Updated September 03, 2025 at 14:30 PM ET
Lisa Phillips was in her early 20s when she met Jeffrey Epstein on his private island in the Caribbean. She says a young woman who worked with Epstein invited her to his estate. Her first encounter with the financier set in motion a pattern of abuse she says lasted for years.
Today, Phillips is demanding accountability for what happened to her and other young women ensnared in the millionaire's sex trafficking ring.
Esptein died in 2019 by suicide in federal custody while awaiting prosecution on charges of sex trafficking girls, some as young as 14. Phillips says Epstein worked to build a network consisting of many other powerful men who, unlike himself, are still alive and well.
Epstein had many enablers and co-conspirators, Phillips said in an interview with Morning Edition. "Jeffrey wasn't seeing many women every day for his own sexual gratification," she said. "He was seeing them and building this ring for other powerful men globally."
Phillips spoke with NPR Tuesday before the House Oversight committee released more than 30,000 documents related to the federal investigation into Epstein. Most of those records consist of material that has already been made public.
Multiple women who say they were sex trafficked by Epstein spoke during a news conference on Capitol Hill Wednesday, calling on the Trump administration to release additional files related to the Epstein case.
Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky) and Ro Khanna (D-California) are gathering support for a measure that, if approved, could force the Department of Justice to disclose more case information publicly.
Phillips rejects the claim by Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson and others that releasing more files would harm victims.
"That's what harms us, is that the people that need to be held accountable aren't," Phillips said. The White House did not immediately respond to NPR's request for comment. Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office Wednesday, the president repeated his earlier claim that demands to release the Epstein files are a "Democrat hoax."
Phillips now hosts a podcast called From Now On where she interviews other women who have experienced sex trafficking, grooming, sexual assault and abuse. On Tuesday, she told NPR's Steve Inskeep that her fight to release all the files isn't about politics, but about human rights.
This interview is edited for length and clarity.
Interview highlights
Steve Inskeep: The question before Congress is a yes/no question: whether to release the files. What do you think might be in them?
Lisa Phillips: Well, the files will contain personal emails from Jeffrey to his co-conspirators, also the videos that were taken from his many houses, especially the Upper East Side home. The townhouse had cameras everywhere, and the flight logs, and the people that were going in and out of the island where many women were trafficked.
Inskeep: I'm interested that you say "co-conspirators" in plural. There's one person who has been convicted for the variety of crimes surrounding Epstein, besides Epstein himself. Do you think there are more people who would fit in that category?
Phillips: I mean, I know there's more people. There were many other powerful people involved. There were many enablers. And Jeffrey wasn't seeing many women every day for his own sexual gratification. He was seeing them and building this ring for other powerful men globally.
Inskeep: Did you feel that you were lured into not only being abused by him but being set up to be abused by others?
Phillips: Absolutely. At the time when I knew him in the early 2000s, I did not know that or even ever thought that. I didn't find out until I started speaking to other survivors after he died in 2019, and I started just being really confused, like, "What happened to me back then?" I didn't want to think about it, but because everybody was talking about it, I reached out to other survivors, and we all have the same story. And then the grooming and the manipulation, I kind of didn't want to admit it, because back then, I thought of him as almost like a mentor or someone that was – he was prominent in New York, and everybody knew about him. Everybody kind of loved Jeffrey. I mean, he was mysterious. And then I started to – when I was deposed for other cases and speaking out, I started to realize that, wait a second, I have some names that I was sent to, which I thought they were for career moves or just relationship building. I just was innocent back then, my thinking, and then I realized a lot of the men that I was sent to, many other women were sent to the same men. That's when I started to realize that I had been trafficked by Jeffrey Epstein.
Inskeep: When you use terms like grooming or manipulation, they seem really meaningful in your story. As you've laid it out, this is not a violent assault. This is someone who says, "come to an island" and then "come into a room" and get involved in a massage, and then you're deeper and deeper involved.
Phillips: Yeah, he's a master manipulator, and just the way he built his sex trafficking ring over so many years was just purely genius, because he had other women and young women also bringing the girls. That's what happened to me. It was another young woman, you know, 21, 22 years old, that brought me over to the island from a photo shoot.
Inskeep: One thing that drives the public interest in this is the idea that there would be even more powerful and famous people implicated than all the powerful and famous people who've already been named in one way or another. Are you convinced that there would be more names if we knew everything?
Phillips: Of course, that's the whole point of everything is that there were other men. It wasn't just Jeffrey doing all of this. Jeffrey did this – he recorded everything to have things on other people, and which he did.
Inskeep: You believe this wasn't just about sex and influence – it was about extortion and blackmail.
Phillips: Yes, of course. For anyone to think it's just Jeffrey Epstein seeing hundreds of women just for his own gratification is ridiculous. Every woman that came into his world that he brought in and [who trusted him] were sent to other men. Whether they knew it or not, they know it now, and they were abused by many other powerful men – politicians, and people in the arts, entertainment, sports.
Inskeep: Mike Johnson, the House speaker, has delayed this process somewhat over the summer and raised the concern of harm to victims that releasing too much information would harm people like you. Now you've decided to speak out, but there are a lot of women who were involved. Do you think it's possible that others could be hurt?
Phillips: I don't think they care that much to say, "Oh, we're not releasing this because it's going to harm the victims." They're not releasing it because it's going to harm them and their friends and people they know.
Inskeep: Whatever their motivations are, are you concerned about women being harmed by further discussion of this or further revelations?
Phillips: No, we're already being harmed because there's no accountability. There's no transparency. That's what harms us, is that the people that need to be held accountable aren't.
Inskeep: As you've made very clear in telling your story, you were used. You were manipulated by someone. And now you are in this political fight that is about Epstein, but seems to be about a lot more, and it's partisan and everything else. Are you concerned about being used by one party or by both at this moment?
Phillips: That's a good question. I mean, for me, it's not a political issue or one side or the other. It's just a human rights issue, to get justice. So I would say no to that question.
Inskeep: President Trump talked about the Epstein files. A number of people who worked for him promised the release of the Epstein files, and then they changed course, and Trump himself seemed reluctant even during last year's campaign. He said, well, there might be innocent people who were just named in the files, and it would be unfair to them. Not that you would know personally, but you've had time to think about it. Why do you think President Trump would be reluctant now to release these files?
Phillips: I believe that President Trump is not releasing the files because he doesn't have the power to do so. I think that the people that are on the list are holding him back from doing so. I don't believe he's doing it out of personal reasons. I believe that he's protecting the people that are on the list.
Inskeep: I want to underline what you just said. And of course, you're telling us your belief. We don't know this from evidence, but you don't think his name is in there in some nefarious way more than whatever we know. You think that other people are restraining the president of the United States. Is that right?
Phillips: I think there's more powerful people on that list than President Trump.
This digital article was edited by Obed Manuel. Majd Al-Waheidi contributed. The radio version was edited by Alice Woelfle and produced by Lilly Quiroz and Lindsay Totty.
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