[0:02]We begin with the newly released evidence. These are Jeffrey Epstein photos that are coming to light for the first time today. They feature powerful politicians, including from both parties, and some of the world's richest men. Now, this is part of 95,000 images that were lawfully provided under these further transparency pushes.
[0:33]And these came from Epstein's estate, from his computer, emails, and other documentation under, as I mentioned, a lawful subpoena from Congress, specifically the House Oversight Committee. These are newly coming to light. We're going to give you context as you see them. It is one thing to read about and hear about some of these relationships. There's Steve Bannon, Trump ally with Woody Allen.
[0:47]Another thing to see them with your own eyes and make your own judgments. House Democrats released about 85 images. Some include Trump. One includes former President Clinton, Trump surrounded by women who were in, I should say, Hawaiian lays, their faces redacted by the committee.
[1:03]Another one shows Trump with an unidentified woman. We don't know, without further context, why the Epstein estate had or saved these, what Jeffrey Epstein's interest was in them, whether or not they relate to something that Trump's own Cabinet official has called alleged blackmail.
[1:22]The answers and context for that kind of question, those kind of issues would come up, of course, when we get the fuller Epstein files, which DOJ must turn over with a looming deadline. I'll get into that shortly, but the estate did not have written context with these images.
[1:42]The mirror selfie now seen around the world shows what you see here. Very simply, sex trafficker Epstein holding the phone next to, close to him, flanking him, longtime Trump ally, former White House official, Steve Bannon.
[2:13]We've reported on their extensive relationship, including their furtive secret efforts to, according to Bannon, help rehab Epstein's reputation, that included during a period where Trump was not having known contact with Epstein, and yet here was his ally helping him, and I have more on that later this hour as we dig through the context of some of these photographs. Here's a photo of President Bill Clinton signed. You can see Epstein and his now convicted and imprisoned associate, Elaine Maxwell, and Jimmy Buffett and his widow, we should mention.
[2:29]Now, One thing that's important about these photos and anyone who's followed any type of journalistic investigative reporting where you have, say, one person accused of wrongdoing or convicted in the case of Maxwell and then other people is being in the email, in the photo or at the event, depending especially on the size of the event, does not tell you whether the other people are part of the alleged criminal activity.
[2:55]And that's an important distinction both in law and in fair journalism. And many of the prominent people listed here had been previously tied to him in some manner. They have denied wrongdoing connected to Epstein. Several have said they didn't know about the extent of Epstein 's now convicted crimes back then.
[3:13]The White House says that the Congress is cherry picking these photos that Democrats on the committee made what they view as, quote, random redactions, and all of it is to, they allege, quote, try and create a false narrative. Now, one point on that.
[3:30]I want to show you, of course, what the White House is saying because that's part of the story in the reporting. And they, like other entities and individuals caught up in this, have every right to respond and explain the context. But when they say that releasing the evidence creates a false narrative, that is, of course, a contradiction with Trump's own claims.
[3:49]He spent 2024 vowing to release the files. That includes written files, photographic files, video evidence, includes all of it. And so he claimed he would do it , he failed to do it, and then as you probably know, if you follow the news, was forced into doing it by signing that law with the deadline looming.
[4:07]So for his own White House to come around and say they're against the thing that he claimed he would do, then recently signed a law to do, is at a minimum rich. And it raises questions of its own. Will they comply with the new law they signed? And of course, why are they afraid of all this evidence and video?
[4:25]As for a top Democrat on the committee, he says there's more to come. Our plan is to demand that the president release the files, and we'll see what he does on the 19th. But again, these pictures, some of these photos are really disturbing.
[4:38]And I know we've put some out today. There are many others. And some of the other photos that we did not put out today are incredibly disturbing. That's an assessment from a lawmaker who has seen more than anyone because they got the materials under subpoena.
[4:58]We also have reporting that a source who knows where the house probe is headed says, quote, fewer than 1,000 images actually contain an inudity. That's from MS Now reporting. And again, if that makes this sound less salacious or exciting , so be it.
[5:18]But we want to fact check some of the claims and vows we've heard with what others say could be less than an explosive cachet coming. MS Now has obtained the cover letter from Epstein's estate. It said it was unable to confirm whether they were taken at the property, owned, rented, operated, or used by Epstein. Now that matters because Epstein is dead.
[5:34]Those lawyers have a legal obligation to comply with subpoenas and tell the truth. Of course, you're always on the lookout for any potential cover- up, but that information could be helpful to some of the people pictured. Because again, as I mentioned in fairness,
[5:57]If you are at an event in New York randomly or Miami or LA randomly that's not the Epstein estate and you're in one photo, that could be different than flying out to meet him. Some photos we can identify the location. And if you are at a very small group gathering or intimate thing, that again could be different from other elements of how he lived his life.
