White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt shows a letter on tariffs from U.S. President Donald Trump to Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, during a press briefing at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 7, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
President Donald Trump is threating to sue the Rupert Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal in response to reporting on his relationship with the late Jeffrey Epstein. On Thursday, July 17, Khadeeja Safdar and Joe Palazzolo of the WSJ reported that for Epstein's 50th birthday, his associate Ghislaine Maxwell (who is now in prison) "collected letters from Trump and dozens of Epstein's other associates for a 2003 birthday album."
According to Safdar and Palazzolo, a "letter bearing Trump's name, which was reviewed by the Journal, is bawdy" and "contains several lines of typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman, which appears to be hand-drawn with a heavy marker."
Trump himself isn't the only one who is having an angry reaction to the Journal's reporting. In an article published on July 18, the Daily Beast's Lauren Lewis reports that "Republicans have gone into total meltdown" on social media "over allegations" in the article.
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Vice President JD Vance posted, "The WSJ should be ashamed for publishing it. Where is this letter? Would you be shocked to learn they never showed it to us before publishing it? Does anyone honestly believe this sounds like Donald Trump?"
Former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Florida), another Trump loyalist, attacked WSJ's reporting as "laughably false" and said he hopes that "Trump gets millions" from his lawsuit against the publication.
Although the Journal is owned by right-wing Murdoch and has a decidedly conservative editorial board, White House Director of Communications Steve Cheung blamed Democrats for their reporting and posted, "The Democrats in coordination with the Fake News media just played themselves by peddling and publishing a totally false and defamatory article. Nobody in their right mind would ever believe this trash. NO PANICANS!"
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt blamed Democrats as well, describing the article as a "coordinated Hoax by the Democrats and Fake News to smear President Trump."
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Read the full Daily Beast article at this link (subscription required).