{"id":1116,"date":"2026-05-13T23:41:28","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T23:41:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cnnglobalnews.com\/?p=1116"},"modified":"2026-05-13T23:41:28","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T23:41:28","slug":"howard-lutnick-said-he-had-three-inconsequential-meetings-with-epstein","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/?p=1116","title":{"rendered":"Howard Lutnick said he had three \u2018inconsequential\u2019 meetings with Epstein"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In House committee transcript, commerce secretary denied any further contact with disgraced financier<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/news\/2026\/feb\/17\/sign-up-for-the-breaking-news-us-email-to-get-newsletter-alerts-direct-to-your-inbox?utm_medium=ACQUISITIONS_STANDFIRST&amp;utm_campaign=BN22326&amp;utm_content=signup&amp;utm_term=standfirst&amp;utm_source=GUARDIAN_WEB\">Sign up for the Breaking News US newsletter email<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The US commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, told lawmakers in a closed-door interview earlier this month that he met <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/jeffrey-epstein\">Jeffrey Epstein<\/a> only three times and had no \u201cpersonal or professional relationship\u201d with the disgraced financier, according to a newly released transcript of the meeting.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI unequivocally condemn the conduct attributed to Jeffrey Epstein and everyone who participated in his illegal activities,\u201d Lutnick said in his opening statement before the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/house-of-representatives\">House<\/a> oversight and reform committee.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2026\/may\/13\/howard-lutnick-jeffrey-epstein-interview-transcript\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In House committee transcript, commerce secretary denied any further contact with disgraced financier Sign up for the Breaking News US newsletter email The US commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, told lawmakers &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/?p=1116\" class=\"more-link\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1117,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-news","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1116\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnnglobalnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}