{"id":296445,"date":"2025-07-27T17:45:12","date_gmt":"2025-07-27T17:45:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/296445\/"},"modified":"2025-07-27T17:45:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-27T17:45:12","slug":"mike-johnson-would-have-great-pause-about-a-ghislaine-maxwell-pardon-jeffrey-epstein","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/296445\/","title":{"rendered":"Mike Johnson would have \u2018great pause\u2019 about a Ghislaine Maxwell pardon | Jeffrey Epstein"},"content":{"rendered":"

The US House speaker, Mike Johnson, said on Sunday he would have \u201cgreat pause\u201d about granting a pardon or commutation to Ghislaine Maxwell<\/a> while another House Republican said it should be considered as part of an effort to obtain more information about Jeffrey Epstein\u2019s crimes.<\/p>\n

Donald Trump and his allies, including Johnson, have been under immense pressure to disclose more information about Epstein for weeks, especially amid scrutiny over the extent of Trump\u2019s relationship with Epstein. The splits over what to do with Maxwell illustrate the complicated challenge posed by the scandal for Trump, his Maga base and the broader Republican party.<\/p>\n

Johnson weighed in on the possibility of a pardon after Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, met with Maxwell<\/a>, who is serving a 20 year prison sentence for sex trafficking, over two days last week. The one-time British socialite was Epstein\u2019s close confidante for years and his partner-in-crime. Epstein killed himself in jail in 2019.<\/p>\n

The House speaker was asked about the possibility of a pardon by Kristen Welker during an appearance on NBC\u2019s Meet the Press on Sunday<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re asking my opinion, I think 20 years was a pittance. I think she should have a life sentence at least. I mean, think of all these unspeakable crimes,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to put into words how evil this was, and that she orchestrated it and was a big part of it, at least under the criminal sanction, I think is an unforgivable thing. So again, not my decision, but I have great pause about that, as any reasonable person would.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pressed directly on whether he favored a pardon, Johnson deferred to Trump.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously that\u2019s a decision of the president. He said he had not adequately considered that. I won\u2019t get it in front of him. That\u2019s not my lane,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Representative Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican who has been pushing for disclosure of more Epstein information, said a pardon should be on the table for Maxwell.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would be up to the president. But if she has information that could help us, then I think she should testify. Let\u2019s get that out there. And whatever they need to do to compel that testimony, as long as it\u2019s truthful, I would be in favor of,\u201d he told Welker on Meet the Press.<\/p>\n

Representative Ro Khanna, a California Democrat who has joined Massie\u2019s effort to release more information, said he did not support a pardon for Maxwell, who was charged with perjury<\/a> in connection to a civil deposition in 2016 (prosecutors did not move forward with those charges once they obtained her sex-trafficking conviction.)<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m concerned that the deputy attorney general Todd Blanche is meeting with her supposedly one-on-one. Look, I agree with Congressman Massie that she should testify. But she\u2019s been indicted twice on perjury. This is why we need the files. This is why we need independent evidence,\u201d he said on Meet the Press.<\/p>\n

After Trump pledged to disclose more information about Epstein on the campaign trail, the justice department said earlier this month it had determined Epstein did not have a \u201cclient list\u201d and did not blackmail anyone.<\/p>\n

Johnson adjourned the US House of Representatives early last week to avoid a vote on releasing Epstein files. He said on Sunday he favored \u201cmaximum disclosure\u201d. During his appearance on Meet the Press, he defended that decision, saying the legislation being pushed by Massie and Khanna would require the release of uncorroborated information and could harm the victims of Epstein and Maxwell\u2019s crimes.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to protect innocent people\u2019s names and reputations whose names might be, as you noted at the outset of the program, intertwined into all these files,\u201d he said. \u201cThese are minors in many cases who were subjected to unspeakable crimes, abject evil. They\u2019ve already suffered great harm. We do not need their names being unmasked.\u201d<\/p>\n

That kind of argument is a \u201cstraw man\u201d Massie said on Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cRo and I carefully crafted this legislation so that the victims\u2019 names will be redacted and that no child pornography will be released. So they\u2019re hiding behind that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Khanna also pushed back on the idea that releasing the information could damage reputations.<\/p>\n

\u201cDifferent people feel that the rich and the powerful have been not held accountable, that they have a different set of rules, and that there may be government officials involved,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re going to be able to distinguish between someone who got a grant for Jeffrey Epstein<\/a> to do cancer research versus rich and powerful men who were abusing underage girls.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The US House speaker, Mike Johnson, said on Sunday he would have \u201cgreat pause\u201d about granting a pardon…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":296446,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12,26],"class_list":{"0":"post-296445","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114926447781669730","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296445\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/296446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}