UNCONFIRMED: this is one commentator's account of a private conversation, with no document or second witness.
In a Vanity Fair profile of Vice President JD Vance by Chris Whipple, published September 16, 2026, Tucker Carlson said he had pressed Trump in the summer of 2025 to release all of the government's Jeffrey Epstein files. “My position from the beginning with Trump, I said it to Trump, was, 'I don't understand why you would ever keep any of this stuff secret.' And I got like a bunch of different answers,” Carlson said. “In the end, it came from Trump directly.” Asked what came from Trump directly, he said: “The order to cover it up came from Trump. I asked him why. And he gave me this long, very emotional explanation that this was all a plot against him, like Russiagate.”
Carlson did not say what the “order” was, who received it, or what it directed. His account has not been corroborated; every outlet that reported it cited Vanity Fair. Carlson broke with Trump over the Iran war and apologized in April for having supported him, and Vanity Fair noted he could be a 2028 rival to Vance (see Tucker Carlson Apologizes for Endorsing Trump: 'I'm Sorry for Misleading People. We'll Be Tormented by It for a Long Time.').
White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis did not dispute the conversation. “Just as President Trump has said, he's been totally exonerated on anything relating to Epstein,” she said, citing the release of documents, cooperation with a House Oversight subpoena and Trump's signing of the Epstein Files Transparency Act. Vanity Fair also cited New York Times reporting that when Vance argued for transparency at a July 2025 White House meeting, Trump at first balked, calling the demands “a Russia, Russia, Russia hoax.” That is consistent with Carlson's description of Trump's reasoning but does not confirm an order (see A NYT Investigation Details a White House Situation Room Meltdown Over the Epstein Files, With 'Empty Gesture' Plans to Appease the Base).