Donald Trump “directly” ordered his administration to “cover up” millions of documents stemming from investigations into Jeffrey Epstein, according to the president’s now-former ally Tucker Carlson.

The right-wing media commentator told Vanity Fair that he urged the president in the summer of 2025 to release all the documents connected to the wealthy and well-connected sex offender, who died in prison in 2019, but Trump was not convinced.

“My position from the beginning with Trump, I said it to Trump, was, ‘I don’t understand why you would ever keep any of this stuff secret.’ And I got like a bunch of different answers,” Carlson, a former Fox News star, told Vanity Fair’s Chris Whipple.

“I don’t feel any need to cover for Epstein. So I said, ‘You shouldn’t either.’ In the end, it came from Trump directly,” he added.

Pressed by Whipple on what exactly came “directly” from the president, Carlson replied: “The order to cover it up came from Trump.”

“I asked him why. And he gave me this long, very emotional explanation that this was all a plot against him, like Russiagate,” he said.

After a protracted political battle with members of Congress who drew up legislation to compel the Department of Justice to publish the files, Trump reluctantly agreed to sign the measure into law late last year, kicking off an ongoing legal and political battle for a fuller picture of Epstein’s influence and alleged connections to a wider group of powerful figures who abused women and girls.

The president’s name appears thousands of times within the millions of documents released by the Justice Department under the Epstein Files Transparency Act. Trump socialized with Epstein throughout the 1990s and 2000s, and Epstein who once described himself as the president’s “closest friend.”

Trump has not been accused of any criminal wrongdoing in connection with Epstein, and one’s appearance in the Epstein files does not suggest otherwise. The president has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing in connection with Epstein and insists he cut ties with the pedophile years before he was under investigation.

In response to questions about the president’s recollection of his conversation with Carlson about the Epstein files and whether Carlson was accurate, the White House directed The Independent to Trump’s lengthy Truth Social post from April that called him, among others, “stupid,” “NUT JOBS,” “TROUBLEMAKERS,” “Hand Flailing Fools” and “LOSERS.”

Trump said Carlson “couldn’t even finish College” and was “a broken man when he got fired from Fox, and he’s never been the same — Perhaps he should see a good psychiatrist!”

“Just as President Trump has said, he’s been totally exonerated on anything relating to Epstein,” White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis told The Independent.

“And by releasing thousands of pages of documents, cooperating with the House Oversight Committee’s subpoena request, signing the Epstein Files Transparency Act, and calling for more investigations into Epstein’s Democrat friends, President Trump has done more for Epstein’s victims than anyone before him,” she added.

In his profile of Vice President JD Vance, Whipple probes whether the second most powerful person in government is a craven political opportunist or a MAGA true believer eyeing the presidency.

Vance and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles appeared to agree that the Epstein files will remain a political liability in 2028 as the vice president looks to expand the “Trump coalition” by bringing in Republican voters who believe the administration failed them.

“The people inordinately interested in Epstein,” Wiles told Vanity Fair, “are the new members of the Trump coalition. It’s the Joe Rogan listeners. It’s the people that are sort of new to our world. It’s not the MAGA base.”

While the Trump administration has been eager to close the book on the Epstein case, bipartisan pressure to investigate people in his orbit — including the president — has only accelerated, with members of Congress issuing subpoenas for interviews with high-profile figures, former employees and administration officials.

The House Oversight Committee has also performed a series of interviews with survivors, whose testimony has led to criminal referrals to at least two people connected to Epstein.

Carlson, meanwhile, has publicly tried to distance himself from the president in the wake of the Iran war, which the former Fox News personality called a betrayal of the “America First” movement that Carlson championed.

He campaigned alongside Trump and urged him to select Vance as his running mate during the 2024 campaign, but he is now not “interested” in talking to the president at all and has suggested developing a viable third party to compete against Democrats and the GOP.