Howard Lutnick, President Donald Trump’s commerce secretary, denied on Tuesday that he misled the public on his past interactions with the late Jeffrey Epstein and downplayed his association with the disgraced child sex offender.

During questioning from Democrats at a Senate appropriations committee hearing on broadband, Lutnick, who for years lived next door to Epstein’s New York City mansion, said he met the billionaire financier three times over the course of 14 years.