Name: US DOJ says it's released all required Epstein files: What's missing? | DW News
Uploaded: 2026-02-16T17:17:15.000Z
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department of justice has told lawmakers it's released all the legally required files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

In a letter to Congress, the Justice Department described the redactions it made in the Epstein files.

It also listed numerous high profile people mentioned in the documents.

Even if some had no interactions with Epstein, some lawmakers insist many significant files remain unpublished.

Republican Congressman Thomas Massie has accused the Trump administration of attempting to the full release.

I spoke about this a short while ago with Scott Lucas, professor of American Studies from the University College of Dublin.

I asked him for his analysis of the Justice Department's claim that it has now released all Epstein files.

It was required to the latest statement by the Justice Department and Attorney General Pam Bondi, which is a legally required statement under the bill passed last November for the release of the Epstein files.

It's an ongoing stonewall to try to protect powerful individuals, and that may include Donald Trump.

The reason why I say this is that contrary to the notion that all the files have been released, of course, less than half have been released.

2.7 million pages were released about two weeks ago.

More than 3 million pages were not released.

Even in the 2.7 million pages that were released, there were many, many heavy redactions, including the names of those who might be potential co conspirators of Jeffrey Epstein.

The statement by bond day on Saturday follows her appearance last week at the House Judiciary Committee where she effectively refused to answer questions, refused even to look at the survivors of Epstein who were in that room, and

effectively insulted lawmakers if they tried to press her for further information.

So no, this, this should not be seen as some mistaken headlines have said that this is suddenly a complete revelation of everything around Epstein.

When you're talking about the Justice Department trying to highlight the name of Janis Joplin, who died when Jeffrey Epstein was 17.

This is a diversion which is actually trying to hide as it has been hidden for many months.

Well, Scott, I gather from what you're saying that you believe that something is being hidden, but

do you feel that the release of files and memos to date is sufficient to maybe understand pretty much what went on in the Epstein case sufficiently?

I think if you go to almost every survivor who has spoken out about this to their lawyers, they have said absolutely not.

They have said that many of the testimonies of those survivors have not been released yet or have been heavily redacted.

They have said that the names of men are being withheld in the files.

Last week, finally, the Justice Department allowed some lawmakers to go in and see some of the files that had been released but had been heavily redacted.

And even though those lawmakers could only see a small fraction of the files, they found the names of powerful men that had been hidden and the ones that had been unredacted.

For example, includes Les Wexner, a retail magnet, 88 years old, who allegedly, allegedly was involved in the crimes of Jeffrey Epstein.

There's the name of a sheikh that was also released.

That sheikh has now resigned as the head of DP World, one of the largest container companies.

I can also tell you that there is further information about Donald Trump which is probably withheld in the files by, by chasing fragments that we have seen in the files that have been released so far.

Well, I wanted to ask you specifically about Donald Trump because many people are talking about what is not known.

And of course it's very diffic to determine what is not known, but what is known.

To what degree has President Trump himself been implicated in the Epstein files?

I must stress at the outset there is no conclusive evidence yet that Donald Trump is implicated in the crimes of Jeffrey Epstein.

However, there is one document that made it through and then was withdrawn for a while, which was an 86 page document with listing co conspirators, potential co conspirators of Jeffrey Epstein.

Another document that did make it through was a list of claims that were made to the FBI to be followed up about people who had been involved with Epstein in sexual abuse, even rape.

And one of those claims, a serious claim, involves Donald Trump.

That particular claim about Trump, that he and Epstein were involved in the rape of a girl between 13 and 15 between 1983 and 1985, was deemed so serious by the FBI that in 2019 they interviewed the alleged victim.

They interviewed her a day before Epstein died in prison.

The woman when, according to the transcript, is heavily redacted.

But according to the portions of her interview with the FBI, 2019, when she was shown a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump, she became agitated and said please crop the image of Donald Trump out of this photograph.

So in that release document, she does not directly accuse Donald Trump of the sexual assault about which the FBI had had a tip, but

she is agitated at the mention of Trump's name.

At the end of that 302, the record of that investigative interview, the witness asked to be excused and the FBI says it will follow up soon with another interview with her.

We do not know if that interview was conducted.

Scott, thank you very much for talking to Us again today.

That was Scott Lucas, professor of American Studies at the Clinton Institute, University College Dublin.

Let's try and make sense of this with Jason Campadonia, who is a journalist with NBC News and iHeartradio.

A lot of us lawmakers then disagreeing with the Justice Department's assertion that it's released all of these Epstein related documents.

Well, this is turning in to be a typical lawyer fight, right?

So one lawyer interprets the law this way, another lawyer interprets it this way.

And a lot of the lawmakers in the United States have some sort of law background.

So they're throwing everything that they can at it and hoping that it is interpreted the way they want it to be interpreted.

Obviously, the Department of Justice didn't interpret it interpret the transparency law the way that was intended when it was written.

So now you have the typical, okay, this guy, you know, they're not doing what we're asking, but

according to their interpretation of the law, they are doing what they're asking.

So it really boils down to a bunch of lawyers in a room throwing mud at each other.

One of the lawyers, the lawmakers biggest concerns are the missing internal Justice Department memos about why Epstein and his associates weren't charged earlier.

How important are those documents to understand what really happened?

Well, right now we don't know because they haven't been released.

So we don't really know how in depth and why they decided to prosecute some, not prosecute others.

We're not exactly sure what those internal memos say at this point.

What we do know and what we have learned over the past couple of months through the following this trial is that there are some massive names involved in this and they may have bigger implications than what most people think.

Presidents, lawmakers, CEOs, celebrities, all of these people are tied to Epstein somehow some way, either through some sort of email, some sort of communication.

So you can't release some sort of internal memo if it just says, you know, celebrity A was at a party.

That could have heavy implications in Hollywood for their livelihood, you know, and everybody that that money touches.

And it really will boil down to where does the money lie and how does it affect the US and basically the world.

If these internal memos are released, there might be some heavy implications.

So they're trying to be very careful, as far as I can tell.

So we have these millions of files mixing political figures and people who had almost no real connection to Epstein, even, as you say, celebrities.

So how then do we make sense of these names?

You know, the head of the LA 28, the Olympics 28, coming here to Los Angeles, Casey Wasserman, highfalutin, high talent, you know, talent agency manager.

But all we know is that he sent a couple of emails to Epstein's girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, and

Like you said, there's millions of pages of documents that we have to comb through.

So if he was involved in some sort of illicit behavior, I'm sure the Department of Justice would have, you know, brought charges against him.

But now he's selling off his talent agency under pressure, under public pressure.

And the LA28 committee has said, hey, look, we've reviewed Wasserman's involvement, so it's okay.

But guys like Chris Tucker, celebrity, he's a comedian.

He was pictured next to Epstein at a couple of parties.

It's rich guys doing rich things and that should be okay.

If you're at a party and there's a bad guy at a party, well, you didn't know that guy was gonna be at the party, so why, why should you be held accountable?

So I think that the general public really needs to just cool their jets and see, see what comes out of all of these internal memos, if they're ever released and exactly what sort of criminal behavior may or may not have taken place.

Journalist Jason Campadonia from NBC News and iHeartRadio, thank you.