Melania Trump summoned reporters to the White House Thursday afternoon to give a surprise statement about Jeffrey Epstein, saying she had no relationship with him, was not a victim of his and had no knowledge of his crimes.

周四下午，梅拉尼娅·特朗普在白宫召集记者，就杰弗里·爱泼斯坦事件发表了一份出人意料的声明，称她与爱泼斯坦不存在任何关系，也不是他的受害者，对其犯罪活动一无所知。

In remarks that lasted just under six minutes, she said she wanted to clear “my good name.” She addressed rumors about the origin story of how she met her husband, the president of the United States. And she called on Congress to give a hearing to victims of Mr. Epstein’s crimes.

在这段时长不足六分钟的讲话中，她表示希望为“我的清白声誉”正名。她还回应了关于她如何与其丈夫——美国总统唐纳德·特朗普相识的传闻，并呼吁国会为爱泼斯坦案件的受害者举行听证会。

“The lies linking me with the disgraceful Jeffrey Epstein need to end today,” Mrs. Trump said. She talked about “numerous fake images and statements about Epstein and me” that “have been percolating on social media for years now.”

“那些将我与可耻的杰弗里·爱泼斯坦联系在一起的谎言今天必须结束，”梅拉尼娅·特朗普说。她提到，“大量关于爱泼斯坦和我的虚假图片和说法”“多年来一直在社交媒体上发酵”。

It was not clear why she chose to speak out now, or to what reports she was referring.

目前尚不清楚她为何选择在此时发声，也不清楚她具体指的是哪些报道。

A spokesperson for Mrs. Trump said the president knew that the first lady planned to make a statement, but later said it was not clear if Mr. Trump was aware of the topic of her remarks. In a phone call with an MS Now reporter, Mr. Trump said he had no prior knowledge of what she had planned to say.

梅拉尼娅的发言人表示，总统知道第一夫人计划发表声明，但随后又称不确定特朗普是否了解她发言的具体内容。在与MS Now记者通电话时，特朗普表示，他事先并不知道她打算说什么。

The White House did not respond to questions about what the president knew on the matter and when.

白宫没有回应有关总统何时知道此事、具体了解多少的提问。

The first lady’s statement is sure to supercharge a narrative that the Trump administration has been struggling to make go away since last summer, when chunks of the MAGA base broke into open revolt against Mr. Trump over his handling of the Epstein investigation.

第一夫人的声明肯定会加剧一种舆论叙事，这种叙事正是特朗普政府自去年夏天以来一直竭力平息却收效甚微的。当时，由于不满特朗普对爱泼斯坦案调查的处理方式，MAGA基本盘中有相当一部分人公开对其表示反对。

The scandal has burbled all year, the president’s supporters refusing to move on from it no matter how many times he instructs them to. Just last week, Pam Bondi lost her job as attorney general in part over her failure to contain the furor. She is still tangled up in it.

这一丑闻全年都在持续发酵，无论总统多少次要求他的支持者们放下此事，他们都拒绝就此翻篇。就在上周，帕姆·邦迪因此事失去了司法部长一职，部分原因就是她未能平息这场风波。她至今仍深陷其中。

What Mrs. Trump said on Thursday may have been designed to clear her own name, but it certainly won’t help the West Wing escape its Epstein troubles.

梅拉尼娅·特朗普周四的言论或许是为了自证清白，但这肯定无助于白宫方面摆脱爱泼斯坦事件的困扰。

The first lady started her remarks by recalling the era when she met her husband, and, apparently, Mr. Epstein.

第一夫人在发言一开始回顾了她与丈夫相识的那段时期，而且显然，她也是在那个时期结识了爱泼斯坦先生。

“Donald and I were invited to the same parties as Epstein from time to time, since overlapping in social circles is common in New York City,” Mrs. Trump explained to the small group of stunned reporters arrayed in the entrance hall of the White House. The first time she ever “crossed paths with Epstein” was in 2000, she said, “at an event Donald and I attended together.”

“唐纳德和我偶尔会和爱泼斯坦受邀参加同样的派对，因为在纽约，社交圈重叠是很常见的，”梅拉尼娅·特朗普向聚集在白宫门厅、显得颇为震惊的一小群记者解释道。她说，她第一次“与爱泼斯坦产生交集”是在2000年，“在一次我和唐纳德一同出席的活动上”。

2000年2月，唐纳德·特朗普及女友梅拉尼娅·克瑙斯与杰弗里·爱泼斯坦和吉斯莱恩·麦克斯韦在特朗普位于佛罗里达的马阿拉歌庄园合影。

“Epstein did not introduce me to Donald Trump,” she said. “I met my husband by chance at a New York City party in 1998. This initial encounter with my husband is documented in detail in my book.”

“爱泼斯坦并没有把我介绍给唐纳德·特朗普，”她说，“1998年，我在纽约市的一个派对上偶然遇到了我的丈夫。关于这次初次相遇，在我的书中有详细记载。”

The encounter she was referring to is a story she has told over many years about meeting Mr. Trump in 1998 at the Kit Kat Club. She has always said that it was Paolo Zampolli, an Italian modeling agent, who introduced her to Mr. Trump.

她所指的这次相遇，是她多年来反复讲述的一个故事：1998年，她在Kit Kat俱乐部与特朗普相识。她一直表示，是意大利模特经纪人保罗·赞波利将她介绍给特朗普的。

Reached by phone in Milan on Thursday, Mr. Zampolli affirmed Mrs. Trump’s account and said “I’m ready to testify in Congress” that he introduced the couple that night at the Kit Kat Club.

周四在米兰接受电话采访时，赞波利证实了梅拉尼娅的说法，并表示“我准备好在国会作证”，证明那天晚上在Kit Kat俱乐部是他介绍两人相识的。

Mr. Zampolli did business with Mr. Epstein and appears several times in the Epstein files.

