More than 2 million files from convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein remain sealed nearly three weeks after Congress’s legally mandated deadline for their release.
Both Democrats and Republican lawmakers are accusing Attorney General Pam Bondi of orchestrating a cover-up.
The Department of Justice revealed in a court filing recently that over 2 million documents are still under review, despite the Epstein Files Transparency Act requiring all records be redacted, unclassified, and released by December 19.
So far, only 12,000 some documents – just over 125,000 — pages have been made public across three separate releases.
That’s less than 1 percent of the estimated 5.2 million total Epstein files. The public still does not know who was on Epstein’s secret client list.
Rep. Thomas Massie, the Kentucky Republican who co-authored the Epstein Files Transparency Act, and Rep. Ro Khanna, the California Democrat who worked with him on the bill, announced they are pursuing “inherent contempt” charges against Bondi for not complying with the law.
“I think the most expeditious way to get justice for these victims is to bring inherent contempt against Pam Bondi,” Massie said recently.
Khanna and Massie posted a video statement blasting the partial December 19 release, and said it “grossly fails to comply with both the spirit and the letter of the law.”
“Americans deserve the truth. DOJ’s refusal to follow the law … and release the full files is an obstruction of justice,” Khanna said in a statement. “They also need to release the FBI witness interviews which name other men, so the public can know who was involved. DOJ is spending more time protecting the Epstein class than the survivors, whose names are required by law to be redacted.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has introduced legislation directing the Senate to initiate legal action against the DOJ for failing to comply with the Epstein files transparency law. He called the partial release a “blatant cover-up” by Bondi.
Contempt is a rarely used congressional power that allows lawmakers to fine, or even arrest, federal officials obstructing the law. It was last successfully used in the 1930s, according to the American Bar Association.
Blanche defended the staggered release on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday, and said the DOJ is working to protect victims’ identities.
“The material that we released on Friday, or the material that we’re going to release over the next a couple of weeks, is exactly what the statute requires us to release,” Blanche said.
A bipartisan group of 12 senators led by Richard Blumenthal, Lisa Murkowski, and Jeff Merkley called for an audit of the DOJ’s handling of the Epstein files in a letter to DOJ Acting Inspector General Don Berthiaume.
“Given the Administration’s historic hostility to releasing the files, politicization of the Epstein case more broadly, and failure to comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, a neutral assessment of its compliance with the statutory disclosure requirements is essential,” the lawmakers wrote.
Massie said previously that many of Epstein’s victims’ lawyers told him “there are at least 20 names of men who are accused of sex crimes in the possession of the FBI.”
“So if we get a large production on December 19th and it does not contain a single name of any male who’s accused of a sex crime or sex trafficking or rape or any of these things, then we know they haven’t produced all the documents,” Massie said.
At the current pace, the release of the full Epstein files could take years to complete. The DOJ said it does not expect to release more documents until late January, more than a month past the congressional deadline.