Asked about his denials that his name appears in the Epstein files and whether the attorney general would have to tell him if it did, Donald Trump said he hadn’t been “overly interested” in the whole affair and, as usual, blamed the Democrats.

I haven’t been overly interested.

You know, it’s a hoax that’s been built up way beyond proportion. I can say this. Those files were run by the worst scum on earth … The whole thing is a hoax. They ran the files.

He suggested that his enemies could have put material in the files that was fake, and added that if the Democrats had had damaging material to use against him, they would have used it before the election.

Referring to the Wall Street Journal’s report that he drew a picture of a nude woman as part of a lewd birthday letter for Jeffrey Epstein when they were close friends, Trump said:

I don’t do drawings. I’m not a drawing person. I don’t do drawings. Sometimes you would say, would you draw a building? And I’ll draw four lines and a little roof, you know, for a charity stuff. But I’m not a drawing person. I don’t do drawings of women, that I can tell you.

He also claimed his poll ratings had increased by 4.5 points since this “ridiculous Epstein stuff” has been in the news “because people don’t buy it”. (He is of course ignoring the fact that much of the criticism and pressure has come from his own furious support base and even the likes of House speaker Mike Johnson have called for the release of the files).