Video footage of Amy Robach speaking in 2019 about how ABC ended its story about trafficking convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s underage child three years ago has recently resurfaced on social media.
The footage was reportedly taken in August 2019 and released online in November of that year by right-wing activist group Project Veritas.
Robach, 50, expressed frustration that her interview with Epstein’s accuser Virginia Giuffre (née Roberts) never aired.
“I’ve had this story for three years,” Robach said while sitting in a studio in New York City. “I had this interview with Virginia Roberts. We didn’t want to broadcast it. First I was told, ‘Who is Jeffrey Epstein? Nobody knows who that is. That’s a stupid story.’
“Then the palace found out we had all their allegations against Prince Andrew and threatened us in a million ways,” Robach added. She was referring to the British king, whom Roberts accused in a 2015 court filing of Epstein trafficking her when she was 17.
In the clip, which was allegedly leaked by an ABC staffer, Robach said the network feared losing access to interviews with Prince William and Kate Middleton. This contributed to the story being dropped. At the time of the video’s release, Buckingham Palace was not responding to a request for comment on Robach’s claims.
“[Roberts] told me everything,” Robach said in the clip. “She had pictures. She had everything. She was in hiding for 12 years. We convinced them to come out. We convinced them to talk to us. It was amazing what we had. [Bill] Clinton. Everything.”
Robach, who recently left ABC News following her relationship with GMA3: Everything you need to know Co-host TJ Holmes was revealed, then said: “I’ve been trying to get it right for three years [air]. And now everything comes out. I’m so p****d right now. Every day I get more and more p*****. What we had was unreal.”
The footage recently resurfaced and was shared on Juanita Broaddrick’s Twitter account this month. She had claimed she was raped by former President Bill Clinton in 1978 while he was serving as Arkansas Attorney General.
highlighting part of what Robach said in the clip, Broaddrick wrote: “‘I had the story for 3 years. We had Clinton…we had everything.’ Amy Robach on Epstein.”
Epstein owned a private Caribbean island called Little St. James and regularly flew there with guests on his private jet. His plane was derisively dubbed the “Lolita Express” after claims it was used to fly underage girls to some of Epstein’s properties.
In the video, Robach did not specifically claim that Clinton was on the island. However, she spoke of “many powerful men” who flew on Epstein’s jet and visited his home.
While Epstein died in prison by apparent suicide in August 2019, Robach supported a hardline theory about how the disgraced financier’s life ended.
“Do I think he was killed? One hundred percent, yes I do,” Robach said during the hot-mic candid conversation. “He made his living blackmailing people. There were many men on those planes. Many men who have visited this island. Many powerful men who have come into this dwelling.”
In response to the video leak in 2019, ABC News said news week: “At the time, not all of our reports met our standards for broadcasting, but we never stopped investigating the story. Since then we have had a team dedicated to this investigation and significant resources dedicated to it.”
In a separate statement, Robach said at the time of the leak: “As a journalist, as the Epstein story unfolded last summer, I was caught in a private moment of frustration. I was upset that an important interview I did with Virginia Roberts wasn’t aired because we couldn’t get enough evidence to meet ABC’s editorial standards regarding her allegations.
“My comments about Prince Andrew and her claim that she saw Bill Clinton on Epstein’s private island were related to what Virginia Roberts said in that interview in 2015,” Robach continued. “I was referring to their allegations – not what ABC News had confirmed through our coverage.
“The interview itself, while I was disappointed that it didn’t air, didn’t live up to our standards,” added Robach. “In the years since then, no one has ever told me or the team to stop covering Jeffrey Epstein and we have continued to aggressively pursue this important story.”
Speaking to NPR in August 2019, Giuffre said she was never told why the interview she filmed with ABC in 2015 didn’t air. “I saw the ABC interview as a potential game changer,” she told the news outlet.
In 2015, Giuffre, then 31, claimed in an affidavit that she was a “sex slave” to Epstein when she was 17. She was also sold by him and British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell to Prince Andrew, who denies all the allegations.
At the time, Buckingham Palace rejected the allegations. Court documents unsealed after Epstein’s death include a statement. In it, Giuffre claimed she had been sexually abused by “numerous prominent American politicians, powerful businessmen, foreign presidents, a well-known prime minister and other world leaders”.
Epstein’s personal pilot testified against Epstein’s former partner Ghislaine Maxwell during the New York trial. For nearly 30 years, Larry Visoski piloted the Boeing 727, which has reportedly hosted a spate of famous names, including Prince Andrew and numerous United States Senators.
Visoski testified that he never saw evidence of sexual activity on airplanes. He flew Epstein and his high-profile passengers aboard the two jets for around 1,000 trips between 1991 and 2019.
Visoski told the court he remembered Prince Andrew as a passenger on the jet, as well as actors Kevin Spacey and Chris Tucker. He also remembered violinist Itzhak Perlman and named tech mogul Bill Gates and politician and former astronaut John Glenn.
Former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell was also named by Visoski as a passenger on the Lolita Express.
