T
he U.S. Congress voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to force the release of long-sealed Justice Department files related to Jeffrey Epstein, marking a dramatic end to months of Republican infighting and delivering a rare bipartisan rebuke to President Donald Trump, who abruptly dropped his opposition to the measure over the weekend.
The House of Representatives approved the bill 427–1, sending it to the Republican-controlled Senate, which passed it within hours. The legislation now heads to Trump’s desk and could be signed into law as early as Wednesday, according to a senior White House official.
The vote capped an extraordinary political showdown on Capitol Hill, one that pitted Trump against some of his most vocal supporters and placed the issue of transparency around Epstein’s alleged trafficking network squarely at the heart of Washington’s bitter internal battles.
Dozens of women who say they were abused by Epstein filled the House public gallery for the vote, some holding photographs of their younger selves—the age, they said, when they first encountered the financier. Many stood, cried, and embraced as lawmakers from both parties cast their votes in favor of releasing the unclassified portions of the investigative files.
Earlier in the day, survivors appeared outside the Capitol alongside Democratic and Republican lawmakers who led the push for transparency. They urged Congress to act decisively after years of secrecy surrounding Epstein’s connections to powerful figures in business, politics, and entertainment.
“Please stop making this political—it is not about you, President Trump,” said Jena-Lisa Jones, who alleges Epstein abused her when she was 14. “I voted for you, but your behavior on this issue has been a national embarrassment.”
The vote came just 48 hours after Trump reversed his long-standing opposition to the release. For months, Trump’s allies had sought to delay or weaken the bill, even as a faction of conservative lawmakers insisted that the documents must be made public.
The White House was caught off-guard by how quickly Congress moved. According to two people familiar with internal discussions, senior aides believed the bill would take significantly longer to clear the Senate.
Trump, who was hosting Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the Oval Office on Tuesday, lashed out at reporters who questioned him about his shifting position. “I have nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein,” he said, calling the journalist who raised the issue “a terrible person” and suggesting the news outlet should lose its broadcast license. Trump also repeated his longstanding claim that he had expelled Epstein from his Florida club decades ago because “I thought he was a sick pervert.”
The Epstein controversy has become one of Trump’s most vulnerable political issues. His approval rating on the matter plunged this week to its lowest point of the year, with a Reuters/Ipsos poll showing that only 20% of voters approve of his handling of the situation. Even among Republicans, fewer than half—44%—said they believed Trump was navigating the controversy effectively.
Trump’s previous resistance to releasing the files angered some of his closest allies, including Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who said Trump personally pressured her to reverse her support. When she refused, she said the president publicly labeled her a “traitor.”
“A traitor is an American who serves foreign countries and themselves,” Greene said Tuesday. “A patriot serves the United States of America—and Americans like the women standing behind me.”
The congressional push was spearheaded by Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky, a libertarian-leaning Republican who accused the Justice Department of “protecting pedophiles and sex traffickers.” He vowed the bill would only be considered successful “when there are rich men in handcuffs.”
Massie’s campaign was strengthened by bipartisan backing, including from Democratic Representative Ro Khanna. Both lawmakers argued that public confidence in the justice system depends on full transparency surrounding Epstein’s network, which prosecutors said relied on wealthy and influential contacts to traffic minors for sex.
Epstein, a former financier with deep ties to political and business elites, pleaded guilty in Florida in 2008 to a felony prostitution charge and served 13 months in jail under a widely criticized plea deal. In 2019, federal prosecutors charged him with sex trafficking of minors. Epstein died later that year in a Manhattan jail cell; his death was ruled a suicide.
For many of Epstein’s accusers, Tuesday’s vote marked the first tangible step toward public accountability.
“We have waited years to see this happen,” said survivor Maria Farmer. “The truth belongs to the American public—and to every girl he hurt.”
(Source: Reuters)
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