Donald Trump’s prison chiefs have reacted angrily after a leading Democrat accused them of giving Jeffrey Epstein’s madam, Ghislaine Maxwell, cushy, “five-star” treatment behind bars.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons fired off an extraordinary public statement attacking Rep. Robert Garcia, 48, after the California congressman toured the Texas camp where the convicted sex trafficker is being held.
Garcia is the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, which has spent months probing why Maxwell, 64, was moved to one of the country’s softest federal lockups.
The agency insisted Garcia’s claims were “not only categorically false but also serve to denigrate the men and women of BOP, who work hard every day to ensure safety and security in often challenging and demanding environments,” in a statement posted to X.
The blow-up followed a visit by staff from the Oversight and Judiciary Committees to Federal Prison Camp Bryan on Tuesday. Garcia described the minimum-security facility as a manicured idyll. “All of the staff came back with the same conclusion, which is that this is a park-like campus and Ghislaine Maxwell should not be there,” he said on CNN’s Erin Burnett OutFront.
In a post on X, Garcia went further. He wrote that the camp is “essentially a pristine park with fountains and ample green space,” and that Maxwell is “the only convicted sex offender there.” He demanded to know why acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, 51, had moved her. “This isn’t justice,” he wrote.
Maxwell is serving a 20-year sentence for helping Epstein traffic underage girls. She was quietly transferred from a prison in Tallahassee, Florida, to FPC Bryan in August 2025, days after a now-notorious meeting with Blanche—then Trump’s deputy attorney general. Blanche was previously Trump’s personal lawyer.
Critics have questioned whether the move was a reward for staying quiet about Trump’s ties to Epstein.
The Bureau of Prisons rejected all of it. It said Maxwell’s transfer was made “independently” and driven by safety concerns, claiming it could “no longer ensure her safety” at the Florida facility. It branded suggestions of preferential treatment, enhanced living conditions, or “outside interference” as “categorically false and inaccurate.”
The agency did not explain why a convicted sex offender was placed at a camp that, under its own rules, bars such inmates without a special waiver.
Garcia and Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Judiciary Democrat, said in a joint statement that prison leadership “repeatedly shut down our lines of questioning” during the tour. Staff were not allowed to see Maxwell.
