Deputy Attorney General—and, of course, President Donald Trump’s former criminal defense attorney—Todd Blanche begrudgingly made a television appearance Friday to say that, fine, the Justice Department will release some Epstein documents. Happy now?
According to Blanche, after releasing 3 million of the 6 million Epstein files, the DOJ’s work here is done. That’s because, per Blanche, 50% of those documents were not “responsive” and therefore will not be released.
However, there is no provision in the Epstein Files Transparency Act for a determination of responsiveness. Put another way, the DOJ doesn’t have the leeway to decide whether something in its possession is relevant or meaningful enough to include.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche
Rather, the law directs the DOJ to release “all unclassified records, documents, communications, and investigative materials in the possession of the Department of Justice, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and United States Attorneys' Offices” relating to eight broad categories, including literally everything about Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.
Now, if Blanche had instead said something like “our original document search contained 6 million documents, but upon beginning review, we realized that 3 million were actually about different Jeffrey Epsteins” or “we accidentally initially included records for Timmy Epstein” or what have you, that would be different.
That would be Blanche essentially saying that the DOJ would not be releasing those records because they aren’t about Epstein or anything related to him.
But Blanche is a longtime defense attorney, and he knows full well what he means by using the term “responsive” here. Blanche is conveying, intentionally or not, that the DOJ has decided a full 50% of the Epstein files aren’t relevant to the law, based on a vague invocation of “responsive”—a criterion that he does not define.
There’s also the whole thing where the DOJ filed a status update with the court only three days ago, bragging that it made “substantial progress” and had “reviewed and redacted, as appropriate, several millions of pages.”
Related | DOJ promises it will totally release the Epstein files soon, guys!
In the event that there really had been some error that resulted in millions of non-Epstein documents being mistakenly included in the DOJ’s review, that would certainly have been necessary to tell the court. Instead, there’s no mention of it at all.
You’d think that with taking six extra weeks and making up new criteria for what warranted release, the DOJ could have ensured that its efforts to protect Trump were airtight. But somehow it still didn’t manage to adequately scrub all mentions of him.
At the time of the release, the files contained a damning document detailing myriad grim sexual abuse allegations, many of which referred to Trump. An hour later, a link to what appeared to be the same document was dead, only to reappear intact shortly thereafter.
But here’s where things get stupid and weird. The document beginning on EFTA01660679 has the same content as the document beginning on EFTA01660651, but with different redactions. One version, for example, has the criminal histories of people who made reports, while another redacts them. One version also redacted the word “daughters” for no discernible reason.
Whichever version you look at, it’s a difficult one, with callers alleging things like having been raped by Epstein and three brothers Oren, Tal, and Alon Alexander. The Alexanders, once prominent New York scene types, all now face sex-trafficking charges of their own.
A cartoon by Clay Bennett.
Sure, these dueling documents could just be the result of some sloppiness, but extending that grace isn’t really warranted, since this is exactly what happened with the December release, when the DOJ removed at least 16 files after initially posting them.
Blanche might have wanted to check in with Trump before dropping these today, as it’s the tiniest bit awkward that his new pick for Federal Reserve chair, Kevin Warsh, makes an appearance in the files.
Also in the files? Brett Ratner, who just directed the “Melania” documentary. And then there’s Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who planned a trip to Epstein’s private island in 2012, several years after he said he cut ties with Epstein and four years after Epstein had already been convicted of sexually assaulting minors.
Of course, we also have to mention former Department of Government Efficiency head Elon Musk, who practically begged Epstein to let him visit his island in 2013.
It’s tough to protect your boss when he’s surrounded himself with people like this, but the DOJ will continue to try its best.
