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We don’t know how Megyn Kelly’s going to defend this. But she’ll surely find a way.
Lawmakers got a look at unreleased, unredacted copies of the Epstein Files, featuring bone-chilling emails as well as witness statements, victim statements, and investigative reports.
According to these lawmakers from both sides of the aisle, some very powerful men — including those in government — are incriminated and could be prosecuted based upon the contents of the documents.
They also reveal how appallingly young some of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims were — sharing more than the public already knew. But will justice prevail?
The deeper into the Epstein files that lawmakers delve, the worse that it gets
On Monday, February 9, some lawmakers were permitted to begin reviewing the millions of Epstein-related documents.
These include documents that have not been released to the public, despite the law mandating their release. Additionally, these files are unredacted.
Also on Monday, Representative Thomas Massie and Representative Ro Khanna held a press conference to discuss their initial review of these documents.
Massie is a Republican. Khanna is a Democrat. In a better world, exposing Epstein’s co-conspirators in full would be an uncontroversial, bipartisan issue.
In an even better world, Epstein and his associates would never have felt untouchable enough to commit their crimes in the first place.
“The core issue is that they’re not complying with … my law, because these were scrubbed back in March by Donald Trump’s FBI,” Khanna pointed out.
The Epstein Files Transparency Act, a bipartisan law passed in July and signed by Donald Trump, required the release of all of the appropriate documents.
Trump’s administration has simply refused to comply. The man himself has repeatedly complained that the American people haven’t let go of these horrible crimes.
Massie shared that an individual is “pretty high up in a foreign government” is among those in the files. (It is unclear if he meant Peter Mandelson, who has resigned in disgrace as Keir Starmer’s Chief of Staff, or yet another individual)
Additionally, Massie urged Trump’s DOJ to “correct their mistakes.” Mistakes is a generous term.
The DOJ has indicated that there won’t be prosecutions based upon the documents
Khanna and Massie revealed that at least six men are likely incriminated in the files.
To be clear, they mean that in legal terms — men who could and should be prosecuted based upon the contents of the files, rather than the men who had the poor taste to associate with Epstein at all, to cheat on their wives, etc.
Another lawmaker, Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin (D), shared that he felt shaken by previously unreported young victims mentioned in the Epstein files.
“You read through these files, and you read about 15-year-old girls, 14-year-old girls, 10-year-old girls,” he told the press.
He added: “I saw a mention of a nine-year-old girl today. I mean, this is just preposterous and scandalous.”
At least one (publicly released) apparent mention of a 9-year-old appears to have been a formatting error.
As anyone who has spent time copy-pasting text on the internet can attest, some aspects of formatting get lost in translation. The same is true when converting thousands upon thousands of emails into PDF.
(Also, Epstein and his associates appear to have a propensity for an extremely high typos-to-text ratio)
It is unclear if Raskin is referring to that likely formatting error, or to another mention of a 9-year-old.
We shouldn’t breathe a sigh of relief if this particular woman was 19 at the time, however. Epstein and his associates were evil men who used their power to turn women and girls into victims. Being an adult would not make her immune to this.
The only hope for justice will be electing officials who care about right and wrong, and never repeating 2024
Khanna and Massie’s pushback has achieved some results already.
Todd Blanche, Trump’s personal attorney who is now Deputy Attorney General (because why hide corruption if you don’t have to) has unredacted one document that the lawmakers highlighted.
“We have just unredacted all non-victim names from this document,” Blanche tweeted.
He then claimed without evidence: “The DOJ is committed to transparency.”
It is clear that the continuing pressure from the public and from politicians is at least partially working. But if we want answers, we’ll need to keep it up.
And if we want justice, we’ll need to elect people into power who actually care about right and wrong.
