Latest / The Vault: The Epstein Files / Howard Lutnick And The Transcript From His Epstein Related Congressional Hearing (Part 3) (5/15/26)
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
- 0:03Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're getting right back to
- 0:07the Howard Lutnik transcripts from his interview with Congress mister Emmer.
- 0:16Question did mister Epstein ever fly on one of our
- 0:20of one of your private planes? Answer no? Question did
- 0:23you ever fly with mister Epstein on any aircraft? Answer no,
- 0:27I had no other personal interaction with them, just the three,
- 0:31So I'm happy to say no, but there by definition no,
- 0:35since I had no personal interaction with them. Question to
- 0:38the best of your recollection, when was the last time
- 0:41you communicated with mister Epstein. Answer It's the one email
- 0:46exchange in twenty eighteen, and that's the only one that
- 0:49I know of actually. Question, thank you, Secretary. The Committee
- 0:53is also investigating Maxwell. Do you know Glenn Maxwell? Answer
- 0:57from the newspapers. Question have you ever met Kallayne Maxwell? Answer?
- 1:02I met her once? Question can you explain to me
- 1:05and the committee when you met her? Answer to the
- 1:08best of my recollection, I met her once. It was
- 1:11at a Rockefeller Institute fundraiser in New York City. Question
- 1:16and what was the nature of your conversation with miss Maxwell?
- 1:19To the best of your recollection. Answer meaningless inconsequential. Mister
- 1:24Grant pops in. Do you know roughly what year this
- 1:27meeting would have occurred? Lutnick, I do not. Spector asked
- 1:31a question, now, did you know where to be affiliated
- 1:33with Jeffrey Epstein when you met her? Lutnick? No, question
- 1:39by mister Emmer. Who else was present when you met her? Answer? Well,
- 1:43it was a charity fundraiser for Rockefeller Institute, which is
- 1:46the premier medical research institute in New York, which is
- 1:49adjacent to New York Hospital. Question thank you, Secretary Lutnik.
- 1:55In two thousand and five, police in Palm Beach, Florida
- 1:57began investigating Epstein. In two thousand and six, Epstein was
- 2:01arrested for the first time for soliciting prostitution for minors.
- 2:06When did you first learn of Jeffrey Epstein's two thousand
- 2:08and six arrest Answer, I don't recall whether when or
- 2:12whether I knew that, so I just had no recollection
- 2:14whether I knew that or not Spector. Mister Epstein reportedly
- 2:19had to register as a sex offender after he was
- 2:21convicted of that two thousand and six offense. Were you
- 2:24ever notified by way of him being your neighbor. Will
- 2:27you ever notified about his status? Secretary Lutnik, No spector.
- 2:33Did you have children under the age of eighteen during
- 2:35that time? Lutnik? Yeah, Emmer. And to be clear, did
- 2:40you ever have any reason to suspect mister Epstein was
- 2:43sexually abusing young women and girls? Answer no. Question did
- 2:48anyone around you ever discuss mister Epstein's arrest in Florida?
- 2:52Answer not that I can remember. Question Secretary Lutnik, You
- 2:56touched on this in your opening statement, But to be clear,
- 2:59you visit Did Little Saint James Epstein's island in December
- 3:03of twenty twelve? Is that right? Answer? In around just
- 3:08before Christmas twenty twelve, I visited the island for lunch
- 3:12with my wife, my children, my friends, my friend, his wife,
- 3:15their children, and my staff for an hour I did.
- 3:19I'm not sure I knew the name of it either.
- 3:21Question If I said that your visit was on December
- 3:25twenty third of twenty twelve, would you dispute that statement? Answer?
