Testing the Epstein blackmail hypothesis reveals Melania may have been Epstein's 'escort' who was 'given' to Trump after two years with Epstein. Was this before or after Virginia Guiffre was 'stolen' by Epstein from Mar-a-lago? Regardless, Epstein was able to blackmail the Trumps 2005-2019 is clear.

05/19/2026

This morning we came across some reporting that alleged that Melania Trump had been an Epstein "escort" for about two years before she was "given" to Trump. Before we could return to the article, which was linked to Microsoft news affiliates, the article was 'disappeared' and so we did the best we could do to reconstruct what we read, using other sources, and then later found the article again, and collectively all of the same revealed the following.

The image above is a page out of one of Jeffrey Epstein's two known client and victim contact books, known as his Black Books, which we provide a link to in our menu above, and which allows anyone to surf his contact book, page by page.

This page above is from the era of his first prosecution and conviction circa 2005-2008. This means that as soon as he was arrested and being prosecuted for prostitution (of a minor) -- by association with a child sex trafficker in a single "client, victim, and vendor Black Book of his child sex trafficking operations, criminal activities, and 'intrigued' associates", Epstein was able to blackmail, coerce, influence, leverage, extort, manipulate victims, and/or more, into doing small favors for him (which is how sex traffickers operate to build trust with victims), then larger favors, and while building trust setting up the trap to force them to hand over their billions to Epstein, for him to control how the same was spent, while also instructing his proxies to give world leaders like Putin, directives via Jagland, Barak, Paul Manafort, and/or others, but we also found plenty of Russian vias for Epstein dating back to 2002, with him referencing Edge Foundation on his visa applications, now linked to child sex trafficking, as is Putin via the International Criminal Court warrant for Putin, and which we were able to link to Epstein, Kushner, Manafort, GOP, Trump Campaign, Russian sanctions attorney, Trump Tower, Trump Organization, Mayflower Hotel April 27, 2016, and/or more, supra, and infra.

We have reported Epstein insider, Howard Ludnick, specified that Epstein's "blackmail' 'M.O.' (translates into mode of operations) was via "massages", and where we have found evidence in the DOJ files of all sorts of recording and/or other more troubling devices found in Epstein's residence(s), and we have also found references in the DOJ files to a database on the 4th floor of one of Epstein's residences, housing the blackmail or child porn and/or sex trafficking materials he generated.

So when insiders let us know this sort of information, that he was blackmailing others (Lutnick specified in the plural) and specified via massages turned naughty, turned criminal, and all recorded in order to blackmail, per his inside circle making podcasts supporting the same is true -- this further becomes our reasonable inference for Epstein blackmailing others, based on all that we know and have been exposed to, regardless if Lutnick made false statements to Congress thereafter, which he did, as we have published.

The UK/EU Mountbatten 'royals' et al. are the largest named family in Epstein's most recent Black Book (link in our menu at the top of the page), and as we have published, Epstein used Andrew to 'leverage' or blackmail (a legal term corresponding to the loose use of the word 'leverage' here) the other 'royals' in the merged child sex trafficking ring and cult of Jeffrey Epstein and Keith Rainier, whose "associates" lists share the Yugoslavian 'royals', Richard Branson, the Mack family, the Bronfman family, and/or others.

The Trump family was the second largest named family in this most recent Black Book of clients, victims, and vendors -- oh and very softly, "associates".

We recently published that Trump knew of Epstein's "finances" regarding sex with minors, and this further supports that Trump himself was blackmailed, and/or helping manage the child sex trafficking operations of Epstein via financing (and where the record shows both Epstein and Trump with Russian financing as a common denominator).

The Kennedy family, put in charge of US human trafficking and/or health and human services, was the third largest family named in the most recent Black Book, and also includes the influence Shriver, Republican Schwarzeneggar, Hollywood Pratt, and Democratic and CNN Cuomo families. RFK was literally named in the Black Book along with Trump and misspelled Melania, and 1,968 others named in the most recent conviction-era Black Book. We also provide the earlier Black Book found in Vermont in the link at the top of the page in our menu.

Regarding Melania being trafficked to, taken by, and/or the escort of Jeffrey Epstein, prior to being "given" to Trump, we found the following.

"In December 2025, social media posts on sites including X and Facebook shared images claiming that Melania Trump, the U.S. first lady, worked as an escort before she met her now-husband, President Donald Trump.

