Deputy U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche, the point person on the Trump administration’s release of the Epstein files, told ABC News on Sunday that the prosecutors’ review Jeffrey Epstein-Ghislaine Maxwell Sex-trafficking case “closed”.
Separately, in comments to CNN about Epstein, Blanche said the “victims want to be made whole” after the late convicted sex offender was acquitted of the scheme and led to a 20-year prison sentence for Maxwell beginning in 2022.
“And we want it,” Blanche said. “But that doesn’t mean we can just create evidence or come up with a case that isn’t there.”
Blanche admitted that “there are a lot of gruesome photos that appear to have been taken by Mr. Epstein or people around him … that don’t allow us to prosecute anybody.”
Blanche’s comments took aim at survivors who met Friday’s release with calls for more accountability for Epstein and Maxwell’s alleged clients. He made those comments amid complaints from federal Democratic lawmakers that Friday’s release — along with several previous ones — was incomplete.
Responding to a question about claims by victim advocates that some identities were not properly corrected, Blanche said Sunday, “We will correct that immediately.” But, he added, “the numbers we’re talking about are .001% of all materials.”
Blanche said it was “amazing” that the Justice Department was facing cover-up allegations less than a day after leaking millions of files.
“We have nothing to hide,” Blanche said. “We never did.”
However, US House member Ro Khanna, Democrat of California, disputed that the Justice Department’s Epstein investigative archive had been vacated as requested by the Transparency Act, which he co-authored.
“They released half the documents at best,” he told CNN. “But they also shock the conscience of this country.”
Khanna referred to some of the files that revealed references and correspondence to prominent figures including a multi-billionaire businessman. Elon Musk and Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick. Those celebrities were at times associated with Epstein or attended private events he hosted at his homes, but have not been accused of wrongdoing.
A former friend Donald TrumpEpstein pleaded guilty in Florida in 2008 to prostitution of a minor and solicitation of prostitution. Epstein committed suicide in federal custody in New York in 2019, when Trump was first president, while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges, officials said.
“You have very wealthy people, tech leaders, financial leaders, politicians, all implicated in some way, emailing them, knowing Epstein is a pedophile and wanting to go to Epstein Island,” Khanna said.
Khanna added: “This is, in my view, one of the biggest scandals in our country’s history. And there is a demand for greater accountability. But the survivors’ lawyers I spoke to said the survivors are still upset. Many are upset that their names have been mistakenly redacted.
Separately, Maryland House Democrat Jamie Raskin said: “The case is closed [the Trump administration’s] mantra” from weeks ago. He also said the 3m documents released on Friday were “nothing when they decide what documents are coming out.”
Top House Democrat Hakeem Jeffries echoed that line during a Sunday appearance on ABC’s This Week.
“This is not over, and it won’t be over until there is full and complete transparency, as survivors have demanded, so that there is full and complete accountability,” Jeffries said.
He also said there were “more … documents withheld” by what he mockingly referred to as the “department of injustice”.
“So the question that needs to be asked — the American people are asking — is what are they hiding from the American people and who are they protecting?” Jeffries commented.
The Justice Department previously said separate investigations in Florida and New York found multiple copies of Epstein’s pages in its files.