[6:14]And in fairness, it is clear there are some people who seem to very clearly know about what he was up to, the birthday book incriminating for that reason. There are others who, in passing , may have been at these fancy events and been at it wrong place, wrong time. It's easy to go on the internet or a podcast and paint everyone with one brush. The harder work, but the work that does matter to get the case and the story right and deal with accountability, is for the government, the investigators, as well as
[6:36]other investigative journalists and try to determine what is the truth. The photos are a piece of that. And the DOJ faces the big deadline Friday. If you remember when this law was passed, well, time keeps ticking on. You see on the calendar, the Epstein files deadline is Friday , December 19th.
[7:05]That is because they gave them one month to comply from when it passed in November, putting huge pressure on the DOJ and the Trump White House to comply with the law they signed or be caught in another Epstein debacle of their own making. I'm joined by contributing writer from the New York Times, Molly John Fast. Welcome to you. If you look at, say, here's a Bill Gates photo, which does not have a date. He has already been linked to Epstein and discussed, this is from getting on the jet, but he' s discussed what he says was a mistake to ever meet with the guy.
[7:26]He says it was only about philanthropy. Woody Allen, who has his own long history, Seen here, the house has obscured the woman's face at that table. What does a picture worth a thousand words mean with evidence like this coming public for the first time tonight?
[7:46]Well, what I think is really important, Ari, is what you said . Again, a picture can mean any number of things, and none of these people are guilty being in a picture, right? We just don't know. We don't have enough information . One of the things that I think is really important to remember about this is we're getting this information because oversight has really been doing its job.
[8:08]And Robert Garcia, who you showed before, is the ranking member of Oversight. And I have to say, I've been really impressed. They subpoena the Epstein estate and got these pictures. These are not part of the law that Donald Trump signed into law.
[8:23]That stuff will get released. you know, legally should be released by Friday, again, who knows. But I do think it's really important to see that these photos are coming out. It doesn't necessarily mean anything about the people in them, but it also is, you know, obviously they had some kind of, you know, even very peripheral relationship.
[8:48]And the truth is that, you know, there was a lot, you know, when I think we'll see more information in these photos. And again, Garcia talked about how, you know, They are very worried about keeping a lot of this redacted and not injuring the victims. And that should be where everyone's mind is at.
[9:03]And you'll see, you know, a lot of those voters are redacted. Maybe they don't even need to be redacted, but they've been very careful, which I think is good. And and I think they're really trying to be careful about what they release. And I just want to push back on what the White House said. You know, the White House said, well, these are partisan pictures, but, you know, they did release a picture with Bill Clinton, who is known to have been a Democratic president.
[9:29]True, and this involves how you release material as you get it. The ultimate cache in the files will be voluminous, just like the emails were. It really comes down to order. I mean, we live in a culture now where not everyone finishes the article.
[9:45]let alone a book-length set of Epstein files. So they did release, for example , those early emails, and there was a lot of discussion that the first ones mentioned Trump, but we got all the emails. I have more to remind people about the Bannon relationship because we got the emails
[9:58]that blew the lid on things. They were in email saying, let's keep this a secret, private entrances, cloak and dagger. Now we have the selfie photos. I have more on that later tonight, but to the point of selectivity, yeah, you get more of it. The deadline looms, and it is interesting that the house is trying to sort of say,
[10:17]If you play games on this, we already have some of this stuff. So these photos and more can come out. And it's not going to work. That dog won't hunt, as they sometimes say, to over-redact. Obviously, there are fair redactions. I think any honest person can agree with that. To your point, and we can show, again, there's a photo where women's faces are redacted.
[10:33]I'll put that back up. From an investigative view, it wouldn't be fair to just list all these women's faces if you don't know whether this is a case where some are alleged as victims, some are alleged as sex workers, others might be bystanders.
[10:56]So you don't just put someone's face out on TV and the internet and half the audience thinks that they fit a category. That's not fair to them. And this case shouldn't resolve with transparency that smears women. I don't think that's what honest brokers would do.
[11:11]I want to play a little bit of Republican Massey talking about the deadline. Take a listen. If DOJ doesn't release the files it has by next Friday, is there anything Congress can do to compel that to happen? Well, I mean, it's a crime if they don't.
[11:29]It's not like they're in contempt of Congress because they didn't respond to a subpoena. This is a new law with criminal implications if they don't follow it. That's some of the heat they're putting on. The truth is a bit more nuanced.
[11:44]You can go back to Watergate. There are fights about evidence where even a lawful subpoena or a law from Congress signed by the president takes a lot of time if the executive chooses to fight.
