A Republican-led US House of Representatives committee said it released 33,295 pages of files on the late high-society sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, as a pair of lawmakers continued to push for the “full release of the Epstein files” by the administration of President Donald Trump.
The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said on Tuesday that the thousands of pages on the Epstein case were provided by the Department of Justice and that the documents had been redacted to remove “victim identities and any child sexual abuse material”.
The mass document release comes as Republican Representative Thomas Massie and Democratic Representative Ro Khanna continued to call for what Khanna described as “the full release of the Epstein files and justice for the survivors.”
Massie and Khanna’s “full release” proposal would require Attorney General Pam Bondi to make public all unclassified Epstein records in the possession of the Justice Department, including the FBI and US attorneys’ offices.
Massie and Khanna were scheduled to hold a news conference with some of Epstein’s victims on Wednesday morning to support their call for the full release of files in the high-profile case.
Republican House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters that he believed Massie’s petition was “inartfully drafted”, because it lacked language that would protect the identities of victims who were sexually abused by Epstein.
Johnson also claimed the petition for the full release of the Epstein files was “moot” due to the work of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which had released thousands of pages of files on Monday.
“It’s superfluous at this point, and I think we’re achieving the desired end here,” Johnson said.
The committee subpoenaed the Justice Department and Epstein’s estate for documents and took a deposition from convicted Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.
In July, the Justice Department and the FBI released a memo stating that a “systematic review” of Epstein-related files “revealed no incriminating ‘client list’”, and said that no credible evidence had been found that Epstein had blackmailed prominent figures.
That announcement surprised many people, including prominent conservatives among Trump’s support base, who had been pushing for all Epstein-related documents to be released, a promise Trump had made during his re-election campaign.
A poll in July by Reuters/Ipsos found that a majority of Americans, including among Trump’s Republicans, believe his administration is hiding details on the Epstein case.
Epstein was linked to a sizeable number of high-profile politicians and businesspeople through his financial dealings and charitable contributions.
He was found dead in his New York City jail cell on August 10, 2019, where he was being held while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. His death was ruled a suicide.
Some of Epstein’s victims were girls as young as 14.
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