Lawmakers Slam Heavy Redactions in Epstein DOJ Records (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: After the Justice Department made millions of unredacted records, unredacted, about convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein available for certain members of Congress to view today, here's what Representatives Thomas Massey and Ro Khanna said they saw just moments ago. Take a listen. REP.

[00:00:19] Speaker 2: THOMAS MASSEY, U.S. Congressional Judiciary Committee Nominee What I saw that bothered me were the names of at least six men that have been redacted that are likely incriminated by their inclusion in these files. Our bigger concern is that there's still a lot that's redacted, even in what we're seeing.

[00:00:39] Speaker 1: Here now joining us, Democratic Congressman Jared Moskowitz of Florida. He serves on the House Judiciary Committee. So, Congressman, you got a look at some of these files today. Now, the Epstein Files Transparency Act only allowed the Justice Department to withhold the personal information of the victims, the survivors, and material that would jeopardize active federal investigations. Did the redactions that you saw comply with the law? And tell us what you saw that concerned you.

[00:01:08] Speaker 3: Well, thanks, Jake. Thanks for having me. First, let me say, obviously, we're all hoping for Savannah's mom's speedy return to her family. So, first of all, you go into the Department of Justice today, you go to the 10th floor of a building, there's nobody who works on that floor. You go into a room with four computers. The system that they set up for us to view these documents has a 24-page handbook on how to use it. There's 2.7 million documents that you have to go through. There's no way to go through them unless you know what you're looking for by batch number. Try to match up the redacted document and look for it in an unredacted capacity. But, first, let me say that today I saw a worldwide sex trafficking ring with people in other countries sourcing young children for Jeffrey Epstein, co-conspirators' names, men and women. Clearly, other people that might be on the client list that are on text messages and emails. Over-redaction, dramatic over-redaction. It looks like intentionally so. And then documents that are still redacted. And when we asked why these were redacted, that's because they were submitted into this electronic system redacted. And the people that were at our disposal to ask those questions did not know why they were still redacted, Jake.

[00:02:29] Speaker 1: Could you identify any of the names of individuals who are mentioned in the files that concern you? And if you're afraid of doing it with me now because of fear of lawsuit, there is the speech and debate clause of the Constitution. Obviously, you can go to the floor of the House and you could say it and not be sued. Can you tell us anybody?

[00:02:51] Speaker 3: Well, Jake, we have Pam Bondi coming to the Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, as you mentioned. It's the first time she's coming to the Judiciary hearing. She's the only Cabinet secretary yet to appear in the House on the Committee of Jurisdiction. And I think we're going to give her the opportunity to start naming people. I think that's what Thomas Massey and Ro Khanna have talked about. Obviously, these names need to come out. I think the DOJ needs to release an unredacted version of these documents while still keeping the victims' names secure. But there are clearly co-conspirators in here that they can name. In the documents I saw, we got pictures and their names. They're talking about sourcing girls. There's people in Paris. There's people in Russia. There's people in Czech sourcing girls for Jeffrey Epstein. And then other people talking about these girls being sent to them. They referred to them as, you know, we're dropping the child off. I mean, it's really gross, Jake, on how these people are talking about this stuff in text message and email. I think the American people need to see it and understand that this is a worldwide network that Jeffrey Epstein was running.

[00:04:03] Speaker 1: Today, Ghislaine Maxwell's attorney said she's prepared to speak fully and honestly. She took the fifth with the House Oversight Committee earlier. But she said she'll speak fully and honestly, but only if given clemency by President Trump. And her attorney essentially at the same time was saying, hey, you know, Ghislaine Maxwell's the only person who could clear President Trump and President Clinton and say they're innocent of wrongdoing. Some people might see that as a quid pro quo. What was your reaction? That's exactly what it is, Jake.

