The US Justice Department has published thousands of documents related to late child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, many of them heavily redacted, partially in fulfillment of a congressional order to release the files.
The documents include several images of high-profile people such as former US President Bill Clinton, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor – formerly Prince Andrew, Virgin founder Richard Branson and singer Michael Jackson, as well as testimony given to FBI investigators. There is also a picture of Donald Trump.
The limited disclosures, published on the department’s website on Friday, mark the latest chapter in a saga that has stoked a political firestorm on both sides of the Atlantic amid questions about Epstein’s ties to rich and powerful figures, including the US president.
Trump, a one-time friend of Epstein, has sought to draw attention to the sex offender’s ties to top Democrats. The President did not comment on the publication of the documents on Friday. In a rare move he refused to take questions from reporters at a White House event shortly before the files were released.
He said, “I really don’t want to screw it up by asking questions, even questions that are very fair questions that I would love to answer. So I think we’ll have to stop there.”
But the DoJ’s heavily redacted disclosures are unlikely to silence critics who have accused the administration of blocking information about the Epstein case.
Deputy Attorney-General Todd Blanch acknowledged earlier Friday that the DoJ would not immediately release all the materials in its possession. He told Fox News that “several hundred thousand” would be published Friday, and “several hundred thousand more” would be made public over the next few weeks.
The release contained 3,951 documents, most of which were only one page long. The bulk release contains a total of 8,408 pages.
Still, these revelations will make for uncomfortable reading given the long list of high-profile people from politics, business and entertainment who socialized with Epstein.
Friday’s release included several photos of Clinton, including an undated photo of the former president appearing to be in a hot tub. Another showed Clinton in a swimming pool with a woman whose face was blackened, and Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s one-time girlfriend, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for child sex trafficking.
There was no suggestion that the people depicted in the latest images released from the Epstein estate had done any wrong.
A spokesperson for Clinton did not immediately respond to comment. But the spokesperson posted on social media a screenshot of a statement White House Chief of Staff Susie Wills gave to Vanity Fair in a magazine profile published earlier this week.
Wills told the magazine that “there is no evidence” Clinton visited Epstein’s private island in the Caribbean.
Friday’s release comes a day after Democratic lawmakers published a new batch of photos from the Epstein estate, showing prominent figures such as Bill Gates and Sergei Brin. The House Oversight Committee is running its own investigation into Epstein, separate from the DOJ.
Trump and top Republicans on Capitol Hill had sought for months to block the release of the DoJ’s files, which contain evidence collected during multiple criminal and civil investigations of Epstein and his associates.
This strategy angered parts of the president’s MAGA base, given that during the campaign he had said he would release the so-called Epstein files.
But a bipartisan vote in Congress last month forced the Justice Department to publish its files. The President signed the measure into law on November 19.
The law gave U.S. Attorney-General Pam Bondi 30 days to turn over the materials, but allowed the department to withhold files that could jeopardize an active federal investigation or raise national security concerns. The last date was Friday.
Blanch told Fox News on Friday that some of the materials released would be redacted to ensure that “each victim… is completely protected”.
Trump’s critics questioned the DoJ’s decision to withhold material and heavily redact some documents. The Senate’s top Democrat, Chuck Schumer, said the files released Friday were “just a fraction of the total evidence.”
He added: “Releasing the trove of black pages violates the spirit of transparency and the letter of the law.”
White House officials and Trump aides said the amendments to the file were designed to protect victims of sex trafficking.
“Why would the sick people of the liberal media want to make public a document called the “List of Masseurs”, which was apparently redacted to protect the victims?” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said, referring to a file on X that was completely blacked out without any names.
Questions remain about Trump’s relationship with Epstein, who was found dead in a prison cell in 2019 while he awaited trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.
Trump has acknowledged that he and Epstein were once friends, but said they had a falling out more than two decades ago. He has vehemently denied any involvement in Epstein’s criminal activities.
Nevertheless, questions about the federal government’s handling of the Epstein files and a separate congressional investigation have increased political pressure on the president.
Last month, the House Oversight Committee published more than 20,000 previously unseen documents from the late financier’s estate, including a 2011 email in which he said Trump was “a dog that didn’t bark” and “spent hours at my house” with a woman later identified as a victim of sex trafficking.
Undated photos published last week by Democrats on a House committee also showed photos of Trump, who in one image appeared to be posing with the financier.
The President rejected the photos and told reporters that “hundreds of people have photos of him”. A White House spokesperson accused Democrats of “selectively releasing photos with random modifications to try to create a false narrative.”
