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source_url: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/10/us/politics/trump-epstein-conspiracy-theories.html
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Trump Shares Unfounded Fringe Theory About Epstein and Clintons
BERKELEY HEIGHTS, N.J. — President Trump used Twitter on Saturday to promote unfounded conspiracy theories about how Jeffrey Epstein, the financier accused of sex trafficking, died in a federal jail, even as the administration faced questions about why Mr. Epstein had not been more closely monitored.
For years Mr. Trump has brashly — and baselessly — promoted suspicion as fact and peddled secret plots by powerful interests as a way to broadcast his own version of reality. Those include the lie that former President Barack Obama was not born in the United States and that millions of votes were illegally cast for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.
[[Epstein conspiracy theories](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/12/nyregion/jeffrey-epstein-conspiracy-theories.html): De Blasio, Scarborough and others join unfounded speculation.]
Hours after Mr. Epstein [was found to have hanged himself](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/10/nyregion/jeffrey-epstein-suicide.html) in his Manhattan jail cell, Mr. Trump retweeted a post from the comedian Terrence Williams linking the Clintons to the death. Mr. Epstein “had information on Bill Clinton & now he’s dead,” wrote Mr. Williams, a Trump supporter. In an accompanying two-minute video, Mr. Williams noted that “for some odd reason, people that have information on the Clintons end up dead.”
There is no evidence to substantiate the claim, which derives from groundless speculation on the far right, dating to Mr. Clinton’s early days as president, that multiple deaths can be traced to the Clintons and explained by their supposed efforts to cover up wrongdoing.
[How Mr. Trump [uses conspiracy theories](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/28/us/politics/trump-conspiracy-theories-spygate.html) to erode trust.]
Responding to Mr. Trump’s retweets, a spokesman for Mr. Clinton [ mockingly wrote](https://twitter.com/angelurena/status/1160340265707679744?s=21), “Ridiculous, and of course not true — and Donald Trump knows it.” The spokesman, Angel Ureña, added, “Has he triggered the 25th Amendment yet?” The 25th Amendment contains a provision allowing for the removal of a president if he is unable to perform his duties, potentially in the event of mental instability.
Posting from his luxury golf club in Bedminster, N.J., Mr. Trump also shared another tweet, from an unverified account, which claimed that recently unsealed documents involving accusations of Mr. Epstein’s abuse had revealed that Mr. Clinton “took private trips to Jeffrey Epstein’s ‘pedophilia island.’”
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