Congressional committee votes to issue subpoena for Jeffrey Epstein files
Jeffrey Epstein. Picture: New York State Sex Offender Registry/AP
A subcommittee in the US House of Representatives has voted to subpoena the Department of Justice for files in the sex-trafficking investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.
Three Republicans on the House Committee on Oversight voted with Democrats for the measure, sending it through on an 8-2 vote. Republican subcommittee chairman Clay Higgins said work to draft the subpoena was beginning.
Earlier on Wednesday, a judge had rejected the Justice Department’s request to unseal transcripts from grand jury investigations into Epstein years ago in Florida, saying the request did not meet any of the extraordinary exceptions under federal law that could make them public. A similar records request is still pending in New York.
News reports on Wednesday said the department told Donald Trump in May that his name was among high-profile people mentioned in government files about Epstein, though the mention does not imply wrongdoing.
Files already released by the government included a 2016 deposition in which an accuser recounted spending several hours with Epstein at Mr Trump’s Atlantic City casino, but did not say if she met Mr Trump and did not accuse him of any wrongdoing.
The president has also said he once thought Epstein was a “terrific guy” but that they later had a falling out.
White House spokesperson Steven Cheung on Wednesday said the reports were “nothing more than a continuation of the fake news stories concocted by the Democrats and the liberal media”.
The subcommittee vote came hours before the House was scheduled to end its July work session and leave Washington for a month-long break.
House Speaker Mike Johnson has adjourned major business in the House ahead of Congress’s August recess to avoid contentious votes on Epstein-related matters as Mr Trump’s administration faces intense public pressure to release more information about the sexual predator.