[11:59]are really disturbing. Today's batch of Epstein photos were secured by the House Oversight Committee, even though , like all House committees, right, it's under Republican control.
[12:29]The Republican majority's hand has been forced to some extent both by the toxic politics of Epstein and quite deft maneuvering of the Democrats on that committee, including ranking member Robert Garcia of California, and Congressman Robert Garcia joins me now. It's good to have you in the program. Let us just follow up with the thing you said this morning, which I think has been haunting all of us all day about some of these are very disturbing. And I wonder if you can just elaborate what you mean by that about disturbing, because we're talking about Jeffrey Epstein here.
[12:54]Right, I mean, look, I think first what's important is obviously we received, this was just yesterday, 95,000 photographs from the Epson estate. We were able to put out, so far, probably about 75 to 80 photos throughout the day today, many of which you've seen, a lot of the public has now seen, which is incredibly important for transparency.
[13:14]And our intention is to put out as many of the photos as possible while protecting, of course, the survivors. including in the photos are many photos of women and many photos that are disturbing and that need to be redacted and that we need to think through very carefully in how those are presented to the public.
[13:34]Because at the end of the day, the most important thing is that we protect the survivors. And I personally met with numerous survivors, both individual and in groups. And this is critical to the investigation. But there is, make no mistake, that beyond what folks have seen today, Jeffrey Epstein was a sick man.
[13:51]Ghislaine Maxwell was a monster. And the harm and abuse that they have caused women and children needs to be exposed. And the powerful men that did that harm need to be exposed, and there has to be justice.
[14:16]I want to be clear that, from my perspective, I agree wholeheartedly, right, that there's no transparency prerogative here that would override the protection of those who have been abused here. But I just want to get a clearer sense from you. Like, are you saying there is documentation of these abuses? That, like, in the photos, there is documentary evidence of some of the things that Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell are accused of or convicted of doing.
[14:45]There are hundreds and hundreds of photos that we've already seen. As a reminder, we've only seen about 25,000 of the 95,000 batch . been going through the whole production in batches. But of the 25,000 photos that we have seen, there are hundreds and hundreds of photos of women, of which some of those are very disturbing, and of which some of those are horrific in nature, and certainly sexual in nature.
[15:19]And so that's the work that the team and the research team right now is focused on. And we're gonna ensure that the public gets transparency, that we get the information out, and we're being very thoughtful about protecting those women. And again, we just got this yesterday, but we are committed to transparency and the truth, and the truth will get out.
[15:46]And right now, there is one person in the United States that has the power to bring justice to these women and to get the truth out, and that's Donald Trump, and he should release the files today. Yeah, thank you for being a little clearer there. And again, I really don't want to rip you into here. What you're saying is really true, but just I think there's some sense, right, that people have that was any of this documented.
[16:01]Are there videos or pictures? And that's a horrific thing to contemplate, but also is part of the story in terms of what this individual did, what the people around him may have done, we don 't know.
[16:15]In terms of these files, These came from the estate. Now, I want to ask you something that was raised by my colleague Lisa Rubin in the first block of this program, which is she seemed to indicate that your committee has a lot of files and only a small sliver of them have been made public, that there are bank files and there are other things.
[16:39]And I can't tell how much those are affirmative decisions being made by the chair, Jim Comer. how much those are working your way through production carefully ? Like, how would you describe why we have seen what we've seen and why we haven't seen what we haven't seen, if that makes sense?
[16:52]Absolutely. Look, I think first, what's really important here is that every single document photo video that we have is because we have fought for them on the oversight committee as Democrats . And Republicans, every single step of the way, have tried to block the release.
[17:09]They try to stop our vote in the subpoena. Donald Trump brought in members of Congress to the Situation Room, tried to stop the vote from happening on the floor. And so Republicans, Mike Johnson , James Comer, at every single turn,
[17:23]have dragged their feet and participated in this White House cover-up. Of what we currently have, we have one batch of documents from the DOJ. All of those documents were essentially already public records. So that was already given to the public. So there's nothing new there.
[17:42]Of the other documents that we have, much of what we have either has been already in the public record, Democrats have already put out as a committee and we still have not put out yet fully are the bank records. And I'll tell you why. We're working right now with our partners in the Senate Finance Committee in both the Senate and the Financial Services Committee in the U.S.
[17:57]House. And we are carefully going through a complex system of documents, ledgers, bank statements that connect money laundering, we believe, possibly, and also information about who was paying who and where Jeffrey Epstein was receiving all of his resources from.
[18:19]And I'll note this one other thing, which is important. The Republicans only decided to subpoena two of the banks, Deutsche Bank, and JP Morgan. We've asked for over 20 banks to be subpoenaed.
