WASHINGTON — The congressmen who forced the Justice Department to release files on notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein say Attorney General Pam Bondi is protecting powerful men by heavily redacting records — and are threatening to fine her $5,000 per day for contempt of Congress, with a “backup plan” if that doesn’t work.
Bondi is seeking to head off the mounting outcry over missing Epstein files by pledging to investigate and prosecute any credibly accused perpetrator, though skeptics claim victims already have laid out chargeable claims to investigators in “dozens” of unpublished FBI interview memos.
“This is where the survivors have named other men who either raped them or visited Epstein’s rape island or covered up the abuse,” said Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), sponsor of the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
“What the American people want to know [is]: Who are these other powerful financiers [and] powerful politicians who trafficked these women, or abused these women as girls or covered it up?” Khanna told The Post in an interview
“That is in those witness interviews, the FBI interview memorandum. They have not released a single one.”
Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, the lead Republican cosponsor of the transparency act, joined Khanna’s pushback and threatened Monday to reveal more names of powerful men if the Justice Department won’t do so on its own.
Massie told The Post that “right now the DOJ is violating the law to protect those individuals.”
“We will first pursue all options to force the DOJ to release those names, and several options remain,” he said.
“Reading the names into the Congressional Record is a viable backup plan.”
Massie claimed at a September congressional hearing that the FBI has a list of at least 20 powerful men who allegedly victimized young women and girls — naming just one, Barclays bank CEO Jes Staley, who quickly resigned.
Massie told The Post that he only knew Staley’s name and would need to be informed of the others before taking such an action.
“To be clear, I do not have the names myself. They reside with the survivors and their lawyers,” he said.
The Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause grants members of Congress legal immunity if they share information during their official duties. The privilege was famously used in 1971 by then-Sen. Mike Gravel (D-Alaska), when he released the classified “Pentagon Papers” on the Vietnam War.
Massie said at the September hearing that “documents in the FBI’s possession… detail at least 20 men, including Mr. Jes Staley, CEO of Barclays bank, who Jeffrey Epstein trafficked victims to.”
“That list also includes at least 19 other individuals,” Massie said, including “one Hollywood producer worth a few hundred million dollars, one royal prince, one high-profile individual in the music industry, one prominent banker, one high-profile government official, one high-profile former politician, one owner of a car company in Italy, one rock star, one magician, and at least six billionaires, including a billionaire from Canada.”
‘5,000 per day’ fine
Khanna said that he’s drafting a resolution to hold Bondi in contempt for not more fully releasing files — giving the attorney general a 30-day “grace period” followed by “fines [of] $5,000 per day that she doesn’t release the files.”
“I don’t want to embarrass Pam Bondi. I want to embarrass the Epstein class that visited Epstein’s rape island and raped these young girls,” Khanna said.
It’s unclear if the effort would have enough support to pass, though Khanna insisted it does.
“This is something that could pass Congress, and we have some Republicans who would be open to supporting it,” he insisted.
“But the goal is not to fight with Pam Bondi for the sake of fighting … The goal is to raise the pressure so that she does the right thing and releases the documents that the survivors want to see and that the law requires.”
Khanna said that Bondi should also release emails sent or received by Epstein, as well as the FBI interviews with victims and witnesses.
“The law explicitly says you can’t conceal information because it would be an embarrassment or reputational harm to people. The Justice Department is treating those accused with the same protection as they’re treating the victims and the survivors,” the Democrat said.
“This is one of the greatest scandals in American history. You have 1,200 young girls who were raped or abused or trafficked, and they were done by powerful men who were in finance and politicians and powerful business leaders … They sat through sex parties or parties where young girls — 13, 14 —were paraded through, and it touched the highest parts of our society.”
‘We will bring charge against anyone involved’
Bondi sought to quell the latest outcry over the Epstein case by insisting that any men who were eligible for prosecution would be held accountable.
“The Department of Justice previously stated we will bring charges against anyone involved in the trafficking and exploitation of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims. We reaffirm this commitment, and ask any victim to please come forward with any information pertaining to any individuals who engaged in illicit activity at their expense,” the attorney general tweeted Sunday.
“We have met with many victims and victims’ groups, and will continue to do so if more reach out. Please contact myself, [Deputy Attorney General Todd] Blanche, or the FBI and we will investigate immediately. We believe in the equal standard of justice in this country and will ensure that Justice is served.”
The FBI declined to comment on criticism from Khanna and Massie and the Justice Department did not immediately offer additional reaction.
Bondi helped kick off a firestorm of interest in the case by suggesting in a February interview that she was reviewing an Epstein client list, before saying in a July memo that no client list exists and that “[w]e did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.”
The Justice Department said in the memo that there are “over one thousand victims” — drawing incredulity that none of the financier’s powerful friends were involved in misconduct.
Epstein died in jail awaiting trial in 2019. The only person currently incarcerated in the case is Epstein’s girlfriend-turned-madam, Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence.
The Epstein Files Transparency Act, which mandated last week’s disclosure, allowed only limited redactions and was signed by President Trump after he initially opposed the legislation, calling it a Democratic “hoax” designed to smear him for his own association with Epstein.
Blanche wrote in a Friday letter: “The Review Protocol… instructed attorneys to redact or withhold material that (1) contained personally identifiable information of victims; 2) depicted or contained child sexual abuse materials… (3) would jeopardize an active investigation or prosecution; (4) depicted images of death, physical abuse, or injury; and/or (5) properly classified national defense or foreign policy information.”
Blanche said files also were redacted to protect victims and due to “various privileges, including deliberative-process privilege, work-product privilege, and attorney-client privilege.”
Files in the cache were so heavily redacted that in many cases it was impossible to know what they contained — in one instance, 100 pages were entirely blanked out.
Other redactions do not appear to be consistent with the described standards for review — for example, Epstein’s apparently naked backside was covered with a black box in a pair of beach photos and an exclusive image previously published by The Post from Moroccan King Mohammed VI’s wedding in 2002 showed former President Bill Clinton’s face but covered Epstein’s own.
‘Loopholes big enough for a plane’
In addition to congressional pushback, there’s an ongoing legal struggle for the files.
The conservative transparency group Judicial Watch has two ongoing Freedom of Information Act lawsuits seeking documents — one against the Justice Department and FBI and another against the CIA.
Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, a friend of Trump’s, said the Epstein Files Transparency Act had “loopholes big enough for a plane with Bill Clinton to fly to Epstein’s island” and that the group is hopeful it will receive a different, potentially less censored set of information.
The FOIA process requires officials to specify why each bit of information is being withheld and allows for judicial review. Fitton said he believes alleged Epstein co-conspirators could be named.
“The big issue is privacy. Privacy is not an automatic exemption. You weigh the public interest in understanding what the information is and learning what the information is versus the privacy interest of the individual involved,” Fitton said.
“I think… the public interest is high enough to outweigh the privacy interest of the men who appear.”
Fitton’s organization regularly unearths non-public information and cover-ups, including the Biden White House’s concealment of dog attacks that severely injured Secret Service officers, but he says that much of the success of his litigation depends on the Trump administration.
“If they take the position they can only process 500 pages a month, it could take a decade,” Fitton said. “The fact that we had to sue in court is troubling. Not one document has been released to us yet under FOIA.”