- 3:29I would not, Emmer. At this time, I would like
- 3:32to introduce as majority exhibit one. This is EFTA two
- 3:36one five one five three zero, and I'll give you
- 3:40a moment to review question, so I'll read it into
- 3:45the record. This is an email from Tuesday, November twentieth
- 3:48of twenty twelve, sent by Leslie Groff. The subject line
- 3:52reads Jeffrey Epstein. The email reads, how well mister Lutnik,
- 3:56Jeffrey Epstein understands that you'll be down in Saint Thomas
- 4:00over the holidays. Jeffrey requested I please pass along some
- 4:04phone numbers to you so the two of you could
- 4:06possibly get together. Any numbers you wanted to pass along
- 4:09to Jeffrey would be great as well. I will say
- 4:12it appears that you are the recipient of this email.
- 4:14Do you recall receiving it? Answer? It may be helpful
- 4:18for you to understand that if the email says how
- 4:20are Lutnik or Lutnik Howard, those went to Matthew Gilbert,
- 4:24they didn't go to me. They were not meaning I
- 4:26would never see them. They went to Matthew Gilbert. You
- 4:29know if they went to me, if they're listed as
- 4:33HWL and because I received hundreds of emails sometimes thousands,
- 4:37and they went to Matthew Gilbert and I would not
- 4:39see them. So these would have gone to him and
- 4:41I would not have seen them. Question. I understand, and
- 4:44for the record, that's why Matthew Gilbert would have been
- 4:47the individual who responded to this email. Is that right answer?
- 4:51I mean he would respond sometimes in his name, but
- 4:54he would also respond sometimes to the same email in
- 4:57my name. Question. And you discuss the invite in your
- 5:00opening statement, but I'm going to ask you again, how
- 5:04did your visit did Little Saint James come about? Who
- 5:06coordinated it? Answer? What I still cannot understand is this
- 5:11November twentieth, How or why without any communication for years,
- 5:15would you inexplicably know where I'm going. It's unsettling, actually,
- 5:19but this is how it happened. You know, I don't
- 5:22know why it happened, but this is you're actually literally
- 5:25seeing it how it happened. But it's inexplicable that he
- 5:28would and his staff would know where I was going
- 5:31to be. I had no interactions with them. Question, So
- 5:35to be clear, you didn't reach out yourself to tell
- 5:37mister Epstein that you were going to be in the
- 5:39US Virgin Islands over Christmas? Is that right answer? Yes, Yes,
- 5:44that is correct. I did not in any way contact
- 5:47or have any connection to them. Question, and it would
- 5:51be safe to say that the invite surprised you. Answer,
- 5:55I find it unsettling and inexplicable. Question who else was
- 5:59involved in coordinating the trip to the island? Answer? I
- 6:02have no recollection, so I can't give you more information.
- 6:06I just have no recollection of it. Question. During our
- 6:09review of the documents that have been released, it appeared
- 6:12that your wife may have been in contact with mister
- 6:15Epstein's team. Did she ever say anything to you about
- 6:19the island visit? Answer? Not that I can recall now, no, specter,
- 6:24do you know if anyone on your staff or anyone
- 6:26else close to you had a connection with mister Epstein
- 6:29or his staff. I'm just trying to understand how he
- 6:32may have been aware of your travels. Lutnick, me too,
- 6:36I find it inexplicable and unsettling, and just reading this
- 6:39sort of it's bothersome. So no, I don't know. Emmer.
- 6:44So you are live on the island on December twenty third,
- 6:47to the best of your recollection, Can you describe the
- 6:49events what happened when you arrived on the island. Lut Nick, sure,
- 6:54so it's fourteen years ago. I went for lunch with
- 6:57my wife, my four children, my friend, a couple with
- 7:01their four children, and staff and boat staff. So it
- 7:04was probably fifteen or sixteen people went for lunch. We
- 7:08sat outside, had lunch. It was boring. We left. Spector,
- 7:13did this friend and their family that was with you
- 7:16have any prior connection with mister Epstein? Or were they
- 7:19there as your guests and for your visit to your
- 7:22neighbor Lutnick. They were there as my guests, but I
- 7:25don't know, and I've never heard that they had any
- 7:27contact with them whatsoever spector prior or subsequent to the
- 7:31visit Lutnick, prior and subsequent Spector, thank you question by Emmer,
- 7:37mister Epstein didn't offer you a tour of the island
- 7:40while you were there? Answer no other than we walked.
