothing about Epstein’s crimes,” Ureña said.

“When it became clear Epstein had no interest in lifesaving philanthropic work, there was no reason for further contact.

The facts are the facts and the truth is the truth, and they’re both on our side.”The emails reinforce previous accounts that Clinton had a more enduring relationship with Maxwell than with Epstein. In addition to her involvement with the Clinton Global Initiative, the records reveal that Maxwell had flirtatious exchange with Doug Band, who at the time was Clinton’s top aide.She was already known to have attended Chelsea Clinton’s 2010 wedding along with her then-boyfriend, Ted Waitt, a billionaire who was a friend of the Clintons’. And she remained in the Clinton orbit even after reports began surfacing accusing her of misconduct related to Epstein’s abuse of young women. In a justice department interview, Maxwell said that “President Clinton was my friend, not Epstein’s.” Her lawyer did not return requests for comment.

NYT