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Attorney General Pam Bondi defended Trump administrationShe told two federal judges this week that hundreds of staff were busy reviewing the documents and making daily phone calls, but acknowledged that some “glitches” compromised the release that was supposed to be completed last month.
“The department has made substantial progress and continues to focus on [Epstein Files Transparency Act] in a timely manner while protecting victim privacy,” Bundy Wrote Thursday in a letter with senior Justice Department officials.
More than 500 reviewers are reading millions of pages of material to prepare Epstein Files To release and protect confidentiality, she added.
Bundy went on to say that part of the work requires processing and “deduplication.” Decades of documents Use the central platform.
“Due to the scope of this work, platform operations require round-the-clock attention and technical assistance to resolve inevitable issues Fault Because of the sheer volume of material,” Bondi said.
In fact, there were some irregularities in the release, and the department failed to meet the Dec. 19 deadline for the larger task.
Observers were shocked to see a photo of Epstein’s office showing a drawer containing a photo of President Donald Trump, which was posted and later removed from a public portal.
Critics claimed the department was covering up evidence of Trump’s long association with Epstein, but the Justice Department dismissed those accusations and said it had removed the image. Later it recoveredregarding unrelated security issues.
Trump has not been accused of any wrongdoing against Epstein and has long distanced himself from the disgraced financier.
Despite the attorney general’s upbeat assessment of Epstein’s handling of documents, the department remains under intense pressure to release more documents as it has already Just over 12,000 Under the Epstein Documents Transparency Act signed into law last November, it must release more than 2 million documents.
Congressmen Rohan and Thomas Massie asked a federal court on Monday to appoint a special master to oversee the release of the documents.
“Simply put, the Department of Justice cannot be trusted to make mandatory disclosures under the Act,” they wrote.
Separately, Epstein’s survivors have asked the Justice Department’s internal watchdog to review the release of the documents.
“Among the documents released to date, there is a disturbing pattern of selective redactions,” Survivor Wrote in a letter Wednesday to the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General. “In many cases, the names of individuals who allegedly participated in or assisted in the abuse appear to have been removed, while survivors’ identifying details remain visible. In some cases, survivors’ names, contextual identifiers, or other information sufficient to publicly identify them were not adequately protected.”