In July 2025, President Donald Trump provided the clearest explanation to date of the decisive moment that severed his once-friendly relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump recounted how Epstein repeatedly and brazenly recruited young female employees from the spa at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s private Palm Beach club. “He was taking our girls from the spa,” Trump said. When Epstein ignored a direct warning, Trump banned him permanently. “I said, ‘Listen, we don’t want you taking our people.’ Not too long after that, he did it again, and I said, ‘outta here.’ We threw him out.”
Trump specifically confirmed that Virginia Giuffre, then a 16-year-old locker room attendant in the summer of 2000, was one of the staff members Epstein “stole.” Giuffre was approached by Ghislaine Maxwell on Mar-a-Lago grounds and soon drawn into Epstein’s trafficking network—a tragedy that haunted her until her suicide in April 2025. Trump framed the incident as a personal betrayal and violation of club etiquette rather than immediate recognition of criminal predation. “I didn’t like it,” he emphasized, adding that the poaching crossed an unforgivable line.
The account marks an evolution in Trump’s public recollections. Earlier explanations from aides cited Epstein behaving like a “creep” or a 2004–2007 real estate dispute as the cause of the rift. Some reports suggested a 2007 incident involving Epstein harassing a member’s teenage daughter prompted the ban. Trump’s latest version centers squarely on staff recruitment, portraying the fallout as a swift response to repeated overreach in the heart of his own resort.
Giuffre’s family reacted with dismay to the president’s language. In a statement, they rejected the term “stolen,” insisting their sister “wasn’t stolen—she was preyed upon” by Maxwell, who targeted a vulnerable teenager on Trump’s property. Brother Sky Roberts called the phrasing “very impersonal,” stressing that survivors are not objects. The family renewed questions about what club management knew and demanded no pardon for Maxwell, whom they described as a “monster.”
Trump has long maintained he distanced himself from Epstein well before the financier’s 2008 plea deal or 2019 arrest. No victim, including Giuffre, has accused Trump of participating in Epstein’s crimes; Giuffre repeatedly stated in depositions that Trump “couldn’t have been friendlier” and did not engage in misconduct. Flight logs show no trips to Epstein’s island, and Trump’s name appears minimally in released files.
Yet the revelation underscores lingering unease. Social photos from the 1990s and early 2000s show Trump and Epstein together at parties, and Trump’s 2002 quote praising Epstein as a “terrific guy” who liked women “on the younger side” continues to resurface. The poaching story, while explaining the ban, highlights how Epstein operated openly in elite circles—recruiting directly from one of America’s most exclusive clubs without immediate consequence beyond a private falling-out.
As partial Epstein files continue to trickle out amid accusations of withholding and redactions, Trump’s account adds another layer to a decades-old association that refuses to fade. What began as brazen staff poaching in the sunlit luxury of Mar-a-Lago ended a friendship—but could not undo the devastating path it set for a teenage girl and countless others.
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