U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick testifies throughout a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Associated Companies listening to on February 10, 2026 in Washington, DC. Lutnick is dealing with bipartisan requires his resignation after revelations that got here to mild within the newest launch of Epstein information.
Chip Somodevilla | Getty Photos Information | Getty Photos
Home Democrats on Thursday demanded Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s resignation, alleging he publicly lied about his relationship with infamous intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein and refused to “come clear” throughout a subsequent closed-door interview.
“The info are clear: you lied to the American individuals and tried to hide your relationship with Jeffrey Epstein in your public statements,” the Home Committee on Oversight and Authorities Reform’s Democratic minority mentioned in a letter to Lutnick.
“Your lack of candor demonstrates that you’re unfit to carry out the duties required of you as secretary of Commerce, and you could step down instantly,” learn the letter signed by all 21 of the panel’s Democratic members.
Lutnick claimed in an interview final yr that, following a go to to Epstein’s Manhattan mansion shortly after he moved subsequent door to him in 2005, he had “determined that I’ll by no means be within the room with that disgusting individual ever once more.”
“So I used to be by no means within the room with him, socially, for enterprise and even philanthropy,” Lutnick mentioned in that interview. “If that man was there, I wasn’t going, as a result of he is gross.”
However after the Division of Justice’s launch of Epstein-related information confirmed continued ties between the 2 males years later, Lutnick admitted in a Senate listening to that he and his household had lunch on the disgraced financier’s non-public island in 2012.
Epstein pleaded responsible in 2008 to a state-level cost of soliciting a minor for prostitution, which required him to register as a intercourse offender. He died in a New York Metropolis jail in 2019 whereas dealing with federal sex-trafficking prices. His loss of life was dominated a suicide.
Democrats wrote in Thursday’s letter that Lutnick’s declare within the 2025 interview was “demonstrably false.”
“Throughout your transcribed interview, you had been introduced with clear proof that you just corresponded and bodily met with Epstein on a number of events previous to his arrest in 2019,” together with the non-public island lunch, they wrote.
“Given the chance to come back clear” in the course of the interview, “you as an alternative supplied implausible distinctions and semantic video games,” the lawmakers wrote.
A Commerce Division spokesperson, in a press release to CNBC, known as the letter “one other failing try by congressional Democrats to distract from Secretary Lutnick’s historic work on the Commerce Division.”
“In a voluntary look earlier than the Oversight Committee, Secretary Lutnick reply almost 400 questions from members and employees, ending solely when members mentioned that they had nothing extra to ask,” the spokesperson mentioned.
“He defined repeatedly that three encounters didn’t represent a relationship, and the committee adjourned with out figuring out any proof on the contrary. Requires his resignation are baseless and politically motivated.”
The White Home mentioned in February that President Donald Trump, who has additionally confronted scrutiny over his previous friendship with Epstein, continues to face behind Lutnick.
Lutnick testified earlier than the Home Oversight Committee behind closed doorways on Might 6. He advised the committee that he was taking part voluntarily, although he had agreed to seem after Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., mentioned she would situation a bipartisan subpoena to compel his testimony.
A transcription of the interview exhibits Lutnick saying he may recall assembly with Epstein thrice, together with the 2005 and 2012 interactions.
In 2011, Lutnick mentioned, Epstein’s employees reached out “suggesting he had a cause to get in contact with me.” It was organized that Lutnick, whereas strolling together with his spouse and canines on a Sunday afternoon, would ring Epstein’s doorbell “to listen to what he needed to say,” the secretary mentioned.
“My greatest recollection is: I rang the bell, sat in his lobby with my canine, waited for him to come back down, heard what he needed to say, and left. So far as I recall, it was about scaffolding. It was meaningless and inconsequential,” he advised the committee.
Below questioning, Lutnick denied that he had been deceptive about his relationship with Epstein, insisting that his use of the phrase “I” versus “we” was an important distinction.
“I used to be correct. I feel I described it precisely. I do not need it to be modified in any means. It was I’d not be within the room with him socially, which I used to be not; for enterprise, which I used to be not; or philanthropic, which I used to be not. So I imagine that what I mentioned was correct. I imagine what I mentioned was correct once I mentioned it, and I imagine it now. So I did not say ‘we’ would by no means. I mentioned ‘I’ would by no means,” he mentioned.
A questioner replied, “All of us perceive that you just had been within the room with him in a social setting, however you might have insisted that this sentence is correct. So I simply — that doesn’t make sense on its face.”
Lutnick later mentioned, “I used to be by no means with him, which means, I used to be by no means in a scenario with him. I used to be with my spouse. And so they had been meaningless and inconsequential. However contextually, so individuals would perceive, I used to be by no means with him in some other method. I, Howard Lutnick, one individual, was by no means in a scenario. So that you could not take it out of context. I used to be by no means with him.”
The Democrats wrote Thursday, “No affordable individual would settle for this account.”
“A cupboard secretary’s most elementary obligation to Congress is candor; your statements have a bearing on the lives of all Individuals. You used a congressional interview to not appropriate the document, however to perpetuate a false public narrative,” they wrote.
“You contradicted prior statements and stonewalled on fundamental questions. A secretary who will parse the which means of plain English to keep away from acknowledging his personal phrases, declare no recollection of a documented go to to a convicted intercourse offender’s non-public island, and refuse to reply fundamental questions on his conversations with the President can’t be trusted to function a frontrunner within the federal authorities.”
“We subsequently name on you to resign instantly as secretary of Commerce,” they wrote.