[18:36]So we need Republicans to join us and subpoena the 20 other banks where we want to get information from. All of that is going to be critically important in the weeks and months ahead. But I'll tell you, Chris, we're making really, really good progress. So if there are images here, I mean, one thing that's striking to me is something that Andrew Weissman said earlier in the program.
[18:53]And this is perchained to say the birthday book, right? Which in some ways I think kicked off a lot of this. The Wall Street Journal's reporting about that. Am I right that nothing from the estate has ever come into the custody of law enforcement? That everything being turned over by the estate, including the photos you got, like this is the first time U.S.
[19:16]government representatives or anyone has gotten this information? Is that true? We're actually not sure what representatives of the government or the DOJ may have that the estate also has. There's certainly a lot the estate has that, according to some of the DOJ, they do not have.
[19:36]Look, the birthday book, Donald Trump spent weeks saying it didn 't exist, as we remember. There have been comments from members of the DOJ and members of the administration that they weren't aware, obviously, of some of what the estate has. And so that is likely true, that there are documents and photos that we're releasing to the public, including possibly ones that we release today that are not in the possession of the DOJ .
[19:58]But I also want to be very clear that what we've released and what we have is a tiny amount of production compared to what the DOJ has. From what we understand from talking to folks at the FBI as well as the DOJ, there's an enormous, enormous amount of documents, of records, of photos , of videos, and other materials in the possession of the Department of Justice.
[20:29]If we really want to solve this investigation and bring justice to the survivors, the DOJ is where the information is. And now we're going to collect it. If they choose to redact information or if they choose to not give us full information, we 're going to get to the truth, even without the DOJ. But they need to do the right thing right now and release all the files.
[20:46]All right, Congressman Robert Garcia, who sits on that Oversight Committee. Thank you so much. A very busy day, and I appreciate you coming by. The release of those new photos from Jeffrey Epstein's estate that we've been reporting raises a fresh set of questions.
[21:01]And I'm hoping my next guest can help answer them. Democratic member of the House Oversight Committee, Congressman Suha Subramanian of Virginia is with us now. Congressman, It's good to have you here. The Democrats tell us that the committee got 95,000 plus images .
[21:18]Just 19 were released today. Can you help us understand what went into the discussions to release these specific pictures? How are you going through these materials? So first, we've only gone through about a fourth of the 95 ,000 images and documents.
[21:36]So there's a lot more to be found. But certainly these 19, I think, paint a picture of a couple of things. One, they show us that all these rich and powerful men, Democrats and Republicans, who were rumored to be associated with Jeffrey Epstein, were found in pictures in Jeffrey Epstein's estate.
[21:54]That's where these pictures and images are coming from. Jeffrey Epstein kept these in his estate. And so the second thing is Donald Trump keeps saying that he didn't know anything about Jeffrey Epstein's crimes when he knew Jeffrey Epstein. Yeah, here he is once again with many women.
[22:08]We don't know if they're victims or not. So that's why we blocked their faces. But again, Donald Trump keeps coming up. And former Prince Andrew, now Andrew, keeps coming up. Some of these other folks keep coming up.
[22:24]And so this is more evidence of some of the associations that Jeffrey Epstein have had with rich and powerful men. But there is no context surrounding them, right? So for example, we don't even know were these pictures taken after he was a convicted sex offender. So should there be concerned about maybe guilt by association or people taking implications away from that that aren't necessarily fair?
[22:49]We're trying to piece some of this together. But again, this is not like it's the first time Donald Trump or Bill Gates or even Steve Bannon has been mentioned side by side with Jeffrey Epstein.
[23:09]And so it's very important to understand that every single time we get documents released from the Epstein estate, we keep seeing the same names over and over again. Now we're seeing images. There was even a picture of a Donald Trump branded condom, right? And Jeffrey Epstein not only had those, but he took a picture of them and kept it. And it was in his estate all these years. And so at the context that is most important to me is the fact that the Epstein estate had these pictures, these professionally taken pictures of him and his associates and colleagues who have been rumored to be associated with him for a long time.
[23:46]There is also some concerns raised about some of the women who, again, their faces were blurred, but they may be able to recognize themselves or people who they knew around that time may be able to recognize them. What were the conversations surrounding trying to be as specific as you can about not re -traumatizing these survivors and their families? Right. Yeah, that's been a high priority for us.
[24:11]And that's why we've been in contact with the victims, families and the victims themselves, to make sure that when we're releasing photos and files, when we're releasing documents that we redact them when they wish to be redacted. In some cases, like last time, Virginia Jufri, we actually saw that the Trump administration unredacted her name. And so we don't want to do that. We don't want to out victims or have victims come forward through our process.
