Ghislaine Maxwell: angling for a Trump pardon

Convicted sex trafficker's testimony could shed new light on president's links to Jeffrey Epstein

The Trumps with Epstein and Maxwell in 2000
Ghislaine Maxwell (right) and Jeffrey Epstein pose next to Donald and Melania (then Knauss) Trump in 2000
(Image credit: Davidoff Studios Photography / Getty Images)

No one was closer to Jeffrey Epstein than British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, who is now serving a 20-year prison sentence in the US for recruiting, grooming and trafficking girls as young as 14 to be sexually abused.

Maxwell's lawyers are appealing her conviction, and have also requested a pardon from Donald Trump in exchange for testifying "openly and honestly" about Epstein's circle before Congress. "I'm allowed to give her a pardon," the US president has said. "But it's something I have not thought about." Five years after saying, "I wish her well" when she was arrested, "Trump is still playing dumb about Maxwell," said Chris Brennan in USA Today.

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