An email in the Jeffrey Epstein files that references U.S. President Donald Trump “blowing Bubba” has attracted scrutiny on social media.
On Wednesday, U.S. lawmakers released more than 20,000 pages of documents connected to Epstein, a convicted sex offender who died by suicide in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting sex trafficking charges.
Some of the documents mentioned Trump, including one from Epstein’s brother, Mark, which references photos of Trump “blowing Bubba.” It is unclear who Bubba refers to, and following the publication of the email, people on social media have speculated about what it means.
Newsweek reached out to the White House by email to comment on this story outside of normal business hours.
Why It Matters
Files related to Epstein continue to cause problems for the Trump administration, as bipartisan groups have called for greater transparency in the case and the further publication of documents and evidence in the government’s possession.
Trump has consistently denied any wrongdoing in connection with Epstein and has said their friendship ended in the early 2000s. But the recent release of thousands of documents has brought fresh scrutiny to the president’s relationship with Epstein.
What To Know
In an email sent in March 2018, Mark Epstein told Jeffrey Epstein to ask Steve Bannon, Trump’s former chief strategist, if Russian President Vladimir Putin has “the photos of Trump blowing Bubba.”
“You and your boy Donnie can make a remake of the movie Get Hard,” Mark Epstein wrote.
Newsweek also reached out to Bannon and the Kremlin by email to comment on this story outside of normal business hours.
Posts on social media about the email have since gone viral, with people questioning what the email means.
One user wrote: “Who is Bubba, and why did Trump blow him?”
Call to Activism, an account with over 1.1 million followers, wrote: “WTF: In one of the leaked emails, Mark Epstein, Jeffrey Epstein’s brother suggests to ask Steve Bannon if Putin has ‘the photo of Trump blowing Bubba,’ to which Epstein replied, ‘and I thought- I had tsuris,’ which is Yiddish for troubles.”
Other social media accounts said that “Bubba” is former president Bill Clinton’s nickname, but Mark Epstein told Newsweek the individual was not Clinton, but did not provide any additional details about the identity of “Bubba” or the meaning of the emails. Newsweek contacted Clinton by email to comment on this story.
Trump is also referenced in other documents, including in emails between Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell in which Epstein called Trump “that dog that hasn’t barked.” In an email to author Michael Wolff, Epstein said Trump “knew about the girls as he asked Ghislaine to stop.”
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee later released additional emails said to show Epstein’s correspondence with former Trump adviser Steve Bannon and former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers.
What People Are Saying
President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social in response to the newly released documents: “The Democrats are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax again because they’ll do anything at all to deflect on how badly they’ve done on the Shutdown, and so many other subjects. Only a very bad, or stupid, Republican would fall into that trap.
“The Democrats cost our Country $1.5 Trillion Dollars with their recent antics of viciously closing our Country, while at the same time putting many at risk—and they should pay a fair price. There should be no deflections to Epstein or anything else, and any Republicans involved should be focused only on opening up our Country, and fixing the massive damage caused by the Democrats!”
House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Robert Garcia, a California Democrat, said in a statement: “The more Donald Trump tries to cover up the Epstein files, the more we uncover. These latest emails and correspondence raise glaring questions about what else the White House is hiding and the nature of the relationship between Epstein and the President.”
What Happens Next
Soon, the House of Representatives will vote on whether to publicly release the full set of Epstein-related government records after a petition to force a vote surpassed the required 218-signature threshold on Wednesday.
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