Bill Clinton to face grilling on significant Epstein ties

CHAPPAQUA, Feb 27 (AFP): Former US president Bill Clinton will be grilled by a Congressional panel on Friday on his well-documented links to Jeffrey Epstein, as Democrats seek to shift focus onto Donald Trump's own ties to the convicted sex offender.
Clinton features prominently throughout the latest Epstein files disclosures, with the former president insisting that he broke ties with him well before the disgraced billionaire's 2008 conviction for sex offenses.
Mere mention in the files released by the US Department of Justice does not imply wrongdoing, and Clinton has not been accused of a crime or formally investigated.
He follows his wife, former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, who testified Thursday, defiantly calling for President Trump-who like Bill Clinton had ties with Epstein-to appear before the panel.
"If this committee is serious about learning the truth about Epstein's trafficking crimes... it would ask (Trump) directly under oath about the tens of thousands of times he shows up in the Epstein files," she said in an opening statement published online.
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton used her forced appearance Thursday before a Republican-led panel probing Jeffrey Epstein to go on the offensive and demand President Donald Trump testify about his own links to the sex offender.
Clinton said after her deposition when asked if she was confident that her husband did not know of Epstein's crimes, Clinton said "I am."
"I don't know how many times I had to say I did not know Jeffrey Epstein," she added.
"I never went to his island, I never went to his homes, I never went to his offices," she said after earlier accusing the panel of trying to "protect one public official"-Trump.
James Comer, a Republican who chairs the committee that will also grill former president Bill Clinton on Friday, said "the purpose of the whole investigation is to try to understand many things about Epstein"-the deceased convicted sex offender.