Members of Congress are elevating questions after {a photograph} they are saying reveals Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick alongside Jeffrey Epstein on the late intercourse offender’s non-public island was briefly faraway from the Justice Department’s web site.
The picture had been hosted within the division’s on-line repository of Epstein-related information uploaded in late January underneath the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
At one level, the unique web page containing the {photograph} on Justice.gov returned an error message, although a model captured by the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine on January 31, 2026, remained accessible online and included the {photograph}.
The web page has since been restored and a Justice Department spokesperson advised NCS, “This image was part of a batch of files that were flagged for nudity. The batch of thousands of images was pulled for review and is being uploaded with necessary redactions on a rolling basis. No files are being deleted.”
Lutnick has not commented on the picture. The Commerce Department and Lutnick didn’t return repeated requests for remark from NCS. The White House didn’t reply to a NCS request for touch upon Friday.
But a number of members of Congress — together with no less than one Republican on the House Oversight Committee — are urgent for solutions in regards to the momentary elimination of the picture.
On X on Thursday, Rep. Nancy Mace, a Republican member of the House Oversight Committee, wrote of the photo, “Howard Lutnick should take questions from the Oversight committee.”
On Friday, President Donald Trump advised reporters as we speak that Lutnick would testify to Congress about his relationship with Epstein.
“Howard would go in and say whatever he has to say,” Trump advised NCS’s Kristen Holmes. “He’s a very innocent guy, he’s doing a good job.”
Earlier this month, Lutnick testified earlier than a Senate Appropriations subcommittee, throughout which he was pressed about his interactions with Epstein. Communications revealed within the newest launch by the Justice Department undercut Lutnick’s earlier claims of reducing off ties with Epstein in 2005, earlier than Epstein was underneath investigation for and later convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor.
During his testimony, Lutnick stated he had in truth visited Epstein’s non-public island for lunch together with his household whereas on trip in 2012.
Numerous different members of Congress have additionally raised questions in regards to the recently-surfaced photo.
Democratic Rep. Ted Lieu said the preliminary elimination of the photo implied the Justice Department is concerned within the “stupidest cover up in history.” Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, who co-authored the Epstein Files Transparency Act, stated the Justice Department should explain the decision-making behind the elimination.
“I’m sure there’s a good reason for this. DOJ needs to tell Congress who pulled this file down so we can ask them,” Massie stated.
A day earlier — following the House Oversight Committee’s deposition of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton — the panel’s chairman, Rep. James Comer, stated it’s “very possible” that he may usher in Lutnick for questioning. It was not instantly clear whether or not Comer had seen the {photograph} on the time he made these remarks.
Rep. James Walkinshaw, a Democrat on the committee, additionally stated Thursday Lutnick has been “lying to the country” about his relationship with Epstein and stated the Commerce secretary ought to reply additional questions on his previous contact with Epstein.
On Friday morning, Rep. Robert Garcia, the rating Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, accused Lutnick of “blatantly lying to the American people,” and stated there was bipartisan help to convey Lutnick in for questioning.
“Quite frankly, he should resign or should be removed from office,” Garcia stated throughout an look on “NCS Newsroom.”
During his earlier testimony earlier than the Senate committee, Lutnick was requested about messages suggesting he’d visited Epstein’s non-public Caribbean island, Little Saint James.
“I did have lunch with him, as I was on a boat going across on a family vacation. My wife was with me, as were my four children and nannies,” Lutnick advised a congressional committee. “We had lunch on the island, that is true, for an hour, and we left with all of my children with my nannies and my wife… I don’t recall why we did it.”
But Lutnick denied that he and Epstein, who met once they lived in neighboring homes in New York, had deeper ties.
“Of these millions and millions of documents, there may be 10 emails connecting me with him… over a 14-year period,” Lutnick advised senators. “I did not have any relationship with him. I barely had anything to do with that person.”
In an interview last year with the New York Post’s “Pod Force One”, Lutnick stated that after a 2005 encounter at Epstein’s dwelling, he grew uncomfortable and vowed that he would “never be in the room with that disgusting person ever again.”
Lutnick stated he noticed a therapeutic massage desk within the center of the house and that Epstein advised him he received a therapeutic massage “every day.”
“And then he like gets, like, weirdly, close to me and he says, ‘And the right kind of massage,’” Lutnick stated.
Lutnick stated that after that interplay, “I was never in the room with him socially for business or even philanthropy. If that guy was there, I wasn’t going, because he’s gross.”
A previous NCS evaluate of the Epstein paperwork present quite a few interactions between the 2 males, together with an invite from Lutnick to attend a Hillary Clinton fundraiser in 2015, a $50,000 donation from Epstein for a 2017 dinner honoring Lutnick, a 2013 enterprise enterprise each invested in, and a number of emails during which Lutnick arrange a 2012 go to to Epstein’s notorious Caribbean island together with his spouse, nannies and youngsters.