Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton said in a lengthy public letter that they will not testify in the House Oversight Committee’s Jeffrey Epstein investigation, even though they were scheduled to appear for depositions this week.
The Clintons released the letter on Tuesday, Jan. 13, saying they would not comply. Bill, 79, was set to sit for a deposition later that day, while Hillary, 78, was scheduled to appear on Wednesday, Jan. 14, according to The New York Times.
Addressed to House Oversight Committee chairman James R. Comer, the letter argues the subpoenas are “invalid and legally unenforceable,” and says the former president and former secretary of state have already provided the information they have about Epstein and his crimes.
“We’ve tried to give you the little information we have. We’ve done so because Mr. Epstein’s crimes were horrific,” they wrote. “If the Government didn’t do all it could to investigate and prosecute these crimes, for whatever reason, that should be the focus of your work — to learn why and to prevent that from happening ever again.”
They added, “You accepted the least from those who know the most but demand the most from those who know the least. To say you can’t complete your work without speaking to us is simply bizarre.”
The Clintons also said they expect Comer, 53, to pursue contempt proceedings against them. In their view, they wrote, he would be seeking a process that could grind Congress to a halt and is “literally designed to result in our imprisonment.”
“We are confident that any reasonable person in or out of Congress will see, based on everything we release, that what you are doing is trying to punish those who you see as your enemies and to protect those you think are your friends,” the Clintons wrote.
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They also said they had offered written statements similar to ones they claim Comer has already accepted from seven or eight former law enforcement officials who were subpoenaed and later excused from testifying.
Comer rejected their position, telling reporters on Tuesday that he and his team had been in contact with Bill Clinton’s attorneys for months and repeatedly offered opportunities for him to appear, but that the former president’s side kept pushing the matter back, according to Axios.
“We’ve communicated with President Clinton’s legal team for months now, giving them opportunity after opportunity to come in to give us a day, and they continue to delay, delay, delay. Delaying to the point where we had no idea whether they would show up today,” Comer said.
He also said the panel would vote next week on whether to hold Bill Clinton in contempt of Congress. That charge can carry a maximum penalty of one year in prison and a $100,000 fine. If the committee approves the measure, it would then go to a full House vote, and the matter could ultimately be referred to the Department of Justice, which would decide whether to prosecute.
Bill and Hillary Clinton were first subpoenaed in August 2025. When the DOJ released some Epstein-related files in December 2025, Bill appeared in multiple photographs. He has denied any wrongdoing.
Other prominent figures have been held in contempt of Congress in the past, including Steve Bannon — who was sentenced to four months in prison on the charge in 2022 — along with Peter Navarro and Dan Scavino, who also refused to comply with subpoenas tied to efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
Navarro, now a senior counselor to Trump on trade, served a four-month sentence for contempt. The Justice Department, however, declined to prosecute Scavino, who now serves as a White House deputy chief of staff in Trump’s second term.
Nick Merrill, a spokesperson for Hillary Clinton, responded on Tuesday to a tweet from journalist Rachael Bade, who wrote that recipients of subpoenas cannot set the terms and may face consequences if they refuse to comply. Merrill replied, “That’s cute, but not on the level. 8 other people were subpoena’ed, 7 were dismissed. The attempt to call the Clintons is overtly political. They refuse to be made tools in a distraction and obfuscation campaign.”
Bill Clinton’s spokesperson Angel Urena made a similar argument in December 2025, saying, “For months, we’ve been offering the same exact thing he accepted from the rest, but he refuses and won’t explain why. Make of that what you will,” per Axios.
