How US commerce secretary's Epstein links were uncovered by British whistleblower

A British whistleblower, Simon Andriesz, has told the BBC how he uncovered evidence suggesting that US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick failed to disclose a business relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Andriesz, a former managing director at a Wall Street firm, discovered an email chain from 2018 in which Lutnick and Epstein discussed a start-up business they were both involved in. He shared his findings from the released Epstein files with US politicians on the House Oversight Committee ahead of Lutnick's appearance there in May. Lutnick told the committee he only learned this year that Epstein was an investor, and the Commerce Department stated there was no evidence of wrongdoing. Andriesz also found that one of Lutnick's firms had planned in 2013 to go into business with Prince Andrew, a figure linked to Epstein, involving a £1m loan to "basically buy a prince." Andriesz, who had previously raised concerns about accounting irregularities at his former employer BGC Partners and was sacked in 2017, discovered his own name in the Epstein files related to FBI interviews he gave about his dispute with the firm. BGC has denied Andriesz's allegations, calling them "categorically false." Andriesz expressed disappointment that his exposure of Lutnick's financial links to Epstein has garnered little interest.