[24:29]So we're going to continue to be vigilant about that. In the end, though, these documents were not part of the DOJ documents. This is just the estate. And this is a subpoena that's four months old that the Trump administration hasn't responded to. And so they have till next week to follow the law now because he signed that bill.
[24:45]And so we're very interested to see that. This is only the tip of the iceberg. So people need to recognize that . Well, there is also a comment that was made by your colleague Robert Garcia, who suggested that there are some of these powerful people that the committee might want to talk to.
[25:01]You're a lawyer, and so you understand how investigations work. Who would you still like to speak to? What do you think are the clear questions that the American people have a right to get an answer to, and from whom? some of these names come up over and over again.
[25:18]And so I want to talk to the people who visited his island. I want to talk to the people who visited his mansion over and over again. And I certainly want to talk to anyone who has information about the inner workings of Epstein's crimes and his criminal ring.
[25:33]We have, you know, Ghislaine Maxwell is a serial liar. She's not told us the truth. She's not a reliable witness. But we want to talk to some of these other folks like Andrew. I want the Clintons to come forward. I want everyone to come forward who has information about Jeffrey Epstein.
[25:49]And so that's why we've agreed to subpoenaing many of these folks. And we're going to continue to try to get as much information as possible. That's what any lawyer would do in a situation like this. The Epstein estate has been producing records to comply with the subpoena on a rolling basis, if I'm correct, a congressman.
[26:05]What else do you expect to obtain and how quickly? So we've actually continued to push the banks and the financial institutions to release the files that they have on Jeffrey Epstein. The victims told us that these financial documents tell a story of his crimes.
[26:25]His business dealings were intertwined with his crimes and his personal life. And so we have to make sure that we have those. I think they are going to be very, very important to our investigation. And then the Epstein estate has more documents too. They've been very cooperative with us to date and we have more to go with this batch right now, 75% left to go through.
[26:49]And we want to make sure that we have all the information and that we release all the information as publicly as we can while still protecting the victims. Let me just ask you before I let you go, I know that you're going to continue to release some of these photos. Do you have a sense of how long it will take you to go through the remaining three quarters of them and make decisions about what else should be released publicly?
[27:05]It's a lot as soon as possible. And we have a great team on the Oversight Committee working through them. I'm hoping in the next week we can get everything we need to be able to release what we need to the public at that point. Joining us, MS Now senior legal reporter, Lisa Rubin, MS Now senior White House reporter, Von Hilliard, MS Now congressional reporter, Michael Schnell, and the Bulwark senior reporter, Will Summer.
[27:30]Michael, this is just a handful of photos. They say they have 95,000 more. What else remains? Yeah, Katie, as you mentioned, the committee saying that they got a trench of 95,000 photos from the Epstein estate.
[27:49]And let's just take a step back and remember, this comes from that subpoena of the Epstein estate that the House Oversight Committee had passed over the summer. Now, Robert Garcia, he is the chairman of the House. He is the top Democrat on the Oversight Committee. He said they just released some of that tranche today, warning that other photos that they haven't released yet
[28:03]are quote, disturbing. It was in that audio that you played just before. Now the committee says they are reviewing these other photos on a rolling basis. They plan to release them on a rolling basis, but they're already reverberating what has been released within the walls of a Congress up here on Capitol Hill.
[28:18]We did here from speaker Mike Johnson earlier today. He said he hadn't yet reviewed the photos or seen the photos. He's been busy with other subjects. But I want to talk about what leader Jeffrey said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.
[28:35]He sort of got into the idea that we could potentially have more information on the horizon next week. And that comes from that bill, the Epstein Transparency Act that Congress passed last month that essentially compels the Department of Justice to release all materials it has involving Jeffrey Epstein.
[28:52]Now, that bill gave the DOJ a month, 30 days to get all this information out. That deadline is in a week from today. So next Friday, that is when the DOJ has to release his information. Leader Jeffrey saying that he is going to make it his duty to ensure that that material is released next week.
[29:08]So certainly a lot on the Epstein front. But again, I just want to make the clarification and make it clear there. Today's photos are from the Epstein estate subpoena. We still haven't seen things from that bill from the DOJ. They've got a week to release that stuff.
[29:23]Well, I'm curious about Steve Bannon. We're looking at an image just there of Steve Bannon and Jeffrey Epstein. Bannon filmed a lot of hours of interviews with Jeffrey Epstein between 2018 and 2019. Where is that footage?
[29:39]Well, as far as we know, Steve Bannon has it. He's been unwilling to release it. He has said, you know, he has sort of posed to someone who wants answers about Epstein. Yet, as we can see here from these photos, I mean, they seem to be on very friendly terms here. If he wants those answers, why doesn't he release the footage, I guess, is the question.