According to the posts, Melania Trump began escorting under a man named Paolo Zampolli, who was good friends with the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell. Epstein was arrested on charges of child sex trafficking in 2019 and was later found dead by suicide in his jail cell. Maxwell was convicted of child sex trafficking in 2021.

https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=122243189684255019&set=pcb.122243189810255019

Snopes readers searched the site looking for more information about these allegations, which we determined are unsupported by credible evidence. We reached out to the White House for more information but have not heard back.

The claim that Melania Trump worked as an escort before meeting Donald Trump has been spreading online since at least August 2016, when the U.K.-based tabloid Daily Mail published an article making that allegation. In August 2025, Hunter Biden, the son of former President Joe Biden, claimed that Epstein introduced the two in an interview on Channel 5, a YouTube channel run by journalist Andrew Callaghan.

However, according to the BBC and NPR, Melania Trump sued the Daily Mail and a blogger in the U.S. who also shared the claim for defamation, seeking $150 million in damages. Her lawyer, Charles Harder, told the BBC the claim was "outright lying." She also threatened to sue Hunter Biden for $1 billion, according to the BBC. 

The lawsuits could be viewed as SLAPP suits, a term that "refers to lawsuits brought by individuals and entities to dissuade their critics from continuing to produce negative publicity," according to Cornell University's Legal Information Institute ... According to reporting from Today and The Times of London, the Trumps did indeed meet at a party hosted by Zampolli, a former modeling agent who represented Melania Trump in the 1990s. A 2016 profile of Melania Trump in Harper's Bazaar and a profile of Zampolli published by the digital magazine Air Mail also claimed that he introduced the couple. 

The claim that Zampolli was Melania Trump's "escort agent" might feel somewhat intuitive, given their established connection — it is not unheard of for sex workers to moonlight as models."

Images shared alongside the claim sometimes contained an incomplete link to an article from Politico. That article may be a 2019 story detailing Maxwell's network of connections that mentioned Zampolli. According to the article, he was reportedly involved in the Sustainable Oceans Alliance, an initiative created by a Maxwell-run charity named TerraMar. It is unclear how often the two interacted. 

Finally, the photo of Melania Trump with her roommate Matthew Atanian often attached to post spreading the rumor was legitimate. It appeared in a Times of London article published in 2016. Some posts claimed the photo showed Trump with Zampolli, and in one copypasta (text repeatedly copied and shared verbatim online), Atanian's name was misspelled as "Matthew Arabian."

Bryant, Kenzie. "Say What You Will About Melania Trump, but She Seems Like a Great Roommate." Vanity Fair, 18 Jun. 2020, https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2020/06/melania-trump-biography-revelations.

Daily. "Melania Trump - An Apology." Mail Online, 12 Apr. 2017, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/~/article-4404142/index.html.

"Donald and Melania Trump: A Timeline of Their Relationship." TODAY.Com, 20 Jan. 2025, https://www.today.com/popculture/donald-trump-melania-trump-relationship-timeline-rcna172256."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/breaking-down-rumor-melania-escort-140000736.html

Though the Trumps have denied the same is true -- in the context Trump literally has the world record for Great Deceiver -- this may be another investigative avenue for more than one reason, if true, (1) the ability of Epstein to blackmail Milania to "handle" Trump; (2) the ability of Epstein to blackmail Trump to "handle" Trump; (3) Sustainable Oceans Alliance, an initiative created by a Maxwell-run charity named TerraMar may have joined the ongoing conspiracy to interfere with the economic activity of the Editor of Uprights News, by Edge Foundation members, as illustrated in diagrams in our 'The Big Pictures' link in our menu at the top of the page;  and/or (4) the ability of Epstein to blackmail or influence Zampolli -- who just like most Epstein-Russia insiders -- was later found dead.