[00:04:31] Speaker 3: First of all, why was she moved from the maximum security prison? Why did Todd Blanch move her? You know, I hope we get an answer from Pam Bondi on Wednesday. Nobody seems to know why she was moved. Who directed that? What was that exchange for? By the way, when she talked to Todd Blanch, she didn't claim any Fifth Amendment privilege. And so her right to remain silent. So all of a sudden now, I mean, this is another failed, you know, Comer, you know, hearing that he has, where he says Ghislaine Maxwell's coming in to talk and we're going to get the truth and we get nothing. She needs to go back to that maximum security prison. There should be no deal for clemency for her to bail anybody out. But at the end of the day, we need to know why she was given this deal, why she was moved, what did she trade for? And what does the administration know that they're not telling us?

[00:05:25] Speaker 1: Democratic Congressman Jared Moskowitz of Florida. Thanks so much. Always good to have you on.

[00:05:30] Speaker 4: Joining us now, California Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna sits on the House Oversight Committee, sat in on the Maxwell testimony and viewed some of the unredacted files today. So, Congressman, what are your biggest takeaways after viewing some of those unredacted documents?

[00:05:45] Speaker 2: That too much of it was still redacted. Anderson, you'll remember that in March, the FBI had a thousand personnel going through these files. Donald Trump had ordered them to go through the files and they made many redactions. And it looks like what happened is those files were redacted then and then they sent them over to justice and justice kept those redactions. Well, the FBI works for Pam Bondi and they need to unscrub the redactions that the FBI made to comply with the Epstein Transparency Act.

[00:06:18] Speaker 4: So even the files you saw were redacted?

[00:06:22] Speaker 2: I'd say 70 to 80 percent of them were redacted. The main 302 statements where survivors talked about who raped them, all of that was still redacted. Now, we did find information about some excessive redactions where there were six men in the two hours we reviewed who should not have been redacted. And I do hope the Justice Department makes that public. Some of the most sensational emails, frankly, some of the redactions may have been legitimate because some of them were from women. Some of them may have been survivors. But the broader theme is that a lot of this was redacted back in March before we passed the law. And the law requires an unscrubbing of those files so we know who the powerful men were who visited the island and raped these girls. And that was never done.

[00:07:13] Speaker 4: You were at Maxwell's deposition with the House Oversight Committee today. She invoked her Fifth Amendment right multiple times and also promised to clear President Trump's name in exchange for clemency. I'm wondering what your takeaway was from that and the whole deposition itself.

[00:07:31] Speaker 2: I was outraged. I mean, she spent hours talking to Deputy Attorney General Blanche and answering his questions. Yet when it came to the Oversight Committee, whether there were Republican or Democratic questions, she took the blanket Fifth Amendment, even when we were asking her nothing about incriminating herself, just asking her who else came to the island. Who else do you know that could have trafficked in girls? And then she says, well, I do have this information. I know this information, but I'm only going to share it if you give me clemency and don't have any prosecution. That's not how things work. She should be sent back to the maximum security prison.

[00:08:09] Speaker 4: We'll play that clip where you and Congressman Massey said there are at least six men whose names have been redacted who should be incriminated by their inclusion in the files. Can you elaborate more on that? I mean, is it clear? Was that part of the group that was redacted in the first place?

[00:08:25] Speaker 2: No, that is not part of the group. It doesn't look like that was part of the group that was redacted in the first place. There are certain documents that say there are 10 co-conspirators, 15 co-conspirators. In that document, some of them were women. Now, I don't know if those women were survivors or not survivors, but we give the benefit of the doubt to justice. Maybe those were survivors who also happened to be co-conspirators and they appropriately redacted them. But there are six men in those documents, some of them foreign-born, a couple of them in the United States with their pictures, and there's absolutely no explanation for why they were redacted. Now, we just discovered six men in a two-hour review. My guess is there are more of those people, and we are going to petition the Justice Department to release that. That could have been incompetence than a cover-up. The broader cover-up, though, that I'm concerned about is the scrubbing that took place in March in the FBI files, where all of this redacted information was then sent to the Justice Department. I think U.S. attorneys looked at it in good faith, but they were looking at documents that were already redacted. So when I said to the Justice Department person, who was very nice, helping me search through the documents, I said, why are these redacted? He said, well, sir, we got them this way. So we just are putting them up in the form we got them. And that is the big issue that needs to be addressed.

[00:09:44] Speaker 4: Congressman Ro Khanna, as always, I appreciate your time. Thank you.