The latest revelation from the email archive of the late pedophile sexual predator and financier Jeffrey Epstein puts the British government of Labor Prime Minister Keir Starmer in great distress from an unexpected source: a photo of Peter Mandelson in his underwear in Epstein’s New York apartment.
The “Prince of Darkness”, as the now 72-year-old is called Peter Mandelson at the time of the last Labor government of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, apparently still casts its shadow over the Labor Party.
He was once a central figure in the New Labor project, but he regularly caused scandals and was forced to resign from ministerial posts twice. Nevertheless, he was already elevated to the House of Lords and in February 2025, Keir Starmer, who relies on numerous New Labor figures, appointed Lord Mandelson as the new British US ambassador.
Already in September Mandelson had to be released again – even back then because of publications from the Epstein archive, according to which he had criticized Epstein’s first conviction for sexual offenses against a minor and continued to call Epstein a friend.
Revealed state secrets to Epstein
A police investigation against Mandelson has been underway since Monday following the latest revelations, following demands from the opposition parties Reform UK and SNP (Scottish National Party). As a minister, he regularly passed on internal government information and state secrets to Epstein. With wise foresight, Mandelson resigned his Labor Party membership on Sunday evening.
The documents also include Epstein’s bank statements from 2003 and 2004. They show transfers to Mandelson totaling $75,000. Mandelson’s current husband received the equivalent of 12,000 euros for a training course in osteopathy in 2009 and 2010, when Mandelon was Minister of Economy and Trade. At the same time, Mandelson sent an internal government memorandum to Epstein about the proposed sale of government assets. Another email from 2009 contains internal government suggestions for handling the global financial crisis at the time. It is unclear whether it comes from Mandelson because the sender is covered up.
In 2010, Mandelson also confirmed to Epstein a 500 billion euro rescue package from the EU one day in advance. Two years later, Mandelson gave Epstein privileged information about the next head of Barclays Bank, five days before the official confirmation.
On Tuesday afternoon, Mandelson announced he was resigning his seat in the upper house. Darren Jones, the British Minister for Interministerial Relations, had called Mandelson a criminal to be despised and promised a law that would make it easier to withdraw his mandate in the event of serious violations of parliamentary rules.
Gordon Brown and his pseudonym
Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, under whom Mandelson served as minister from 2008 to 20010, had already asked the Starmer government in September 2025 to explicitly review the communication between Epstein and Mandelson at the time regarding information about state asset sales. But nothing is said to have been found. Why did Brown want this of all things to be checked back then?
One possibility is that the email with the cover-up broadcaster about measures to address the banking crisis came from Gordon Brown himself – under the pseudonym “John Pond”, which Gordon Brown is known to have used in government communications at the time when he wanted to keep his own name out of it.
All of this now casts a huge shadow over Labor then and now. On Wednesday, parliamentarians want to request more government information about Peter Mandelson, such as what was known about Mandelson before his appointment as ambassador to the USA.