Accordingly, if any of these allegations are true -- and they are believable given the Trump-Epstein backstory -- then this further opened the Trumps up to blackmail, control, manipulation, extortion, influence, leveraging, and/or the like by Epstein, beyond what Epstein had on Trump via Katie Johnson as detailed by her in her lawsuit against Trump, which she dropped per her attorney, after receiving threats, but her allegations of child gang rape with Maria Doe (possibly Maria Farmer) at ages of 12 and 13 by Trump and Epstein are something else. She alleged Trump raped her without a condom after she begged him not to, he beat her up, and if she or Maria talked, they and/or their families would be killed or harmed, then as Trump finished, leaving her crying on the floor raped by Trump are her allegations, he threw money at her and told her to "get a fucking abortion", to the 12 and/or 13 year old Trump and/or Epstein rape victims.

https://cdn.factcheck.org/UploadedFiles/Johnson_TrumpEpstein_Calif_Lawsuit.pdf

Furthermore, our Editor believes he may have contacted this TerraMar and Sustainable Oceans Alliance group seeking a development partnership, as he did with the Gates Foundation, Bezos' ex-wife, and/or other financing channels linked to Epstein, including SBIR I funds Trump 1.0, and so if indeed he did reach out to Maxwell's charity, Gates Foundation, Bezos' ex-wife, and/or others linked to Epstein, who then refused to work or collaborate with our Editor (because he was among the first investigators of the government to link Trump to Russia and then Russia and Trump to Epstein, communicated to the DOJ and State Department for rewards -- who RICO obstructed the same with Aileen Cannon, Merrick Garland, Jack Smith, Todd Blanche, Jason Quinones, Jeanne Pirro, Tulsi Gabbard, Peter Thiel, Palantir, Valar, Carbyne, Barak, Trump, GOP, Dems, and/or others -- retaliating by stalking, cyberstalking, cyberterrorism, economic interference, and intentional infliction of severe emotional distress, to intimidate to obstruct a protected whistleblower, just like all of the other Edge Foundation 'participants' had in overt furtherance with them).

So is it possible that someone like Epstein would be in a position to sex traffic someone like Melania to someone like Trump? Yes, is the reasonable response here based on the evidence.

Does this mean Melania was an escort, sex trafficked to Epstein and/or Trump? No, but with reporting and facts like these (and other facts like Melania did some clad or porn photography, and Brunel, Trump, Wexner, and/or Epstein were all in close proximity to, hovering around, and/or cycling through young models), coupled to all the other known sex trafficking facts, it isn't impossible to perceive the same is possible that Melania was an escort for Epstein (she also shows up in Epstein's black book of clients and victims, under Trump Organization (see the link in our menu at the top of the page to access the database), even likely, but more evidence may be required here, although that one Microsoft affiliated article this morning made some truly stronger claims than we found above, presenting photo and video evidence of notes between Melania and Epstein with notes signed "I love you".

Then you take all of this in context of Trump accusing Epstein of "stealing" Virginia Guiffre from Mar-a-lago, who was then sex trafficked to 'prince' Andrew Mountbatten and all sorts of other men, who Epstein could then blackmail into doing anything, and it seems they did, per the Mountbatten's SCL's Cambridge Analytica conspiring to treason and elections fraud in the US and UK (Brexit) to engineer Epstein into more power with less accountability, but the situation spiraled out of control for Epstein, and he was murdered per the 2nd autopsy not linked to compromised Trump nor compromised Bill Barr (who was documented as present during sex trafficking abuses involving Leon Black within the DOJ's own files, and then they let that guy take over Trump, Epstein, and Russia investigations, resulting in no prosecutions of Trump, Epstein, and prominent Russians, nor their companies, but instead dropped Rosneft sanctions to give aid, comfort, and adhere to enemies of the United States "engineering" Epstein's crime syndicate into power all over the world and in a conspiracy between Russian, French, Israeli, British, and/or other world leaders implicated in Jeffrey Epstein's treasonous child sex trafficking and war crimes financing using taxpayer funds doled out to Epstein billionaires within Edge Foundation, now put in charge of "intelligence", employing "peeping" technologies, exploiting children, selling their data, trying to get them to become addicted to Epstein-linked platforms, sharing child porn on those platforms, and the like -- but also stalking, cyberstalking, intimidating, retaliating, discriminating, and/or generally and chronically harming Epstein victims, including the Editor of Uprights News.

So most of our reporting is in constant defense of this ongoing harm that not only doesn't stop but has snowballed and escalated from an employment dispute in Alameda, CA, linked to lethal operating conditions at a company, Roche, linked to Edge Foundation 'participants' (Maja Oeri Hoffman), covered up by them and others since 2002, starting with Edge Foundation's Microsoft, Yahoo, and Google defaming and harming and seeking to destroy all of the economic activity of our Editor and forever, then them having others (Bill Barr, HR McMaster, Chris Christie, Chris Matthews, Stepher Harper, Harlan Crow, Nicholas Sarkozy, Jeb Bush, GW Bush, Dianne Feinstein, and/or others) infiltrate, intimidate, influence, socialize with, and/or stalk our Editor's family members, while our Editor was investigating them and/or their networks for crimes against the United States and against children in a pro se qui tam investigation.

