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Lutnick plans to testify about Epstein ties to House panel

Erik Wasson, Bloomberg News on

Published in News & Features

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has agreed to an interview with the House Oversight Committee over his ties to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, the panel’s chairman said.

“I commend his demonstrated commitment to transparency and appreciate his willingness to engage with the Committee. I look forward to his testimony,” Representative James Comer, a Kentucky Republican, said in a statement on Tuesday.

“I look forward to appearing before the committee,” Lutnick said in a statement. “I have done nothing wrong and I want to set the record straight.”

Axios reported earlier on Lutnick’s plans to testify.

Lutnick has come under fire in recent weeks after documents released by the Justice Department revealed that the former chief executive officer of Cantor Fitzgerald LP visited Epstein’s island in 2012, years after Epstein’s conviction for the procurement of minors for prostitution.

The documents also included a photo of Epstein, Lutnick and three other men standing near an oceanside cliff, and what appear to be business agreements between the two men, who lived next door to each other in Manhattan. Another email to Epstein contained a resume for Lutnick’s nanny, though the Commerce secretary has denied providing that document himself.

The materials have not indicated any wrongdoing on Lutnick’s part, but did show that he previously incorrectly characterized the extent of his relationship with Epstein.

In a New York Post podcast interview last year, the Commerce secretary said he had severed ties with Epstein in 2005 after the financier made a comment about massages during a tour of his home.

 

Lutnick, during congressional testimony earlier this year, insisted that there was nothing inappropriate about his visit to Epstein’s island.

“We had lunch on the island, that is true, for an hour, and we left with all of my children, with my nannies, and my wife, all together. We were on family vacation, we were not apart,” Lutnick said. “To suggest there was anything untoward about that in 2012, I don’t recall why we did it, but we did.”

President Donald Trump has also faced criticism over his ties to Epstein but has denied any wrongdoing. Trump previously suggested his Commerce secretary could testify before the panel.

“Howard would go in and do whatever he has to say,” Trump told reporters on Friday. “He’s an innocent guy, doing a good job.”

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(With assistance from Catherine Lucey.)


©2026 Bloomberg L.P. Visit bloomberg.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

 

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