- 7:44I think like from where we had lunch, there was
- 7:46like this, To the best of my recollection, it was
- 7:48like a cliff, so we went to sort of look
- 7:52at the water. Question what was the nature of your
- 7:54conversation with mister Epstein during the visit? Answer meaningless and
- 7:59in consequential. I was with my wife and my children
- 8:03and my friends, another couple in their children who was
- 8:05a big crowd, and we had lunch and we left. Question,
- 8:09besides the group that you arrived with, who else was
- 8:11present on the island? Answer just staff. You know we
- 8:15were outside under sort of a cover outside area, that
- 8:18was it. Question Did you see any young women or
- 8:22girls on the island? Answer no? Question and I asked
- 8:26this in the context of the New York town Home.
- 8:28But did you notice any weird or unusual artwork when
- 8:31you visited the island? Answer no, I wasn't inside any building.
- 8:36I don't recall being inside any building. Question and you
- 8:40never visited the island again? Is that right? Answer? That's correct? Never.
- 8:45Question did you ever hear rumors about the island? Obviously
- 8:49now it has the nickname Pedophile Island, Nothing of that
- 8:52sort prior to or around the time you visited? Answer no,
- 8:57of course not. In twenty nineteen, we all learned lots
- 8:59of information, but nothing before then. Question there's a photo
- 9:04that was released I believe in the Epstein File Transparency
- 9:07Act and has been reported. Are you aware of the
- 9:09photo of you on the island? Answer yes, question and
- 9:13that was or what you were describing of looking over
- 9:17the cliff. Would it be safe to assume that was
- 9:19when the photo was taken. Answer yes, it's entirely confirmatory
- 9:24that photo. Specter. Had you seen that photo before it
- 9:28was released by the Department of Justice? Lutnick No question
- 9:31by spector. Did you know what it existed? Lutnick, No,
- 9:35mister Emmer. At this time, I would like to introduce
- 9:38majority exhibit and these are photos that were released by
- 9:41the Department of Justice as part of the Epstein Files
- 9:44Transparency Act. Lutnick. Majority Exhibit number two was marked for identification. Emmer.
- 9:51Question and for the record, these are images showing multiple
- 9:54mass of different male faces hanging on the walls of
- 9:57a room at mister Epstein's Island, with a aunt his
- 10:00chair in the middle of the room. Secretary Lutnik, when
- 10:03you visited Epstein's Island, did you see or enter this room?
- 10:07Answer no question. Have you seen pictures of the mass before?
- 10:11Answer no question. The reason that we introduce this is
- 10:15many people online have speculated that one of the masks
- 10:18resembles you, specifically the one on the first page in
- 10:22the middle. What's your response to these claims? Answer, you
- 10:26got to be kidding me. That's the most ridiculous and
- 10:28absurd thing I've ever heard what a bald man I
- 10:32have hair? Look, I mean I don't have many, but
- 10:34at least I have some that is not remotely me.
- 10:37That's nonsense. Question. Thank you. During your visit to the island,
- 10:42did you discuss the company Adfin Solutions with mister Epstein? Answer?
- 10:46No question. What was adfin Solutions? Answer? It was a
- 10:51company that attempted to create an exchange for online ads.
- 10:54They went out of business. Question Were you personally an
- 10:57investor in Adfin Solutions? Answer? No question. Was Canter Fitzgerald
- 11:02an investor and Adfin Solutions? Answer yes to this. Mister
- 11:08Twellinger jumps in, mister Emmer, just so the record's clear.
- 11:12I believe there's different redacted. We can't hear over here. Turwilger. Sure,
- 11:18Just so the record's clear, Mister Emmer, I think you
- 11:20may want to ask which part of counter Fitzgerald there's
- 11:23multiple subsidiaries, or the secretary could offer a little bit
- 11:27more information. Which part of Cantor was an investor? Emmer?
