Why Trump flew to campaign events on Jeffrey Epstein's plane last weekend

MIAMI — Former President Donald Trump’s campaign flew in a blue Gulfstream jet formerly owned by sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, using it to travel to several campaign fundraisers over the weekend, the Miami Herald has confirmed.

Trump, enroute on his own private plane to a campaign event in Bozeman, Montana last week, unexpectedly landed in Billings because of mechanical problems, a campaign spokeswoman said. He and part of his staff then flew on a small charter to Bozeman for a rally Friday night. The next day, he switched to another larger Gulfstream with a serial number that matches a plane once owned by Epstein, his former neighbor in Palm Beach, Florida, the campaign confirmed.

“The campaign had no awareness that the charter plane had been owned by Mr. Epstein,” the spokeswoman said, adding that the charter was commissioned by a vendor that has often been used by the campaign. “We heard about the former owner through the media.”

Epstein was arrested on sex trafficking charges in 2019 — accused of sexually abusing more than 100 girls and young women over decades. Epstein was subsequently found dead in his Manhattan jail cell a month later. His death, which was ruled a suicide by the Manhattan medical examiner, has long been a source of conspiracy theories.

Trump’s use of the plane is likely to add to public scrutiny surrounding his relationship with Epstein, even though no evidence has surfaced that Trump was involved in Epstein’s crimes.

According to flight data, the plane is now owned by an Ontario, California company, Threshold Aviation Group, which offers private charter service. The company’s website indicates its planes are housed in a hangar in Chino, California. The Herald reached out to the company, but did not get a response.

The campaign spokeswoman confirmed that a decal with the words “Trump 2024” was placed on Epstein’s old plane for the trip. Trump’s own private plane, a 727 named “Trump Force One,” was having mechanical difficulties, which led them to land in Billings, about two hours east of Bozeman. After Bozeman, Trump used Epstein’s old plane to travel Saturday to a fundraiser in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and then to Aspen and Denver. “Trump Force One” was then able to pick Trump up in Denver. Epstein’s old plane was only used one day, the spokeswoman said.

The Aspen Daily News reported that Trump arrived in a blue Gulfstream, tail number G-550, touching down at the Aspen-Pitkin County Airport around 4:45 p.m. Saturday. He was to attend a fundraiser hosted by the Trump 47 Committee, which supports Save America and the RNC, the paper reported.

That charter tail number, G-550, belongs to a plane with the same serial number as Epstein’s former Gulfstream jet. Flight Aware shows the plane had been registered in 2018 to one of Epstein’s companies based in the U.S. Virgin Islands. At that time, its tail number was JE212. It is not the plane nicknamed the “Lolita Express” which Epstein replaced around 2017. The Lolita plane has since been destroyed.

Trump was in the same social circles as Epstein, and flew on Epstein’s planes six times from 1993 to 1997, records show. But the two had a falling out over a property in Palm Beach that they had a bidding war over in 2004. There are numerous photographs of Trump and Epstein together in the 1990s, long before Epstein was arrested on solicitation charges in Palm Beach.

Although tens of thousands of pages of documents have been unsealed in various Epstein civil cases, none of the documents released to date have implicated Trump in Epstein’s trafficking crimes.