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Attorney General Pam Bondi said convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell "will hopefully die in prison" when members of Congress alleged that President Donald Trump's administration gave Maxwell special treatment.
Bondi, who clashed with Democratic House Judiciary Committee members when asked questions about late convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who Maxwell, 64, served as the longtime madam to, said but couldn't name who ordered the controversial decision to have Maxwell transferred to a lower security prison. Rep. Deborah Ross (D-N.C.) referenced the transfer during a heated exchange between Bondi and members of Congress, seeking answers for who approved the move.
"I learned after the fact," Bondi said of the transfer.
"That is a question for the Bureau of Prisons. I was not involved at that at all," she added.
"You know instead of talking about Ghislaine Maxwell, who will hopefully die in prison, hopefully will die in prison, you should be talking about Iryna Zarutska," Bondi said, referencing the Ukrainian woman who was brutally murdered on a North Carolina train to the North Carolina congresswoman.
Maxwell is reportedly "prepared to speak full and honestly" if Trump grants her clemency, her attorney, David Oscar Markus, said in a statement obtained by NBC News after she exercised her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination while appearing virtually before the House Oversight Committee for questioning regarding her ties to the late convicted pedophile on Monday (February 9).
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) confirmed that Maxwell was scheduled to appear before the committee last month, while her attorney, David Oscar Markus, warned that she would plead the Fifth as she faces an ongoing appeal of her conviction in Manhattan federal court.
“Of course, in the alternative, if Ms. Maxwell were to receive clemency, she would be willing—and eager—to testify openly and honestly, in public, before Congress in Washington, D.C.," Markus said via the New York Post.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) submitted seven questions he intended to ask Maxwell prior to Monday's scheduled virtual appearance including whether her attorneys' claim made in a December filing that 29 associates of Epstein entered secret non-prosecution agreements was "accurate" and if she could reveal the names of those individuals. Khanna also said he planned to ask whether she or Epstein had ever arranged, facilitated, or provided access to underage girls to Trump, who was among the notable names mentioned in the Epstein files and reported to have had a close relationship with the late convicted pedophile, which he's publicly claimed was fractured long before Epstein's arrest.
Maxwell reportedly told the Trump-appointed Justice Department that the president was "never inappropriate with anybody" during his friendship with Epstein, according to audio and transcripts obtained by the New York Post on August 22. The convicted sex offender was moved from Federal Correctional Institution Tallahassee to Federal Prison Camp Bryan in August amid conversations with the Department of Justice about Epstein and her appeal to her criminal conviction was rejected by the Supreme Court in October.