A new GOP attack ad tries to link Democratic congressional candidate Zach Dembo to the late child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Congressional Leadership Fund
Congressional Leadership Fund
A new attack ad says Democratic congressional candidate Zach Dembo benefitted from a $500,000 political donation from Reid Hoffman, a wealthy friend of the late child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, while Dembo ducked a question on releasing the “Epstein files.”
“Billionaire Reid Hoffman vacationed on Epstein’s pedophile island after Epstein’s conviction. So why did he funnel half a million dollars into a dark money PAC for Zach Dembo?” the ad’s narrator asks.
The ad then cuts to a WLEX/Channel 18 interview with Dembo from July 2025 as he announced his candidacy.
“We asked Dembo, does he believe the Epstein files should be released?” a WLEX reporter says.
“I’m a little bit unclear right now, based on the conflicting reports, as to whether the Epstein files exist or not,” replies Dembo, a former federal prosecutor.
“Ducking the question while victims demand answers,” the narrator says over images of children cowering and covering their faces. “That’s disgusting, Zach Dembo.”
The new ad is paid for by the Congressional Leadership Fund, or CLF, a Super PAC that works with House Speaker Mike Johnson to elect Republicans to Congress.
The ad alters Dembo’s quote in the WLEX interview and does not include context surrounding the degree to which both parties are tied to associates of Epstein.
The CLF, the same Super PAC which paid for the ad, accepted a $5 million donation in April from Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. Lawmakers have scrutinized Lutnick for his own ties to Epstein, including his visit to Epstein’s private island and his appearances in the Epstein files.
Lutnick has not been accused of wrongdoing. He described his interactions with Epstein, his neighbor in New York, as “meaningless and inconsequential” during a closed-door meeting with the House Oversight Committee in May.
Further muddying the GOP’s attack in this instance, Republican President Donald Trump has endorsed Dembo’s Republican opponent, Ralph Alvarado, and financially helped Alvarado through his MAGA Inc. PAC.
Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump were friends who socialized together for years. Now that Trump has endorsed Ralph Alvarado for Congress, the Epstein-Trump connection muddies the waters when Alvarado and his allies accuse Zach Dembo of having unsavory ties to Epstein’s world.
Trump was a friend of Epstein who socialized with him for years, calling him “a terrific guy” and “a lot of fun to be with.” Trump says he later cut off Epstein after he decided the man was a “creep,” although the exact timing of their rift has been hard to determine.
All that aside, are the CLF ad’s claims about Dembo accurate?
Did an Epstein associate really give big money to Zach Dembo’s campaign?
One of the outside groups supporting Dembo in the 6th District race is Kentuckians Not Corruption PAC, run by a longtime Democratic operative in Washington, D.C., named Christopher Koob.
From Aug. 14 through Sept. 30, the group reported $1.2 million in contributions, including $500,000 on Sept. 24 from Reid Hoffman, a venture capitalist and co-founder of LinkedIn.
Hoffman was also a friend of Epstein, who died in a New York jail cell in 2019. Hoffman visited Epstein’s island, exchanged gifts and offered him advice about dealing with the growing scandal around his child sex activities. Hoffman has since condemned Epstein’s actions.
On the question of the Epstein files, the huge trove of U.S. Department of Justice investigative documents concerning Epstein’s activities: Dembo called for their release months before Trump was pressured, most notably by U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., into releasing many of the files last January.
In an August 2025 interview on WKYT/Channel 27, Dembo said: “One of the things we’re hearing a lot about these days is the Epstein files. And I think that is a great example of corruption in D.C., wherein the president promised to release them and has failed to do so.”
That interview came a month after the WLEX interview used in the attack ad.
“Where I come from, you keep your promises,” Dembo said in the WKYT interview. “Not only that, but as a prosecutor, I know these victims deserve justice, too. So I don’t care if Democrats or Republicans are hurt by the release of the Epstein files. We need to be transparent, and we need to be sure we’re not protecting the rich and the powerful at the expense of normal, hard-working Kentuckians.”
The portion of the July 2025 WLEX interview used in the CLF attack ad omits several words and leaves out some important context.
In the interview, Dembo was criticizing former Attorney General Pam Bondi for giving contradictory information to the public on whether an Epstein “client list” existed and would be released by the Justice Department.
When Trump fired Bondi in April 2025, it was considered largely due to her handling of the Epstein files.
“I’m a little bit unclear right now, based on the conflicting reports coming from the attorney general, as to whether the Epstein files exist or not,” Dembo told WLEX in July 2025.
The CLF ad removed the words “coming from the attorney general” from the middle of Dembo’s quote.
“So the first thing I would ask is, we need to know the truth about whether they do exist,” he continued. “That sort of discussion and the inconsistent statements coming from Department of Justice leadership are a great example of why I had to resign in the first place and why I’m taking this step.”
Is the ad accurate?
No, the ad is not accurate.
Dembo did not duck the issue of the Epstein files. He plainly called for their release last year.
It is accurate that Hoffman, a former friend of Epstein, gave $500,000 to a PAC that has supported Dembo.
However, Hoffman is not the only Epstein associate involved in the 6th Congressional District race. Epstein famously cultivated many powerful friends in finance and politics, and Alvarado has benefitted from some of them, too.
This story was originally published October 22, 2026 at 6:59 AM.
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John Cheves is a government accountability reporter at the Lexington Herald-Leader. He joined the newspaper in 1997 and previously worked in its Washington and Frankfort bureaus and covered the courthouse beat.
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