Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin called out Rep. Jasmine Crockett for alleging he took campaign donations from deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, saying she has the wrong Epstein.
Ms. Crockett, Texas Democrat, said on the House floor Tuesday that her team had looked into Republicans who received donations from Epstein, and named Mr. Zeldin, a former House lawmaker, among others.
Mr. Zeldin hit back, saying, “Yes Crockett, a physician named Dr. Jeffrey Epstein (who is a totally different person than the other Jeffrey Epstein) donated to a prior campaign of mine.”
“No freakin’ relation you genius!!!” he wrote on X in all caps with the hands clapping emoji.
Mr. Zeldin previously was a congressman for a district on Long Island, and ran for governor against New York Gov. Kathy Hochul in 2022.
Ms. Crockett said Tuesday, “Folks who also took money from somebody named Jeffrey Epstein, as I had my team dig in very quickly: Mitt Romney, the NRCC, Lee Zeldin, George Bush, WinRed, McCain-Palin, Rick Lazio.”
She said Democrats would “expose it all.”
“And just know that the FEC filings, they are available for everyone to review. This is absolutely ridiculous,” Ms. Crockett said.
Federal Election Commission filings show that a man named Jeffrey Epstein, a physician from Manhasset, N.Y., donated a total of $1,000 to Mr. Zeldin in April and August 2020.
Another Jeffrey Epstein, the owner of a beverage distribution company from North Brunswick, New Jersey, donated $500 to Mr. Zeldin in February 2020.
Neither donation could have been made by the sex offender Epstein, who died in jail awaiting trial in August 2019.
Similarly, there are Jeffrey Epsteins who have donated to Republicans’ campaigns: a Jeffrey Epstein from Pennsylvania donated to Republican presidential candidate John McCain in 2008, a Jeffrey Epstein from Dix Hills, N.Y. donated to Mr. Romney in 2012 and McCain in 2008, along with another Jeffrey Epstein from Ohio who donated to the Bush-Quayle campaign in 1992.
FEC filings do show that the notorious Epstein donated to former New York Republican Rep. Rick Lazio in 1996.
This all came as tensions were high after the House and Senate voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to force the Justice Department to release all the files it has from investigating Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking crimes. President Trump, who initially opposed the measure, said he will sign it.
The GOP also pushed for the censure of Democratic Del. Stacey Plaskett of the U.S. Virgin Islands for “inappropriate coordination with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein during a congressional hearing” in 2019, but the vote did not pass.
The Washington Times has reached out to Ms. Crockett’s office for comment.