That pro se qui tam has been obstructed so many different ways by Epstein, Edge Foundation, those they could influence, between 2002-2026+, for 24 years, until one of many RICO obstruction overt furtherance events by immediately and permanently-disqualified SCOTUS 'justices', per Baude and Paulsen 2024, and per Prakash and Smith, 2006, who engaged in judicial overreach more than one to give aid, comfort, and adhere to enemies of the United States, including by attacking whistleblower act protections and authority, and by attacking Special Counsel protections and authority, and by manufacturing totally illegal bribery by billionaires with Citizen's United, and by manufacturing totally illegal RICO obstructing retroactive immunity -- in the context that 6/9 SCOTUS justices were hand-picked by the Federalist Society, financed by Jeffrey Epstein's Google (both founders linked to Epstein and to financing child sex trafficking operations with Epstein implied attorneys for the USVI Attorney General's investigation into them and JP Morgan), Chevron (Epstein's Rockefeller family), and Mercers (Cambridge Analytica and Breitbart who conspired with Russian enemies 2016), and that same Epstein-linked SCOTUS has since denied Epstein victims justice, which engaging in judicial overreach and RICO obstruction to keep Epstein's crime syndicate in power, as de facto officers, behaving badly and in bad faith, allowing for their immediate removal without impeachment and the voiding of all of their changes to the government (per Prakash and Smith, 2006). 

And so we dug a little deeper on Melania, and finally found the article we read this morning.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/epstein-bragged-he-had-melania-old-trump-melania-video-resurfaces-amid-alleged-claims-linked-to-epstein/ar-AA23vbr9

"Melania Trump had denied having ties with the deceased s-- offender, Jeffrey Epstein. Despite making her best attempt to distance herself from him, a new video from 1999 has resurfaced, which allegedly claims that she was an escort for him before he gave her to Donald Trump.

Coincidentally, he was heard bragging about his close friendship with Melania and Donald Trump. He claimed that he was the one who introduced the then-Slovenian Model to Trump.

On April 10, Melania Trump shocked the American public with her unforeseen statement about her alleged relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. During the speech (via X), she claimed that she had “never been friends with Epstein” and she met him due to overlapping social events in New York City and Palm Beach.

She added, “I am not Epstein's victim. Epstein did not introduce me to Donald Trump.” She even claimed that she did not know about the disgraced financier in 2000, during a party, which she attended with her husband. However, a video from 1999 is circulating on social media, when Trump was still married to Marla Maples.

In the video, a reporter caught the two together during an event, and he addressed her as “Melania Knauss from New York, from Austria.” The interviewer greeted her and asked him if he was at Churchill Downs by Chapel? The President replied, “It’s certainly beautiful. I can’t imagine a better investment. I’m here because a friend of mine has horse racing today.”

An X user claimed, “Epstein bragged he had Melania before he gave her to Trump.” According to reports from The Daily Beast, they obtained exclusive recordings of Epstein, where he was heard bragging about his bond with Trump and the First Lady. Moreover, an email from the Epstein files released earlier this year raised speculation.

In a 2002 email, Melania Trump wrote to Ghislaine Maxwell (and not Epstein) with the subject line, “HI!” She concluded, “Love, Melania.” In another email from 2016, from an unknown sender, it suggested that Trump had first met his now-wife.

The mail read, “I remember flying back with Donald on his plane the first weekend I went to visit you in Florida was the weekend he met Melania and he kept on coming out of the bedroom saying, ‘wow what a hot piece of ass”.

According to Michael Wolff’s book, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, Trump shared a special bond with Jeffrey Epstein. The author talked about one of the emails sent to him, where the deceased s-- offender wrote, Trump “knew about the girls.”

He debated that Trump had framed their relationship as his interest in politics grew. He also mentioned that he had spent hours at his residence with Virginia Roberts Giuffre, a victim. Likewise, in a separate exchange with Thomas Landon Jr., a then-New York Times reporter, Epstein asked him if he was interested in seeing Trump with young women in bikinis in his kitchen.

