WASHINGTON — Lawmakers unhappy with Justice Department decisions to heavily redact or withhold documents from a legally mandated release of files related to Jeffrey Epstein threatened Saturday to launch impeachment proceedings against those responsible, including Pam Bondi, the U.S. attorney general.
Democrats and Republicans alike criticized the omissions, while Democrats also accused the Justice Department of intentionally scrubbing the release of at least one image of President Trump, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) suggesting it could portend “one of the biggest coverups in American history.”
Trump administration officials have said the release fully complied with the law, and that its redactions were crafted only to protect victims of Epstein, a disgraced financier and convicted sex offender accused of abusing hundreds of women and girls before his death in 2019.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Fremont), an author of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which required the release of the investigative trove, blasted Bondi in a social media video, accusing her of denying the existence of many of the records for months, only to push out “an incomplete release with too many redactions” in response to — and in violation of — the new law.
Khanna said he and the bill’s co-sponsor, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), were “exploring all options” for responding and forcing more disclosures, including by pursuing “the impeachment of people at Justice,” asking courts to hold officials blocking the release in contempt, and “referring for prosecution those who are obstructing justice.”
“We will work with the survivors to demand the full release of these files,” Khanna said.
He later added in a CNN interview that he and Massie were drafting articles of impeachment against Bondi, though they had not decided whether to bring them forward.
Massie, in his own social media post, said Khanna was correct in rejecting the Friday release as insufficient, saying it “grossly fails to comply with both the spirit and the letter of the law.”
The lawmakers’ view that the Justice Department’s document dump failed to comply with the law echoed similar complaints across the political spectrum Saturday, as the full scope of redactions and other withholdings came into focus.
The frustration had already sharply escalated late Friday, after Fox News Digital reported that the names and identifiers of not just victims but of “politically exposed individuals and government officials” had been redacted from the records — which would violate the law, and which Justice Department officials denied.
Among the critics was Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who cited the Fox reporting in an exasperated post late Friday to X.
“The whole point was NOT to protect the ‘politically exposed individuals and government officials.’ That’s exactly what MAGA has always wanted, that’s what drain the swamp actually means. It means expose them all, the rich powerful elites who are corrupt and commit crimes, NOT redact their names and protect them,” Greene wrote.
Senior Justice Department officials later called in to Fox News to dispute the report. But the removal of a file published in the Friday evening release, capturing a desk in Epstein’s home with a drawer filled of photos of Trump, reinforced bipartisan concerns that references to the president had been illegally withheld.
In a release of documents from the Epstein family estate by the House Oversight Committee this fall, Trump’s name was featured over 1,000 times — more than any other public figure.
“If they’re taking this down, just imagine how much more they’re trying to hide,” Schumer wrote on X. “This could be one of the biggest coverups in American history.”
Several victims also said the release was insufficient. “It’s really kind of another slap in the face,” Alicia Arden, who went to the police to report that Epstein had abused her in 1997, told CNN. “I wanted all the files to come out, like they said that they were going to.”
Trump, who signed the act into law after having worked to block it from getting a vote, was conspicuously quiet on the matter. In a long speech in North Carolina on Friday night, he did not mention it.
However, White House officials and Justice Department leaders strongly pushed back against the notion that the release was somehow incomplete or out of compliance with the law, or that the names of politicians had been redacted.
“The only redactions being applied to the documents are those required by law — full stop,” said Deputy Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche. “Consistent with the statute and applicable laws, we are not redacting the names of individuals or politicians unless they are a victim.”
Other Republicans defended the administration. Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), chair of the House Oversight Committee, said the administration “is delivering unprecedented transparency in the Epstein case and will continue releasing documents.”
Epstein died in a Manhattan jail awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. He’d been convicted in 2008 of procuring a child for prostitution in Florida, but served only 13 months in custody in what many condemned as a sweetheart plea deal for a well-connected and rich defendant.
Epstein’s crimes have attracted massive attention, including among many within Trump’s own political base, in part because of unanswered questions surrounding which of his many powerful friends may have also been implicated in crimes against children. Some of those questions have swirled around Trump, who was friends with Epstein for years before the two had what the president has described as a falling out.
Evidence has emerged in recent months that suggests Trump may have had knowledge of Epstein’s crimes during their friendship.
Epstein wrote in a 2019 email, released by the House Oversight Committee, that Trump “knew about the girls.” In a 2011 email to Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted of conspiring with Epstein to help him sexually abuse girls, Epstein wrote that “the dog that hasn’t barked is trump. [Victim] spent hours at my house with him … he has never once been mentioned.”
Trump has ardently denied any wrongdoing.
The records released Friday contained few if any major new revelations, but did include a complaint against Epstein filed with the FBI back in 1996 — which the FBI did little with, substantiating longstanding fears among Epstein’s victims that his crimes could have been stopped years earlier.
Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), one of the president’s most consistent critics, wrote on X that Bondi should appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee to explain under oath the extensive redactions and omissions, which he called a “willful violation of the law.”
“The Trump Justice Department has had months to keep their promise to release all of the Epstein Files,” Schiff wrote. “Epstein’s survivors and the American people need answers now.”
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