Secretary of Labor Alexander Acosta on Wednesday refused to confirm or deny that financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was an intelligence asset.

“So there has been reporting to that effect and let me say, there’s been reporting to a lot of effects in this case, not just now but over the years and, again, I would hesitant to take this reporting as fact,” Acosta said during a press conference.

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“This was a case that was brought by our office, it was brought based on the facts and I look at the reporting and others, I can’t address it directly because of our guidelines, but I can tell you that a lot of reporting is going down rabbit holes.”

According to investigative reporter Vicky Ward, Acosta told members of Trump’s transition team that he was instructed to “back off” of Epstein a decade ago because Epstein “belonged to intelligence.”

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