Name: US Justice Department releases more Epstein files | DW News
Uploaded: 2026-01-31T17:05:41.000Z
Duration: 7 min 12 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

We begin with the biggest release so far of files relating to the late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

More than 3 million pages have been made available, including thousands of videos and images with references to multiple public figures, including Donald Trump.

authorities are hoping to draw a line under the affair, but

survivors of Epstein's crimes say it's not over yet.

3 million pages, 2000 videos, and 180,000 pictures.

Pictures mentioning people such as the US President, the then Prince Andrew, and Elon Musk.

These are just a sample of what the enormous amount of new documents released by the Justice Department contain.

We didn't protect or not protect anybody.

The latest Epstein files were made public after they were withheld from an initial release in December.

The new records include thousands of references to Donald Trump, including emails in which Epstein and others shared news articles about him, commented on his politics, or gossiped about him and his family.

The then Prince Andrew's name appeared several hundred times, including in an email chain which the prince invited Epstein to Buckingham palace in 2010, the month after Epstein had been released from house arrest for procuring an underage girl for prostitution.

There were also exchanges between Epstein and powerful businessmen such as billionaire Elon Musk and Microsoft co founder Bill Gates.

The late Jeffrey Epstein and his relationships with the world's richest and most powerful people have been a source of intense intrigue for conspiracy theorists, online sleuths and parts of Trump's MAGA base.

But the man responsible for the latest release is not convinced this tranche will end the focus on the files.

There's a hunger or a thirst for information that I do not think will be satisfied by the review of these documents.

Blanche said the release marked the end of the process and.

But survivors of Epstein's crimes have said in a statement, this is not over.

Right, we can talk now to Mark Shanahan, Associate professor of Political Engagement at the University of Surrey in the uk.

So what does the newly released documents tell us about how the U.S.

department of justice, of the Trump administration as well, is handling.

It's showing that the Department of Justice is very much in the control of Trump.

There was a law passed back in November 15, back in on November 15, demanding the full release of the Epstein files, demanding full transparency.

And they've been dropped out in dribs and drabs ever since, often as a distraction when something not so good is happening to the Trump administration.

Heavily, heavily redacted, heavily Heavily curated.

And sometimes, as with overnight last night, some files are released and then suddenly they disappear from the DOJ files.

The Department of Justice has had about 100 lawyers scrolling through all of these documents since November, probably for a long time before November, trying to weed out mentions of the victims, but

seemingly trying to weed a lot of mentions of powerful people around Donald Trump who may be damaged by what is in these files.

I mean, for Trump himself, this appears to be political kryptonite.

So we haven't got the openness and the transparency that one would expect from the Department of Justice.

And looking at the last couple of weeks that Trump has had, not a brilliant Davos with the rollback on Greenland, the Minneapolis protests are really turning public opinion against him.

Even the release of the Melania film in the last 48 hours, which hasn't exactly gleaned many, many Oscar nominations.

These all seem to be areas that he requires distraction and dumping.

I'm going to jump in there because we've got a lot to get through on this topic.

And as you mentioned, there are many more documents, but they've not been released.

Could this not p even more pressure on the Trump administration?

Yeah, there's probably something around 6 million documents.

This is hanging over the Trump administration.

He may well have nothing to hide in there.

There may be nothing that incriminates him at all.

But until there is a full and transparent release, we can't guarantee this.

So this will hang over the administration like a bad.

Before he was president, he wanted all of these released.

Suddenly he's done 180 on it and seemingly has stuff to hide.

Now, you mentioned there before that there were, you said around 100 lawyers trolling through all the documents.

And victims groups are pretty angry about the latest publication claiming that victims haven't been properly protected.

You know, there's names being released and even photographs.

Could there be legal implications then for having revealed the identities of the victims?

And could this actually damage then the reputation of the work of the Department of Justice even further?

Yeah, I mean, the DOJ's reputation is in the mud anyway.

Under Pam Bondi, it has not been seen as an independent agency of government, but

There are already many court cases from the survivors, from other people who have been named in the files against the government.

And this will only embolden those survivors to bring more court cases, both for anything that comes out of these releases that show that investigations into their complaints were not handled properly.

And secondly, this time for the release of names, tying them into documents while redacting the names of some very wealthy, some very powerful people.

It looks as though the DOJ is protecting the wealthy at the expense of the victims.

And that will cost them in the long term.

All right, we're going to have to leave it there, Mark, but great to get your analysis there.

Mark Shanahan from the University of Surrey joining us today from Oxford in England.