The Justice Department stated late on Monday that it is still going through millions of documents that might have something to do with Jeffrey Epstein. This is happening despite though Congress is pushing for the information to be made public under a new statute that requires more openness.
Under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the department was required to release a broad collection of records by Dec. 12. The deadline has gone, but federal authorities say they can’t complete the obligation all at once since there is so much material. Instead, the department has opted for a rolling release, posting large batches of documents online over several days in mid-December and continuing the process since then.
In a court filing submitted Monday, the Justice Department said it has released roughly 12,285 documents so far, totaling about 125,575 pages. At the same time, more than 2 million additional documents that may fall under the law remain “in various phases of review.”
According to the department’s own data, that suggests that less than 1% of records that could be useful have been properly evaluated. Officials did say, though, that a “meaningful portion” of the remaining material is thought to be duplicate entries, and that the number of pages in each file varies greatly.
The documents still being examined include internal Justice Department and FBI emails, court records, interview notes from the FBI, subpoena materials, and “various forms of media,” according to the filing.
The Epstein Files Transparency Act, which passed in the middle of November, authorized the department 30 days to make public records that had been kept for decades. These include early federal investigations into Epstein, files from Epstein’s and Ghislaine Maxwell’s sex trafficking prosecutions in 2019 and 2020, and papers relating to the department’s evaluation of Epstein’s suicide while he was in pre-trial custody.
In some cases, the law enables redactions to safeguard victims’ personal information, child sexual abuse material, and some graphic photographs.
Paul Engelmeyer, the Manhattan judge who oversaw Maxwell’s case, has also told the district’s senior federal prosecutor to personally check that any grand jury records that were made public have been carefully checked to remove the names of the victims. Engelmeyer got the Justice Department’s update in a letter.
Over 400 lawyers from the Justice Department are now working on the study. It is yet unknown when the public will be able to see all of the files. On Christmas Eve, the government said it had found more than a million more records. This might push out the completion date by “a few more weeks.”
The slow pace has sparked criticism from Democrats and Epstein survivors. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer accused the department of a “cover-up” last month. “The law Congress passed is crystal clear: release the Epstein files in full so Americans can see the truth,” Schumer said in a statement.
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