Both the House and Senate acted decisively on Tuesday to pass a bill to force the Justice Department to publicly release its files on the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a remarkable display of approval for an effort that had struggled for months to overcome opposition from US President Donald Trump and Republican leadership.
When a small bipartisan group of House lawmakers introduced a petition in July to manoeuvre around House Speaker Mike Johnson’s control of which bills reach the House floor, it appeared a long-shot effort — especially as Trump urged his supporters to dismiss the matter as a “hoax”.
But both Trump and Johnson failed in their efforts to prevent the vote. Now the President has bowed to the growing momentum behind the bill and even said he would sign it if it also passed the Senate.
The decisive, bipartisan work in Congress further showed the pressure mounting on lawmakers and the Trump administration to meet long-held demands that the Justice Department release its case files on Epstein, a well-connected financier who killed himself in a Manhattan jail while awaiting trial in 2019 on charges he sexually abused and trafficked underage girls.
For survivors of Epstein’s abuse, passage of the bill was a watershed moment in a years-long quest for accountability.
“These women have fought the most horrific fight that no woman should have to fight. And they did it by banding together and never giving up," said Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene as she stood with some of the abuse survivors outside the Capitol.
"That’s what we did by fighting so hard against the most powerful people in the world, even the president of the United States, in order to make this vote happen today," added Greene, a Georgia Republican and longtime Trump loyalist.
In the end, only one lawmaker in Congress opposed the bill. Representative Clay Higgins, a Louisiana Republican who is a fervent supporter of Trump, was the only "nay" vote in the House's 427-1 tally. He said he worried the legislation could lead to the release of information on innocent people mentioned in the federal investigation.
The bill forces the release within 30 days of all files and communications related to Epstein, as well as any information about the investigation into his death in federal prison. It would allow the Justice Department to redact information about Epstein’s victims or continuing federal investigations, but not information due to "embarrassment, reputational harm, or political sensitivity".
A separate investigation conducted by the House Oversight Committee has released thousands of pages of emails and other documents from Epstein's estate, showing his connections to global leaders, Wall Street powerbrokers, influential political figures and Trump himself. In the United Kingdom, King Charles III stripped his disgraced brother, Andrew, of his remaining titles and evicted him from his royal residence after pressure to act over his relationship with Epstein.
Pushing for more accountability, the survivors of Epstein's abuse cast the current effort in Congress as a step towards accountability for Epstein's crimes after years of government failure under multiple presidential administrations.
Senate acts quickly
Even as the bill cleared his chamber, Johnson pressed for the Senate to amend it to protect the information of "victims and whistleblowers." But Senate Majority Leader John Thune quickly shut down that notion.
As senators gathered in the chamber Tuesday evening (local time) for the first votes of the week, it became clear no one would object to passing the bill as written.
Just before Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer called to pass the bill by unanimous consent, Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin, a Republican who is close to Trump, walked in the chamber and gave Schumer a thumbs-up. He then walked over to Schumer and shook his hand.
"This is about giving the American people the transparency they’ve been crying for," said Schumer, D-NY "This is about holding accountable all the people in Jeffrey Epstein’s circle who raped, groom, targeted and enabled the abuse of hundreds of girls for years and years."
Trump's reversal on the Epstein files
Trump has said he cut ties with Epstein years ago, but tried for months to move past the demands for disclosure. On Tuesday, he told reporters that Epstein was connected to more Democrats and that he didn't want the Epstein files to "detract from the great success of the Republican Party".
Still, many in the Republican base have continued to demand the release of the files. Adding to that pressure, several survivors of Epstein's abuse rallied outside the Capitol Tuesday morning. Bundled in jackets against the November chill and holding photos of themselves as teenagers, they recounted their stories of abuse.
“We are exhausted from surviving the trauma and then surviving the political conflicts that surround it,” said Jena-Lisa Jones, one of the survivors.
She added that she had voted for Trump, but had a message for the president: “I beg you, Donald Trump, please stop making this political.”
The group of women also met with Johnson and rallied outside the Capitol in September, but have had to wait months for the vote.
That's because Johnson kept the House closed for legislative business for nearly two months and also refused to swear in Democratic Representative Adelita Grijalva of Arizona during the government shutdown.
After winning a special election on September 23, Grijalva had pledged to provide the crucial 218th vote to the petition for the Epstein files bill. But only after she was sworn into office last week could she sign her name to the discharge petition to give it majority support in the 435-member House.
It quickly became apparent that the bill would pass, and both Johnson and Trump began to fold. Trump on Monday said Republicans should vote for the bill.
Yet Greene told reporters that Trump's decision to fight the bill had betrayed his Make America Great Again political movement.
"Watching this turn into a fight has ripped MAGA apart," she said.
How Johnson is handling the bill
Rather than waiting until next week for the discharge position to officially take effect, Johnson moved to hold the vote under a procedure that required a two-thirds majority.
But Johnson also spent a morning news conference listing off problems that he saw with the legislation. He argued that the bill could have unintended consequences by disclosing parts of federal investigations that were usually kept private, including information on victims.
“This is a raw and obvious political exercise," Johnson said.
Still, he planned to vote for the bill. “None of us want to go on record and in any way be accused of not being for maximum transparency,” he added.
Meanwhile, House Democrats celebrated the vote as a rare win for the minority.
“It’s a complete and total surrender, because as Democrats we made clear from the very beginning, the survivors and the American people deserve full and complete transparency as it relates to the lives that were ruined by Jeffrey Epstein,” said House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries.
The morning's headlines in 90 seconds, including ‘helpful information’ comes to the Marokopa investigation, weather warnings in place, and a step towards the Epstein files being released. (Source: Breakfast)
SHARE ME