[29:57]It certainly demonstrates they had a working relationship. Yeah, so explain that a little further, this relationship, because it is an uncomfortable or tense position. Steve Bannon being a very vocal and prominent member of the the Maga Sphere, the America First Sphere.
[30:19]And those are the folks that were demanding answers about Jeffrey Epstein, demanding to know who was in his powerful circle and what they knew when. How does he straddle both of those worlds? I mean, I think it's a re I mean , we've seen emai from Epstein's estate tha you know, he was communica a lot.
[30:41]My colleague Mona the bulwark has written asked, why isn't Steve Ba who associated with Epstein facing that same heat and So it's a very strange thing and it sort of maybe sums up the right-wing media approach to Epstein, which was saying, you know, we got to look into this guy. Look at all these Democrats he's palling around with while not looking at what was going on with, say, Donald Trump and Epstein, or in this case, Steve Bannon and Epstein.
[30:59]Yeah, I know, Vaughn, you've done a lot of reporting on this as well. What have you found? Right, I've actually talked to Mark Epstein, the brother of Jeffrey Epstein, about the relationship between Steve Bannon and his brother. And this was back in late 2018, the first half of 2019, before Epstein was arrested, re- arrested by federal authorities.
[31:23]And the two men, according to Mark Epstein, he was told that Bannon has 15 to 16 hours of footage. And over the summer, Bannon suggested that he's still working on this documentary that he claimed to have been working on back when he first filmed this back in 2019 and that he was going to release some parts of it at the beginning of 2026.
[31:44]We haven't heard an update on that suggestion, but the two men , according to Mark Epstein, this was an effort to rehabilitate According to Mark Epstein, the image of his brother, of course, this was at a time in which he had been released and he had gotten that sweetheart deal at that point in time. This picture, we believe, is in New York.
[32:00]That is where the two men had spent a significant amount of their time together there. This is at a time in which, folks will recall, Steve Bannon had left. as the effective strategist and counselor inside of the White House. He left there in late 2017, and so this was during that intermediate period of which DeBannon was kind of in no man's land figuring out what was his next act.
[32:30]And so there's a lot of questions as to exactly what are on those tapes, not only that he has, but also the other author that whose name I'm missing here at the top of my head here, who also has hours of recordings that he said that we have not seen here released either. That's Michael Wolff. We haven't seen those as well. Lisa, 95,000 images.
[32:46]We got a handful today. Should we expect anything that would reveal more about who knew what about Jeffrey Epstein's actions when? I'm not sure. And remember also that these 95, 000 images, it's not clear to us whose control they're in right now.
[33:05]They were produced to the committee as a whole. The committee is chaired by Republicans. They have not made their own drop of documents today. And it's not clear that they will, before the Epstein File Transparencies Act, deadline comes a week from today .
[33:34]One of the things that Republicans on the committee might be trying to do right now because they are sitting on other productions from other sources other than the estate is try to figure out how what they have in their possession compares and contrasts with what DOJ has in its possession and is preparing to produce next Friday . If you're the Department of Justice, And particularly under this president, you want to fulfill that promise of we've been more transparent with you than other departments of justice with respect to Jeffrey Epstein. Perhaps you'd like to be the one to produce some of the same materials that were otherwise obtainable or obtained by the committee from other sources.
[33:57]And so I don't know when we'll next see a production that comes from this committee. from sources other than the Department of Justice, but we know that they're sitting on productions from at least two major financial institutions, as well as more documents from the U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Justice itself. That body did its own investigation, leading to two separate lawsuits against one, the Epstein estate and two, JPMorgan Chase.
[34:24]And so I guess one big question I have is when will we see more and who is in control of when we can see more? So there's a deadline next Friday for DOJ. If they don't meet that deadline , what happens? That's a really interesting question. I mean, we've seen Thomas Massey on camera today suggesting that a failure to comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act would be criminal.
[34:42]I certainly don't see criminal penalties written into the text itself. In fact, I went back to look to see what Mr. Massey was talking about that I had missed. He might be referring to some other more general criminal statute.
[35:01]I mean, it's an interesting question whether failure to comply with a statute that requires itself turning over materials to Congress is itself contempt of Congress, but perhaps that is what he is talking about. The other thing though, Katie, is that within 30, you know, they have this 30-day deadline to produce materials, but with respect to what they withheld, They have another period of time after that to sort of justify their withholding and redactions to Congress.
[35:24]And that, I think, is going to be almost as interesting as what they produce, because we won't know what we don't know until they tell us what we don't know. That is a good point. Vaughn, I want to ask you another question about the White House. This is an interesting statement from Abigail Jackson. She says, once again, House Democrats are selectively releasing cherry-picked photos with random redactions.
