A top Senate Republican demanded that if former Prince Andrew is found to have broken American laws with respect to his ties to Jeffrey Epstein, he should stand trial in the U.S.
“If he’s violated American law, absolutely,” Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., told Fox News Digital.
Scott’s comments came after the news that the former prince, now Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, who is linked to the late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, was arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office in the United Kingdom Thursday.
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British authorities were reportedly investigating whether Mountbatten-Windsor had shared confidential trade information with Epstein while acting as Britain’s special envoy for trade over a decade ago, The Associated Press reported.
Mountbatten-Windsor has denied any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein despite being one of his most well-known associates. He was also accused by the late Virginia Giuffre — one of Epstein’s most prominent accusers — in her memoir of having sex with her when she was a minor.
The list of co-conspirators and those connected to Epstein continues to grow after Congress’ move to force the Department of Justice (DOJ) to release millions of documents related to him known as the “Epstein Files.”
But criminal action against those alleged to have ties with Epstein has remained scarce, given that appearing in the files doesn’t directly translate to criminal charges. Scott argued that if people “violate the law, you should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.”
“It’s as simple as that. It’s despicable what Epstein did,” Scott said. “I can’t imagine these people who had relationships with Epstein, especially after he was convicted the first time, and they kept their relationship.
“If they’ve done anything wrong, they should be held accountable,” he continued. “I don’t know if Prince Andrew has done anything wrong, but everybody who has should be held accountable. What you read that happened to these young girls is just like — I’ve got two daughters, I’ve got a granddaughter, and I can’t imagine, you know, the position that Epstein and, it seems like, some other people put these young women in.”
The Senate voted unanimously last year in favor of legislation that President Donald Trump signed into law that required the DOJ to release all unclassified records, documents, communications and investigative materials “publicly available in a searchable and downloadable format” related to the late financier and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.
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Several names of prominent Americans, including Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, were revealed in the trove of unredacted documents.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., when asked if Lutnick or others should face consequences, said earlier this month that “transparency is something we all ought to aspire to here.”
“And if there are folks who are, you know, named in there or discussed in there in some way, they’re going to have to answer for that,” Thune said.
Millions of files and a handful of months later, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced earlier this week that the DOJ had unloaded all the documents. But lawmakers have said it’s not enough.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., charged that the DOJ’s handling of the Epstein files “is a travesty.”
“But in France, the Paris prosecutor’s office just opened two investigations based on new leads from the released files,” Schumer said on X. “And in Britain, former Prince Andrew has been arrested over ties to Epstein. When will there be justice in America?”
