A pair of U.S. lawmakers have threatened legal action against U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, after her deadline to release all government files related to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was met only in part.
The release of the Department of Justice (DoJ) documents was highly anticipated but in the end, only a portion of the available material was made public.
A leading campaigner on the issue, Republican congressman Thomas Massie, stated he could attempt to initiate contempt proceedings against the attorney general as a result of this partial release.
The DoJ insists it is complying with its legal obligations, with Bondi claiming to be part of the most transparent administration in American history.
The phrase Epstein files refers to the significant cache of information that was gathered by the U.S. justice department during its two criminal investigations into Epstein.
A law compelling the release of the full trove was signed by U.S. President Donald Trump in November, following pressure from his supporters and members of the Republican Party. The deadline for releasing the material was Friday. While some material was released, it was heavily redacted, leaving many angry, including lawmakers like Massie and survivors of Epstein's abuse. Trump has yet to comment on the matter.
The DoJ indicated that more documents will follow in the coming weeks. However, during an appearance on CBS’s Face the Nation, Massie suggested the Justice Department was flouting the spirit and the letter of the law.
He further added: The quickest and most effective way to secure justice for these victims is to bring inherent contempt against Pam Bondi, which does not require going through the courts.
Inherent contempt is a rarely utilized legal action that can be employed by either the Senate or the House of Representatives, which has not been invoked for nearly a century, as noted by the American Bar Association.
Ro Khanna and I are currently discussing and drafting that right now, Massie mentioned, referring to the Democratic congressman who is also prominently involved in the push for the release of the complete Epstein files.
In the same interview, Khanna elaborated on how the contempt proceedings could unfold: We aim to build a bipartisan coalition which would impose fines on Pam Bondi for every day that she's not releasing these documents.
Massie emphasized that unlike an impeachment effort, which is another option theoretically available, a contempt motion would only need support from the House of Representatives.
Bondi's deputy, Todd Blanche, was dismissive of the threats from Congress members during a Sunday interview, asserting: Not even a little bit. Bring it on. We are doing everything we're supposed to be doing to comply with the statute.
Blanche referenced the scale of the task, indicating it involved about a million pages of documents, most containing victim information. He stated, If by complying with the statute we don’t produce everything on Friday, we will produce things next week and the week after—that's still compliance with the statute.
Democratic Senator Tim Kaine remarked in the same program that contempt or impeachment efforts were premature.
Blanche added that certain Epstein-related files that were initially released on Friday were later removed by the DoJ from its website due to concerns expressed by victims, with one file featuring an image of Trump being reinstated after a review.
