It’s not as if the political world needed an excuse to keep focusing on the Jeffrey Epstein scandal, but The Wall Street Journal advanced the controversy with its new report on a 2003 birthday album, collected by former Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell, which reportedly included a letter bearing Donald Trump’s name.

The letter, the Journal reported, was “among the documents examined by Justice Department officials who investigated Epstein and Maxwell years ago, according to people who have reviewed the pages.” From the article:

The letter bearing Trump’s name, which was reviewed by the Journal, is bawdy — like others in the album. It contains several lines of typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman, which appears to be hand-drawn with a heavy marker. A pair of small arcs denotes the woman’s breasts, and the future president’s signature is a squiggly ‘Donald’ below her waist, mimicking pubic hair. The letter concludes: ‘Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret.’

The fact that Trump and the late millionaire pedophile had a relationship is not new. In fact, not only have we all seen the video footage of the two men hanging out, but as my MSNBC colleague James Downie noted, in 2002, a year before the birthday album came together, Trump told New York magazine, “I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy. He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.” Years later, he said the two had a falling out and that they hadn’t been in touch for 15 years before Epstein’s death in 2019.

But in light of the ongoing controversy, The Wall Street Journal’s reporting about the 2003 letter — which has not been independently verified by MSNBC — delivered another jolt to the political world about a story the White House desperately wants to go away.

For his part, Trump has had quite a bit to say about the newspaper’s reporting, publishing separate items to his social media platform, explaining that he initially tried to convince the Journal not to publish the report, and after his appeals were ignored, he announced plans to file a lawsuit.

In the latter missive, the president wrote, in reference to the letter attributed to him, “These are not my words, not the way I talk. Also, I don’t draw pictures.” The Republican made similar on-the-record comments to the Journal, which quoted him saying, “This is not me. This is a fake thing. It’s a fake Wall Street Journal story. I never wrote a picture in my life. I don’t draw pictures of women. It’s not my language. It’s not my words.”

I won’t pretend to know where this story is headed, but if a core element of Trump’s defense is that he’s never before drawn a picture, this sounds a bit sketchy.

The New York Times reported during the president’s first term, for example, on a 2005 sketch of the Manhattan skyline that Trump drew and signed, which sold at auction for more than $29,000. He signed other drawings that also sold for considerable sums.

What’s more, in his 2008 book, “Never Give Up,” Trump wrote about his annual habit of donating autographed “doodles” to be auctioned for charity.

All of which suggests the first draft of the president’s defense still needs some work.