former Apollo Global Management CEO Leon Black declined to answer questions about his non-disclosure agreement during Friday’s testimony before a House committee about his dealings with notorious sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, according to the committee’s Republican chairman.
The chairman, Representative James Comer of Kentucky, said he had issued two subpoenas to Mr. Black, “the first for all of the NDAs in which he participates, and the second for his July 16 deposition.”
“This is a result of … refusing to answer specific questions about the NDA and its terms,” Comer told reporters after a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing. “We believe the information is vital to the investigation.”
“I would like to remind everyone that Mr. Black came voluntarily and they have refused to disclose that, so I have issued a subpoena and we are giving it to him as we speak,” Comer said.
Comer earlier told reporters that the committee was “fairly confident” that Black had signed non-disclosure agreements with some of his victims.
When Mr. Black received his subpoena, he took a long break and then finished his interview.
In an opening statement prepared for the committee, billionaire Black denied knowing about the late Epstein’s serial sexual abuse of underage girls and young women, but praised Epstein’s financial acumen.
“Mr. Epstein resolved for me a major property matter that none of the experts and lawyers I consulted could resolve,” Black told the committee, according to a copy of his statement obtained by CNBC.
“It was an issue that destroyed tremendous value for my family and the company I founded, Apollo,” Black said.
“This is the first time someone has actually walked out in the middle of (an interview) because there were very important questions about Leon Black and Jeffrey Epstein’s past,” said Rep. Suhas Subrahmanyam, D-Virginia, a committee member.
“This is also the first time I’ve ever heard someone wax poetic about how smart Jeffrey Epstein was and how great he was,” Subrahmanyam said.
“I think the fact that Leon Black resigned today is very telling,” said Rep. Yassamin Ansari of Arizona, the other Democrat on the committee.
“We’ve had a number of these interviews, and I think there were a number of unreliable witnesses who lied to the committee over and over again,” Ansari said.
“But today was even more different. Leon Black was arrogant and smug.”
Black’s attorney, Susan Estrich, said in comments to reporters that issuing the subpoena was a “deliberate political decision.”
“As Mr. Black said, let me be clear: He has never abused any women, he has never been with any underage women, he has never engaged in sex trafficking, he has never paid Epstein for access to women, he has never been threatened by Epstein,” Estrich said. “Mr. Black knew nothing about Mr. Epstein’s heinous acts.”
In his prepared opening statement, Mr. Black said Mr. Epstein defrauded him of more than $60 million in financial advisory fees by falsely claiming they were tax deductible.
Black said he was not involved in Epstein’s sex trafficking operations and that he was not paid for contacting women.
In a prepared opening statement, he said he was misled by Mr. Epstein’s Jekyll and Hyde personality.
Leon Black, former CEO of Apollo Global Management, arrives to testify before a closed session of the House Oversight Committee at the Capitol in Washington, DC, on June 26, 2026.
Kevin Dietch | Getty Images
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has been investigating Epstein’s relationships with a number of wealthy and influential people.
Comer earlier told reporters that Black’s interview “could be the most groundbreaking of all the testimony.”
“It’s pretty significant,” Comer said.
“I came here voluntarily today to set the record straight about my relationship with Jeffrey Epstein and specifically why I paid him,” Black said in a prepared statement.
“Let me be clear: I have never abused a woman,” Black said.
“I have never dated any underage women. I have never been involved in sex trafficking. I have never paid Epstein for access to women,” he said. “I have never been threatened by Epstein. I had no involvement in or knowledge of any of Epstein’s heinous activities.”
“I knew about Jekyll, but I didn’t know about Hyde,” Black said.
In his statement, Black relied on the 2021 findings of the so-called “Dechert Report.” The report is named after the law firm retained to investigate how much money Epstein paid for financial advice, the work he performed, and whether he knew about his conduct before his 2019 arrest on federal child sex trafficking charges.
“Dechert’s report concluded that I paid Mr. Epstein $158 million,” Black said, according to prepared remarks.
“Dechert then investigated the services provided by Epstein and determined that Epstein performed extremely valuable and legitimate tax and estate planning services for my family’s office, that his tax work contributed to billions of dollars in savings, and that all of Epstein’s work was vetted by reputable law and accounting firms.”
Mr. Black said Mr. Epstein told him that the fee he was paying him was “60 cents on the dollar, which is tax-deductible,” but he learned years later that this was not true.
“So what I believed was $95 million in net fees paid to him over five years was actually $158 million,” Black said. “However, at the time I was led by Epstein to believe that he was paying ’60 cents on the dollar.’ That assurance was false.”
Rep. Robert Garcia of California, the ranking Democrat on the committee, told reporters that the amount of money Mr. Black paid Mr. Epstein was “an enormous amount of money, and without Mr. Black’s support Jeffrey Epstein would not have been able to commit his horrific crimes.”
Mr. Black said he met Mr. Epstein in the mid-1990s when Mr. Epstein was a trustee of Rockefeller University.
“His network included such respected luminaries as David Rockefeller, Ehud Barak, Larry Summers, George Mitchell, Bill Richardson and Ace Greenberg,” Black said.
He said he had known Mr. Epstein for 18 years “before I paid him a dime.”
Black said he began paying Epstein in 2013 for “honest advice” on tax, insurance, trust and estate matters, saying he had “remarkable acumen.”
“In hindsight, we know, as does the world, that Epstein engaged in horrific and despicable activities,” Black said.
“I feel terrible for Epstein’s victims.”
—CNBC’s Irit Skulnik and Karen James Sloan contributed to this article
