Republican rebels on Wednesday ramped up the pressure on their party to force the Trump administration to release its files on Jeffrey Epstein, hosting victims of the convicted sex offender at the Capitol, where they delivered harrowing pleas for Congress to act.
The dramatic demonstration seemed to leave most Republicans unmoved, however, and GOP leaders stepped up their own efforts to defuse the Epstein controversy by approving an alternative bill designed to bolster an ongoing investigation by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
The competing maneuvers have created a kind of stalemate — at least for now — between the clashing GOP factions in a debate that’s ruptured their party and infuriated the MAGA loyalists who helped propel President Trump into the White House for a second time.
On one side, the rebels — led by Reps. Thomas Massie (Ky.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.) — are short of the Republican support they need to compel the Justice Department (DOJ) to release its Epstein files. Their discharge petition is two Republicans shy of forcing that vote.
On the other side, Speaker Mike Johnson (La.) and his leadership team appear to be a long way from quelling the internal revolt over the fate of the sensitive documents. And the appearance of the Epstein victims on Capitol Hill sparked a media frenzy that has made that task only tougher.
The impasse means the issue is certain to hover over Trump and the GOP conference well into September, creating new headaches for Republican leaders as they scramble to stave off a government shutdown at the end of the month.
The fight has been brewing all summer, since Trump’s Justice Department — which is led by officials who previously vowed to release the Epstein files — reversed course in July to say the case was closed and no additional disclosures were merited.
The change of tune infuriated many of Trump’s MAGA supporters, prompted Massie and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) to propose legislation forcing the DOJ’s hand and led to Wednesday’s emotional press conference at the Capitol, where nine survivors of Epstein’s sexual abuse hammered the government for keeping the files secret and accused Congress of shielding the rich and powerful at the expense of assault survivors.
“We are not asking for pity. We are here demanding accountability, and I’m demanding justice,” said Lisa Phillips, who said she was taken to Epstein’s private island in 2000. “Congress must choose: Will you continue to protect predators, or will you finally protect survivors?”
The event was arranged by Khanna and Massie, and the victims made clear they want Congress to vote on their bipartisan bill — and endorse the discharge petition if GOP leaders won’t bring it to the floor voluntarily.
“All of them are on the same page,” said Bradley Edwards, a lawyer representing many of the victims. “Unequivocally, redact personally identifying information and release everything else.”
Johnson has rejected those calls, warning that the Khanna-Massie bill isn’t written carefully enough to prevent the release of personal information that could hurt the victims. Shortly after the victims spoke Wednesday, he and his leadership team staged a vote on their alternative bill, which aims to advance the Oversight Committee’s probe.
The Speaker said that’s the preferred avenue because it “has the force of law, will protect victims, does not require Senate approval, and is already underway and delivering results.”
Critics of the bill disagree, saying Johnson’s proposal lacks the teeth to compel the DOJ to release any files it wants to keep under wraps. Massie, for one, said the thousands of DOJ documents released by the Oversight panel Tuesday were “managed by the White House” and the Johnson bill is merely “a polite request to the DOJ to police themselves.”
“They are redacting things to prevent embarrassment. They’re not redacting things to protect victims. And in the process of preventing embarrassment, they’re hiding some criminals,” Massie said. “You can’t trust them. You can’t let them curate all of the evidence that implicates the DOJ and their best friends.”
From the White House, Trump weighed in on the debate even as the victims were speaking at the Capitol. Talking to reporters in the Oval Office, he framed the Epstein controversy as a “hoax,” devised by Democrats, to hurt him politically.
“It’s really a Democrat hoax, because they’re trying to get people to talk about something that’s totally irrelevant to the success we’ve had as a nation since I’ve been president,” Trump said.
Trump’s characterization infuriated the Epstein victims at the Capitol, who wasted no time pushing back against the president. One of them, Haley Robson, said she’s a registered Republican and challenged Trump to meet with her during her visit to Washington.
“These women are real. We’re here in person,” she said. “There is no hoax. The abuse was real.”
A White House official also stepped into the debate Wednesday with a warning to any Republicans who might be weighing a move to sign Massie’s discharge petition.
“Helping Thomas Massie and Liberal Democrats with their attention-seeking, while the DOJ is fully supporting a more comprehensive file release effort from the oversight committee, would be viewed as a very hostile act to the administration,” the official said.
That prompted an outcry from Greene, a prominent Trump ally, who called the official “a coward.”
“The ‘hostile act’ was Jeffrey Epstein raping 14-year-old girls,” she said Wednesday in an interview with Real America’s Voice, a conservative outlet. “That was the ‘hostile act’ and it’s not a hoax.”
Still, Greene is one of only four Republicans to endorse the discharge petition, along with Massie and Reps. Nancy Mace (S.C.) and Lauren Boebert (Colo.). And it’s unclear whether supporters will find two more GOP lawmakers to buck the president.
Massie said he’s holding out hope his Republican colleagues will return to their districts and face pressure to do so from conservative voters clamoring for more transparency from the federal government.
“Where are the men on the Republican side of the aisle? They need to step up and just basically tell the White House, ‘Look, I support your ideology at the White House, but on this issue, you’re wrong,” he said.
“Eighty percent of the base — 80 percent of the people who elected Donald Trump — want these files released. And the other 20 percent aren’t paying attention to the issue,” he added. “So it’s the right thing policy wise and it’s the right thing politicalwise. They just have to disassociate themselves from a few billionaire donors that they feel indebted to.”
Emily Brooks contributed.