[35:44]By the way, the redactions, you can see the black boxes are done by the committee. The blurred images were done by MS now because we didn't know who some of these people were. But anyway, she says, this is Abigail Jackson, random redactions to try to create a false narrative. Here's the reality.
[36:01]Democrats like Stacey Plaskett and Hakeem Jeffries were soliciting money in meetings from Epstein after he was convicted. He was a convicted sex offender.
[36:26]The Democratic hoax against President Trump has been repeatedly debunked, and the Trump administration has done more for Epstein's victims than Democrats ever have by repeatedly calling for transparency, releasing thousands of pages of documents and calling for further investigations into Epstein's Democrat friends. It's time for the media to stop regurgitating Democrat talking points and start asking Democrats why they wanted to hang around Epstein after he was convicted.
[36:44]We've asked everybody in the images why they wanted to hang out with Epstein after he was convicted. What we're still unclear on, and this is what makes it so strange , is that this is a president who runs toward every controversy. He does not fall down in the face of a drama.
[37:13]He punches back, he shrugs it off, he's shown himself to be extremely strong in the face of what would otherwise be career- ending controversies. What is the deal with this one? This is one that I think is clearly uncomfortable, and in the face of uncomfortability, the president has so often- We all knew, and I'm sorry to interrupt you, but we all knew that Donald Trump had a friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, and it's well documented.
[37:33]We have images of him. We've been playing him for years . So what else could be in there that is more surprising or more revelatory than what we already know? I mean, we expect him to be all over these pages.
[37:50]We've got reporting that says he is all over these pages, according to the DOJ. Right, and they continually say, as the White House did in that statement there, that there has been no criminal wrongdoing alleged to the president. But what is not criminal doesn't make it ethical or doesn't make it morally right or righteous.
[38:14]And if one was around conversations or experiences in which there was womanizing taking place or the knowledge that there would be potential harassment or even assault, to what extent is one culpable for the denialism that could have existed. And I think that is where there' s an uncomfortable conversation for the president and this White House in the year of 2025. We have watched him now repeatedly deny not only the extent of his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, he denied
[38:37]Knowing E. Jean Carroll, and then when a photo came out, he acknowledged, OK, well, I don't remember her exactly. And that is where, time and again, the president's denials of sexual harassment made by now more than two dozen women have been met by strident pushback.
[38:56]And essentially, what you have is mounting evidence that the president has engaged in morally questionable relations with women over the course of his many decades as an adult here. Where does this go from here? We have more photos and more that show him having a deeper relationship with this man than we previously knew.
[39:15]Again, is it criminal wrongdoing ? Perhaps not. Hopefully not. I think for Americans that are looking at who their commander- in-chief and leader of this country is, I think that there's a lot of questions about who he morally surrounded himself by and the extent to which he did or did not know information that could have protected other women from being victimized over the course of those years that followed.
[39:41]I wonder if we can talk about the latest document production that y'all just made. Can you talk about the context that we don't have around these images at this point? Because it's just photos, although it comes from emails and the computer. Sure.
[39:56]Let me just say that obviously, you know, oversight Democrats have been committed to transparency. and any time that we receive information from whether we've sent the subpoena or whether we have fought to get that information, we're going to put it out to the public. And that's, I think, the most important thing. Obviously, just last night, we received about 95,000 photographs from the Epstein estate.
[40:14]I want to be clear. Our committee, oversight Democrats, have gone through maybe about 25,000 of them so far. So there's an enormous amount of photos we have not gone through. It will take days and weeks to ensure that we go through those photos and that a reduction is done in the appropriate way.
[40:37]Let me just also say that clearly we have put out I think maybe 15 to 20 of those photos this morning. Democrats have. We will continue to put out more photos in the days and weeks ahead. But I just caution folks at the redaction process and ensuring that we are protecting the survivors and the women who were abused by Epstein are protected.
[40:55]What else do you expect to get in this document production? What else do you expect you'll see when more of these come out? There's obviously 95,000 photos. There are many, many photos of women and of some of Epstein's properties, which is a significant portion of these photos.
[41:19]These photos were basically in the possession of the Epstein estate. And so that includes pictures that maybe were sent to Epstein, perhaps He took himself. We know there are some that he took himself. Others took, but they were in his possession. And so that is what's important.
[41:40]And obviously, there are photos of powerful men and folks that we want to have an opportunity to speak with and ask questions of. The thing right now that's the most important is there is one man who has the power to release the files and get to the truth and bring justice to the survivors, and that's Donald Trump.
