Trump Goon Scrambles in Last-Minute Late-Night Epstein Files Drama
The Trump administration wants more time to publish more of the Epstein files because it “needs to protect” the victims it has spent months publicly outing.
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“The Court should not order the [Justice] Department to take further action,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche wrote in a filing late Thursday night. He was responding to a D.C. lawsuit over the DOJ’s handling of the scandal.
Blanche asked that if the judge demands a fresh release, “the Court grant a stay of sixty days” so that the department can consider an appeal, or seven days “at a minimum” so it can weigh filing for emergency review. He says he wants to shield “victims, law enforcement personnel, and the Department’s resources.”
Trump signed a law in November ordering the release of investigative files concerning Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes. He did so as scrutiny of the president’s own, once-close relationship with the pedophile was mounting, and only after a bipartisan push through both Congress and the Senate forced his hand.
The DOJ’s bungled release of the files has so far sparked almost as much backlash as Trump’s initial refusal to order it, prompting the president to fire Attorney General Pam Bondi in March. To date, the department has published around half of the documents in its possession.
Trump’s order allows officials to redact documents to protect victims’ identities. Many of the omissions, critics say, have instead protected Epstein’s alleged accomplices. A review by The Wall Street Journal found the published documents featured at least 43 victims’ full names.
They include more than two dozen who were minors at the time of abuse, and some names appeared over 100 times. Survivors’ attorneys have put the figure much higher.
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Katie Phang, a lawyer and former MSNBC journalist, brought the D.C. lawsuit against the DOJ in April. She claims the department violated the Epstein Files Transparency Act, signed by the president in November, by withholding certain documents and needlessly redacting the ones it did release.
Blanche, who is Trump’s former criminal defense attorney, replaced Bondi at the department’s helm in March, and the president has since tipped him to take on the role permanently. He has defended the department’s handling of the case and rejected the idea that it is obliged to publish more.
Phang’s suit argues that Blanche’s refusal is illegal in several respects. Among other things, she notes the department has redacted the identities of recipients and senders on an email thread in which Epstein discussed a “torture video” and having sex with underage girls.
District Judge Emmet Sullivan, a George W. Bush appointee, is presiding over the lawsuit. He ordered Blanche last Thursday to either produce the unredacted material Phang has requested or explain exactly why Blanche believes he’s allowed to withhold it.
Sullivan noted that Blanche had, by that point, made a number of procedural maneuvers to get the case dismissed while failing to “respond substantively to any of the arguments” laid out in the suit.
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The Daily Beast has contacted the Justice Department for comment on this story.
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