Epstein shared a picture, writing, “Hawaiian Tropic girl Lauren Petrella.” In another post, he shared a link to an article about Celina Midelfart, a Norwegian businesswoman. He described her as his “20-year-old girlfriend in 93” and after two years, he gave her to Trump."

Could Epstein have blackmailed Melania or Trump if these or Katie Johnson's, Stacey Williams', Ivanna Kamensky's, Michael Cohen's, and/or others' claims are true?

It seems Epstein had several blackmail and influence talons into the Trump family members directly and indirectly (as the Money/Wealth Manager of Putin, per DOJ files), which we believe Epstein used to force Trump to run for POTUS to RICO obstruct for Epstein and others. Trump had such a terrible history with women and crime that he would have been a fool to run for POTUS, to be torn apart by the press, and yet most of the press in the US is controlled by the orbit of Jeffrey Epstein (Fox News, Rupert Murdoch, Conrad Black, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Twitter/X, Facebook, LinkedIn, AT&T, and/or others covers a lot of communications and influence channels ... linked to PayPal, Palantir, Carbyne, Valar, Spacex, Tesla, and so much more), and so we believe the record is starting to prove Trump may not have had much of a choice than to run, and now more and more evidence and witnesses are coming forward against Trump, and EACH account against Trump linked to Epstein is something Epstein could have and would have used against Trump as blackmail or "leverage", and so we propose with our evolving and pretty strong hypothesis, that this is exactly what happened. Epstein blackmailed Trump into running for office with several blackmail "handles" on them.

We found documents in the DOJ files that supported Epstein reached out to Putin regularly via intermediates, but not following orders, giving them, and where language came up in these DOJ documents that Epstein sought to communicate how to "handle" Trump to Putin. 

Now this creates a type of interesting scenario, where we found in the DOJ files that Epstein may have been Putin's Money/Wealth manager, and where those Epstein had in that sort of arrangement were being bled "dry" like "spigots" or blackmailed by Epstein, and so here Epstein telling possibly blackmailed Putin that he has the ability to provide Putin something to "handle Trump", in the context that Trump may still be in a position of blackmail by Putin as a result, and may not want to be adhering to, comforting, and aiding Russia all the different ways he has, but may have instead been blackmailed or threatened with worse if he didn't obey, and so in the past we were pretty anti-Trump, but now we are finding evidence that kind of makes Trump look like Epstein's and Putin's useful idiot, but now Epstein's gone (as is Epstein's 2016 counterpart in Russia), and there is only Putin and Trump left in that trio, and when Putin calls, Trump comes running has been the pattern.

There is a lot of evidence supporting this hypothesis across the public record.

How do we protect America against Epstein's and Putin's Trump and the GOP (now led by Trump's family) being blackmailed by enemies of the United States, likely Epstein's Putin, Epstein's Maxwell, Maxwell's sister (instructed by Maxwell via prison email to move the blackmail "emails, stuff, etc", for Leon Black (etc) who Maxwell specified was/were "spigot(s)" about to "dry", as proof of the blackmail and blackmail materials and continuity post Epstein's death and Maxwell's imprisonment, as we have already reported, supra), Leah "Doe", and/or others, and where the record may prove that Epstein blackmailed Putin to "engineer" Trump into office (see Sater and Cohen emails of 11/03/2015 and the whistleblowing of Delario in the DOJ files), after Epstein pitted Epstein's Clintons versus Epstein's Trumps for POTUS? 

The best way we know of helping protect America from all of the same -- is for us to help America connect the dots as fast as possible as insiders and victims of the Epstein crime syndicate -- to protect ALL victims from any further harm -- maybe even Donald Trump -- and/or others "stuck" in a legal nightmare that Epstein may have blackmailed them and/or us all into -- Epstein and/or Maxwell employing some "dead man triggers", naturally, and maybe in Russia. 

The non-verbal between Putin and Trump says it all -- Trump needs help -- as Putin may be blackmailing Trump to totally destroy America from the inside and from the outside, is a reasonable inference. And so to defend ALL victims of Epstein against all of the same, we will continue to test the truth here with more information as it becomes available -- but talk of Melania as a former escort 'given' to Trump after being "taken' by Epstein, makes clear the Trump family is in trouble again, and so they have awarded themselves military contracts, but if they violate the law in any manner, then join the government fraud conspiracy they have already furthered. Personally, I'm not sure if doing all of these things in order to make more money when you already have plenty of money, only to risk losing all of your money, is worth the hassle?