Republicans warn Bondi not to bury the Epstein files after the law is passed John Thune
Within hours of Donald Trump signing the Epstein Files Transparency Act into law, Republican senators were on the floor to issue a clear message to US Attorney General Pam Bondi: Don’t bury these documents.
The bill’s passage marks a rare moment of bipartisan support in an ideologically divided Congress, which now sets a 30-day deadline for the release of Justice Department files related to the actions of convicted sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein, who goes by the name By the judge “The most famous pedophile in American history.”
It also represents a rare defeat for Trump, whose connections with Epstein have been the subject of intense speculation, along with several other powerful figures linked to the sex trafficker who committed suicide in 2019. Trump was originally against passage of the bill, before shifting in the face of rebellion in his own party.
The bill was approved in the House by 427 votes and passed through the Senate by unanimous consent, a rarely seen level of cross-party support. Instead of celebrating, many Republican lawmakers spent the week bracing for what they fear is coming: a slow drip of information, one way or another justified by Bondi’s Justice Department.
Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said, “People who feel strongly about this will feel cheated” if the Justice Department claims “we can’t release anything because of an active investigation.” “I don’t think that will help allay the long-standing doubts that many have had about this.”
The concern stems from the previous Trump administration’s resistance to transparency, which included months of rejecting public demands — and even insults to those demanding a release — before reversing course this week when its passage became inevitable.
Now, with Bondi opening investigations exclusively into Democrats mentioned in Epstein’s correspondence, Republicans are watching closely for signs that the department might use those investigations as a reason to redact or withhold material because they are now part of an ongoing investigation.
“If you do blanket detention, I think they’re going to make a lot of people angry,” said Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, a member of the Judiciary Committee. He later added: “It will add fuel to the fire if they don’t produce something meaningful.”
The legislation provides for the release of non-classified material within 30 days in searchable form. However, it does include exceptions for information that could jeopardize ongoing investigations and material depicting minors — potential escape routes that the Justice Department could exploit.
The bill requires the disclosure of material related not only to Epstein but also to his partner Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite who was convicted in 2021 and sentenced to 20 years in prison for recruiting and grooming underage girls for Epstein to abuse.
Bondi acknowledged Congress’ mandate on Wednesday, saying the department “will follow the law” while “protecting victims but also providing maximum transparency.”
However, her carefully considered words offered little comfort to some skeptics on Capitol Hill. Tillis pressed for clarification of any redaction. “I think they would do well to think about how to release as much as possible, and then have a very clear reason why they can’t release it,” he said.
But Republican Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana was more optimistic. “Congress has spoken. I fully expect the Department of Justice to release all the documents. It will take some time, but I think it’s starting,” he said, adding: “I hope we’ll see the first batch… after Thanksgiving.”
This urgency reflects deep doubts about how the Justice Department has historically handled the case.
In 2008, then-U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta agreed to a non-prosecution agreement that allowed Epstein to plead guilty to state prostitution charges and avoid federal prosecutions related to sex trafficking. Epstein served 13 months of an 18-month sentence in a minimum security facility with work release privileges. That deal, which was later ruled to have violated the victims’ rights, protected Epstein from more serious federal charges for more than a decade until his 2019 arrest on federal sex trafficking charges.
Epstein died in federal custody in August of that year, one month after his arrest on sex trafficking charges. His death was officially ruled a suicide.
The Epstein files, which so far comprise nearly tens of thousands of pages of emails and correspondence released by the House Oversight Committee, detail the convicted sex offender’s connections across political, academic and financial elites. Names from both parties appear, though Trump’s name appears more than a thousand times, most of them linked to Epstein’s apparent obsession with the presidency.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a Republican, supported his colleagues. “I trust the Justice Department’s judgment to ensure that any files it releases protect victims,” he said. He added that Congress had a “clear intent” to “release the information.”
The near-unanimous support – marred by only one dissenting vote in the House of Representatives – reflects both public interest and political risk. The Justice Department now has 30 days to make the materials available in a searchable format. The FBI indicated that its records include more than 300 gigabytes of data and evidence. Content depicting child abuse will remain locked, and information that could jeopardize ongoing investigations may be redacted or deleted.
The real test now is with Bondi’s department. Republican senators have made clear they will scrutinize any significant delay or widespread redaction, so how quickly and transparently the Justice Department’s actions could shape perceptions of the Trump administration’s commitment to accountability on a highly sensitive matter.
Republican Senator Eric Schmidt of Missouri summed it up by saying: “All reliable information that can be published should be released.”