- 11:30Which part of Canter Fitzgerald was an investor? Answer Canterer
- 11:34Fitzgerald has a subsidiary that did venture capital investing with
- 11:38small investments in many companies in sort of high risk investments,
- 11:43and then those would then have subsidiary companies that might
- 11:47be for each particular investment. It was called Canter Ventures,
- 11:51and so the company would be called CV. So Canter
- 11:54Ventures would be CV. But it was a venture capital
- 11:58alarm of counter Fitzgerald, sort of multiple layers down the
- 12:01subsidiary chain. Question. And the reason that we ask is
- 12:06there was a stock purchase agreement that was released as
- 12:09part of the Epstein File Transparency Act that you signed
- 12:12on behalf of CV A FH and mister Epstein signed.
- 12:16Did you know that mister Epstein was an investor in
- 12:19this company adfin Answer no question. When did you learn
- 12:23that he was an investor? Answer to the best of
- 12:26my knowledge, when these documents were released, best to my recollection.
- 12:30Question And would you have been aware of all the investors,
- 12:33whether they were individuals or entities, in any of Kennter
- 12:37Fitzgerald's portfolios. Answer no, of venture capital investments, no question.
- 12:42And for the record, had you and mister Epstein ever
- 12:45invested in the same company prior to this occurrence? Answer no,
- 12:49not that I know of. Mister Grant jumps in the
- 12:54signatory page from the investment to Advin Solutions. You said
- 12:57you had not seen or I'm sorry that you let me.
- 13:00You're a phrase. It's common for another investor in a
- 13:03VC deal to have the page from another investor. Ludnik
- 13:07no I found it inexplicable and unsettling that he had
- 13:10that it was released, that my company's signature page would
- 13:14be in someone else's files. It's unsettling, Emmer. And when
- 13:18a stock purchase agreement is executed and the individuals are signing,
- 13:22they're typically not in the same room. Is that right,
- 13:25Ludnik That is correct, mister Grant. And do you have
- 13:29any idea of how mister Epstein would have come across
- 13:32that page? Answer from Ludnik no I find it inexplicable
- 13:37and unsettling, mister Emmer. At this time, I'd like to
- 13:42introduce majority Exhibit three. And this is an email that
- 13:46you are not a recipient of, dated May fourth, twenty thirteen,
- 13:49from Jeffrey Epstein to David Mitchell discussing ad Finn and
- 13:53a potential meeting between you and mister Epstein. Question, mister secretary,
- 13:59do you know who David Mitchell is? Answer yes, Question
- 14:02how do you know him? Answer? He was the husband
- 14:05of one of my wife's friends. Question were you in
- 14:08contact with them during this period of spring twenty thirteen?
- 14:12Answer I may have been. Question when did you understand
- 14:15his relationship to be with Jeffrey Epstein? Answer I don't
- 14:18recall knowing that he had any relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
- 14:22Question and what we're specifically interested in here? One it
- 14:26says one of the line says, I think I'm seeing
- 14:29h Lutnik later cool restaurant in Williamsburg. Do you recall
- 14:33meeting Epstein at a restaurant in Williamsburg in May of
- 14:36twenty thirteen? Answer? I did not. I mean this seems
- 14:41to think that David Mitchell was planning on seeing me,
- 14:43not mister Epstein. But as I testified, the only times
- 14:46that I recall ever seeing him are the ones that
- 14:49we've gone through already, Mister Emmer. At this time, I'd
- 14:54like to introduce majority Exhibit four. And this is an
- 14:57email chain dated May twenty eighth, twenty eighteen, between Jeffrey
- 15:02Epstein and a redacted email labeled HWL it's Big bat
- 15:07smart EFTA one zero five zero seven seven two Lutnik.
- 15:12Majority Exhibit number four was marked for identification. All right,
- 15:17we're going to wrap up right here and in the
- 15:19next episode dealing with the topic, we're going to pick
- 15:21up where we left off. All the information that goes
- 15:24with this episode can be found in the description box.