New Delhi: The United States Justice Department on Friday (January 30) released a huge tranche of files on millionaire financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, exposing more details of his communications with the wealthy and powerful of the US – with some of them having communicated not long before he died by suicide in 2019.The Justice Department had announced that it was disclosing “more than 3 million pages” of documents, along with more than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images, as required by a law passed by Congress. More than 600,000 documents have been published online so far. Until now, the files have offered little revelations of the links between Epstein and Donald Trump. However, they contain revelations about several influential people including Microsoft founder Bill Gates, billionaire tech businessman Elon Musk, former prince Andrew, former US president Bill Clinton, Lord Peter Mandelson, the former UK ambassador to the US, and others. However, it has drawn criticism from Congressional Democrats, who have been key to pushing for the release of these case files. They argue that Friday’s release is only about half of the files that have been collected. Here’s what the files say about Epstein’s powerful friends:Chat with Elon Musk and Howard Lutnick about island visitsAccording to the files, Elon Musk, SpaceX and Tesla founder, and former senior advisor to Donald Trump, e-mailed Epstein in 2012 and 2013 about visiting his infamous island compound, the scene of many allegations of sexual abuse, Associated Press reported.Epstein allegedly inquired about this in an email asking how many people Musk would like flown by helicopter, and Musk responded that it would likely be just him and his partner at the time. “What day/night will be the wildest party on our island?” he wrote, according to the Justice Department records. It’s not immediately clear if the island visits ultimately took place. Musk has maintained that he repeatedly turned down Epstein’s overtures. “No one pushed harder than me to have the Epstein files released and I’m glad that has finally happened,” he wrote in a post on X, of which he is the executive chairman.He claimed that he “had very little correspondence with Epstein and declined repeated invitations to go to his island or fly on his “Lolita Express”, but was well aware that some email correspondence with him could be misinterpreted and used by detractors to smear my name.“Meanwhile, Epstein also invited Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to the island in December 2012, as per the records. Lutnick’s wife allegedly accepted the invitation and said they would arrive on a yacht with their children. The two reportedly also had drinks on a previous occasion in 2011, according to a schedule. Further, six years later, they e-mailed about the construction of a building across the street from both of their homes.Lutnick has, however, distanced himself from Epstein, calling him “gross”, and claiming that he cut ties decades ago.Bill Gates, ‘Russian girls’ and drugs for an STDAccording to The Financial Times, e-mails from an account that appeared to belong to Jeffrey Epstein claimed that Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates tried to hide a sexually transmitted disease from his wife Melinda after having sex with “Russian girls”.In one email by Epstein, as per the files, the late sex offender allegedly tried to take issue with Gates for ending their relationship.“TO add insult to injury you then subsequently with tears in your eyes, implore me to please delete the emails regarding your std, your request that I provide you with antibiotics that you can surreptitiously give to Melinda, and the description of your penis,” the message reads, as quoted by FT.Another email reportedly read: “I have been asked and wrongly acquiesced into participating in things that have ranged from the morally inappropriate, to the ethically unsound. From helping Bill to get drugs, in order to deal with consequences of sex with russian girls, to facilitating his illicit trysts, with married women, to being asked to provide adderall fro [sic] bridge tournaments.”A spokesperson for Gates told FT that the claims were “absolutely absurd and completely false”.More details on former prince AndrewAccording to the files, Guardian reported, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor invited Epstein to Buckingham Palace after Epstein’s house arrest ended.In 2019, in a disastrous interview, the former prince tried to claim he distanced himself from Epstein after his 2008 conviction for abusing a 14-year-old girl in Florida. However, the files suggest the pair remained close.Emails from September 2010, between Epstein and “The Duke” – believed to be Mountbatten-Windsor, then Duke of York – claim that Epstein requested “private time” on a planned visit to London.“The Duke” responded: “We could have dinner at Buckingham Palace and lots of privacy.” Two days later, he followed up: “Delighted for you to come here to BP [Buckingham Palace]. Come with whomever and I’ll be here free from 1600ish.”It is unclear if the meeting took place, but the two were pictured walking together in New York’s Central Park three months later. The new documents reportedly also suggest that, the month for the above correspondence, Epstein had offered to arrange for Mountbatten-Windsor a dinner with a “clever, beautiful and trustworthy” Russian woman, 26, which the former prince apparently was “delighted” to agree to. Politics with Steve Bannon and an ex-Obama officialFurther, the documents claim that Epstein exchanged hundreds of friendly texts with Steve Bannon, a top adviser to US President Donald Trump, just months before Epstein’s death. They allegedly discussed politics, travel and a documentary that Bannon was said to be planning to help salvage Epstein’s reputation.In March 2019, Steve Bannon allegedly asked Jeffrey Epstein to supply his plane to pick him up in Rome. Months later, Epstein messaged Bannon, “Now you can understand why trump wakes up in the middle of the night sweating when he hears you and I are friends,” AP reported. The context of the exchange however remains unclear due to heavy redactions in the released files.Further, a 2018 exchange referred to Trump’s apparent threats to oust Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. This was around the time when Epstein also communicated with lawyer and former Obama White House official Kathy Ruemmler, warning Democrats against portraying Trump as a mafia figure, even as he described the president as a “maniac.” According to AP, Ruemmler has said she later regretted ever knowing Epstein.New details on Epstein’s incarceration and suicideEpstein was arrested on federal sex trafficking charges in July 2019. He killed himself in a New York jail cell in August 2019.As per the latest batch of documents, there are emails between investigators about Epstein’s death, including an investigator’s observation that his final communication doesn’t look like a suicide note, AP reported. Previously, several investigations have determined that Epstein’s death was a suicide.The records also detail a trick that jail staffers used to fool the media gathered outside while Epstein’s body was removed: they used boxes and sheets to create what appeared to be a body and loaded it into a white van labeled as belonging to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.The reporters followed the van when it left the jail, not knowing that Epstein’s actual body was loaded into a black vehicle, which departed “unnoticed,” according to the interview notes.With inputs from Associated Press.