[41:58]And Donald Trump right now needs to release the files to the American public so that the truth can come out and we can actually get some sense of justice for the survivors. So what do you think the significance of these photos is? Because some of these are folks we already knew had associations with Jeffrey Epstein.
[42:12]I think anything that we release is significant. I think clearly, I think people should be able to make judgments on their own as to what they see in these photos. For us, this is about transparency. If we receive information or pictures or anything else, videos that we put out last week , and I think it's important to note that it's been
[42:29]It's been oversight Democrats have fought every single time to release all this information. And we but there is a White House cover up happening right now in not releasing these files that needs to end. There are women who were now who were raped when they were children who just want justice.
[42:43]Let's release the files immediately. What do you suppose to put out all these files in the 19th. You think we're going to get everything they need. You think it's going to be satisfactory. I think that the Justice Department needs to put out the files today. What happens on the 19th, I'm hopefully put everything out.
[42:58]It shouldn't be heavily redacted . The file shouldn't be tampered with. We should get the full production. There are hundreds and hundreds of FBI agents that have worked on putting these files together. They know what's in them. The President himself is aware of what's in these files.
[43:13]They tried to stop the release. We forced the action in Congress . It's time to release the files. What's your plan to be on the 19th, though, if the DOJ does not release these files? Right now, our plan is to demand that the President release the files, and we'll see what he does on the 19th. But I think, again, these pictures, some of these photos are really disturbing.
[43:41]Will you subpoena the estate for the email components attached to them? Every time that we've requested a subpoena, Republicans are the ones that are able to actually enforce that. So we have forced these subpoenas on Republicans. We forced votes on Republicans and subpoena. We need all the emails attached to the photos.
[44:00]We need all the bank records that yet Comer and the committee have yet refused to subpoena all 20 banks. We've done two banks. There's a lot more information out there. Is Chairman Comer helping in this effort? I mean, what's your engagement with him on I think there have been some instances where House Republicans have obviously worked with us to try to get some information, but it has been a struggle.
[44:23]We had to force that very first vote and get a couple Republicans with us to force that initial subpoena. We have to fight to get Acosta in front of us. We've had to release these documents and photos to get Republicans then to join us and actually release more. What we need from Chairman Comer is to subpoena the 20 plus banks that we have requested, that survivors have pointed us to, to follow that money trail of money laundering and the enormous amount of money that we have from so many folks.
[44:47]We need a subpoena to get the emails attached to these voters and all that information. Any other questions? That is being negotiated right now with with the committee and their How are you making a decision to redact images? I mean, is that an implication that they were victims or could have been victims?
[45:02]What does that mean? Our commitment from day one has been to redact any photo any information that could Lead to any sort of harm to any of the victims And we've been committed to that , and we'll continue to do that.
[45:18]And the DOJ's deadline for full transparency isn't until next week. But have you gotten anything new from DOJ? We have not got anything new. We've had some limited conversations, but we really don 't know what they're going to put out. It could be that the DOJ puts out some documents. Remember, the DOJ actually put out some documents when we subpoenaed the DOJ, the oversight committee, a few months ago.
[45:41]What they put out, all the documents they put out, the 95, 000-plus documents they put out, whatever that number was, they were all already public. And so there was no real new information that they put out. What people should know is that we have only reviewed about a fourth of the 95,000 pictures that we received late last night . We will continue to put more of these photos out in the days and weeks ahead.
[46:03]You touched on this, Congressman , but to put a finer point on it , do you have faith that the Department of Justice will comply with this law and release those files in just a week from now? I think that we have to look back at what's happened up to this point when you spend your entire campaigns and you're going to release the files. And then you do everything you can to stop their release when the attorney general says they' re on her desk and she refuses to release them, when you try to set up sham investigations to stop the release, when you're bringing members of Congress into the Situation Room at the White House so that you don't vote to get the release done in the Congress.
[46:31]That all points to the same thing, which is the White House consistently has tried to cover up the Epstein files in the release. And I know the 19th has watched the request over the time frame here, but do you think this gets buried because it comes out Friday night on the 19th, a week before Christmas, and people don 't pay as much attention? Look, I think the release used to happen regardless of when it is.
[46:46]I think the American public are smart enough to understand that, at this moment, what we want is a release of all the files. Any final questions? Thank you for standing out here in the colds. I know it's cold. Thank you. Without a jack. Go ahead. There were new Epstein photos released today showing you and also Bill Clinton, Steve Bannon.
[47:03]What were your reaction to those new photos that were released? Well, I haven't seen it, but I mean, everybody knew this man. He was all over Palm Beach. He has photos with everybody. I mean, almost there are hundreds and hundreds of people that have photos with him. So that's no big deal.