赞波利与爱泼斯坦存在业务往来，并在爱泼斯坦文件中多次出现。

Mrs. Trump’s name appeared in the Epstein files, too — another matter she evidently wanted to clear up on Thursday. In a 2002 email written to Ghislaine Maxwell, a woman named “Melania” wrote to Ms. Maxwell to praise a profile of Mr. Epstein in New York magazine. Ms. Maxwell called the woman “sweet pea,” and the woman signed her email “Love.”

梅拉尼娅的名字也出现在爱泼斯坦文件中——这显然是她在周四想要澄清的另一件事。在2002年一封写给吉斯莱恩·麦克斯韦的电子邮件中，一个名叫“梅拉尼娅”的女子写信给麦克斯韦，称赞《纽约》杂志一篇爱泼斯坦的人物特写稿件。麦克斯韦称这名女子为“小甜心”，而该女子在邮件中署名“爱你的”。

On Thursday, the first lady addressed her correspondence with Ms. Maxwell: “To be clear, I never had a relationship with Epstein or his accomplice Maxwell. My email reply to Maxwell cannot be categorized as anything more than casual correspondence.”

周四，第一夫人回应了她与麦克斯韦的通信：“需要明确的是，我从未与爱泼斯坦或其同伙麦克斯韦有任何关系。我对马克斯韦尔的邮件回复只能算是普通的通信。”

The hydra-headed Epstein scandal has ensnared so many people who’ve walked the halls of the White House that the first lady seemed intent on setting herself apart.

牵涉甚广的爱泼斯坦丑闻已将太多曾在白宫出入的人卷入其中，以至于第一夫人似乎希望将自己与这滩浑水划清界限。

“I was never on Epstein’s plane,” she insisted, “and never visited his private island.”

“我从未登上过爱泼斯坦的飞机，”她坚称，“也从未去过他的私人岛屿。”

The same cannot be said for her husband, whose name appeared on the flight logs for Mr. Epstein’s plane several times, or for the commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, who acknowledged in a Senate hearing earlier this year that he’d traveled to Mr. Epstein’s island.

但她的丈夫却不能这样说——其名字曾多次出现在爱泼斯坦飞机的飞行日志上；而商务部长霍华德·卢特尼克也在今年早些时候的一场参议院听证会上承认，他曾前往爱泼斯坦的岛。

And so there the first lady stood on Thursday, trying to distance herself from all things Epstein. She slammed those who would peddle “false smears” against her and cited people and publishers who’ve issued public apologies to her in the past. Among them: The Democratic operative James Carville; Harper Collins UK; The Daily Beast.

于是，周四第一夫人站在那里，试图与一切跟爱泼斯坦相关的东西划清界限。她猛烈抨击那些兜售针对她的“不实抹黑”的人，并列举了过去曾向她公开道歉的人士和出版机构，其中包括民主党策略师詹姆斯·卡维尔、哈珀柯林斯英国分公司以及《每日野兽》网。

“Be cautious about what you believe,” Mrs. Trump warned.

“对你所信的事情要保持谨慎，”梅拉尼娅·特朗普警告说。

She shifted the focus to the victims of Mr. Epstein’s crimes. “I call on Congress to provide the women who have been victimized by Epstein with the public hearing specifically centered around the survivors,” she said. “Give these victims their opportunity to testify under oath in front of Congress.”

她随后将话题转向爱泼斯坦罪行的受害者。“我呼吁国会为那些遭受爱泼斯坦侵害的女性举行公开听证会，专门围绕幸存者展开，”她说。“让这些受害者有机会在国会面前宣誓作证。”

去年9月，在国会大厦前举行的声援爱泼斯坦案受害者的“与幸存者站在一起”集会。

The House Oversight Committee has been investigating Mr. Epstein and the federal government’s handling of the case against him since last year. The inquiry grew from the furor over the Trump administration’s backtracking on a decision to release its full investigative material.

自去年以来，众议院监督委员会一直在调查爱泼斯坦案以及联邦政府对此案的处理方式。这项调查源于特朗普政府在公布完整调查材料的决定上出尔反尔所引发的强烈不满。

Representative Robert Garcia of California, the top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, said in an interview that he agreed with Mrs. Trump’s call for a public hearing, adding that Democrats had been pushing Republicans to hold one for months. He also said that Mrs. Trump’s comments seemed to reject Mr. Trump’s frequent contention that the Epstein investigation was a “hoax” pushed by Democrats.

监督委员会资深民主党人、加州众议员罗伯特·加西亚在接受采访时表示，他同意梅拉尼娅关于举行公开听证会的呼吁，并补充说，民主党人数月来一直在敦促共和党人这样做。他还表示，梅拉尼娅的言论似乎驳斥了特朗普经常声称的爱泼斯坦调查是民主党推动的“骗局”的说法。

In recent months, Mr. Trump has tried to dismiss the Epstein controversy. He told the country it’s time to “move on” and snapped at a reporter who asked him what his message would be to Mr. Epstein’s victims.

近几个月来，特朗普一直试图淡化围绕爱泼斯坦的争议。他曾告诉全国公众，是时候“向前看”，并厉声斥责一名问他想对爱泼斯坦受害者说些什么的记者。

On Thursday, his wife struck a different tone: “Every woman should have her day to tell her story in public, if she wishes.”

周四，他的妻子则采取了不同的语气：“每一位女性都应该有机会在公众面前讲述自己的经历，如果她愿意的话。”

And then she turned on her stiletto heels and stalked out as the dazed reporters started shouting after her: “Why now!? Why now!?”

随后，她踩着细高跟鞋转身离去，留下茫然的记者们在她身后开始大喊：“为什么是现在！？为什么是现在！？”