Viral photo, flight logs don't prove Chief Justice John Roberts went to Jeffrey Epstein’s island

There’s no evidence that U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts was photographed on Jeffrey Epstein’s private island, despite what some social media users claim. 

A related narrative claims Roberts was listed in Epstein’s flight logs, but it also lacks evidence.

The claims falsely connecting Roberts to Epstein, the billionaire who was accused of running a sex trafficking ring before he died in jail, have picked up as supporters of President Donald Trump attack the Supreme Court for rejecting a bid to overturn the election in his favor.

Attorney Lin Wood, who has pushed unfounded claims of voter fraud and has hashtags related to the QAnon conspiracy theory in his Twitter bio, suggested in one of several Dec. 17 tweets that the chief justice was listed on Epstein’s flight logs. Social media users quickly followed suit.

"Lin Wood confirms Chief Justice John Roberts was on Epstein’s pedo island, has documentation" said the headline on one pro-Trump blog post shared widely on Facebook.

"John Roberts having fun at Epstein’s island!" said another Facebook post, which showed a photo of President Bill Clinton with several other men in an ocean. "He is compromised!"

The posts about Roberts were flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) 

In reality, the photograph that social media users say shows Roberts on Epstein’s private island was actually snapped at a Dominican Republic resort in January 2017. The picture shows Clinton with four men. It was featured in Spanish-language news reports from the time.

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Other fact-checkers have debunked the same claim, as well as similarly false claims that said photos from the same trip showed Clinton with Epstein and another convicted sex offender. 

It’s not clear who the person social media users identified as Roberts actually is. But as the Dispatch noted, photographs from Trump’s inauguration — which also took place in January 2017 — show that Roberts had grayer hair and a bigger bald spot than the man in question.

President Donald Trump is sworn in as the 45th president of the United States by Chief Justice John Roberts during the 58th Presidential Inauguration in Washington on Jan. 20, 2017 (AP)

The Supreme Court also heard several oral arguments that month, the court’s calendar shows.

A person by the name of "John Roberts" was listed in 2010 and 2011 entries in the handwritten flight logs kept by Epstein’s pilots. But PolitiFact found no credible evidence that the person named is the chief justice, as opposed to another person by the same name. 

Other fact-checkers noted that after the logs came out, Fox News White House correspondent John Roberts also denied any connection to Epstein on Twitter.

PolitiFact searched Google and Nexis and found no credible reports indicating that the chief justice was friends with Epstein. Other fact-checkers reached the same conclusion. We reached out to Wood and the Supreme Court’s public information office, but we did not hear back.

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