Khanna, Massie Warn That AG Bondi Might Face Contempt of Congress Action for Not Releasing All Epstein Files

Continuing their campaign against the Trump Justice Department (DOJ) that began with the “rolling” release of the department’s Epstein files, Representatives Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna again roasted the agency on CBS’s Face The Nation and named one of the names — albeit one already public — they thought should have appeared in the document dump.

Since Friday’s release, which includes posting the files to the DOJ website, Massie, a Kentucky Republican, and Khanna, a California Democrat, have said the department and its headmistress, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, are illegally withholding documents.

The pair co-wrote the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which required DOJ to release all files by Friday — 30 days after President Donald Trump signed it.

Speaking to the network’s hate-Trump leftist Margaret Brennan, the two representatives again warned that trouble is ahead for Bondi. They say Bondi is breaking the law by not releasing all the files. While Khanna has said the pair are preparing articles of impeachment, today he and Massie discussed holding Bondi in contempt of Congress.

“Rolling” Release

Bondi landed the pair’s crosshairs on Friday after a partial release of the files. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche explained the release in a letter to Congress.

Releasing all the documents was impossible because “several [DOJ] components have just provided documents this week,” Blanche wrote. As well, he said, though 200 DOJ lawyers vetted the documents for release, “the volume of material and the requirement that every page of every document be reviewed for potential redactions” was too great to meet the deadline. 

Thus, he said, the documents will be released on a “rolling” basis. Blanche said DOJ lawyers redacted portions of the files to protect Epstein’s 1,200 victims and that “there are no redactions of famous people.”

That wasn’t quite true, as Fox News reported. Sources told the network that “the same redaction standards were applied to politically exposed individuals and government officials.”

Massie fumed on X that Bondi was breaking the law. Just before the release, he explained how he and everyone would know the department had violated the act.

Some victims’ attorneys have contacted Massie, and “collectively, they know there are at least 20 names of men who are accused of sex crimes in the possession of the FBI,” he said:

If we get a large production on Dec. 19 and it does not contain a single name of any male who is accused of a sex crime or sex trafficking or rape or any of these things, then we know they haven’t produced all the documents. It’s that simple.

Khanna observed that the released files omitted two key items: a 60-count indictment of Jeffrey Epstein that preceded a deal he cut with prosecutors in Florida in 2008, and an 82-page memorandum that supported it.

Khanna told CNN that he and Massie are drafting articles of impeachment.

Today’s Face the Nation

Today, they intensified their campaign against Bondi and her department. 

Host Margaret Brennan asked Massie whether DOJ was complying with the spirit of the law even though all the files had not been released.

“No, they’re flouting the spirit and the letter of the law,” he said, referring to the video in which he explained how Americans would know whether DOJ is complying with the law. It says “[n]o record shall be withheld, delayed, or redacted on the basis of embarrassment, reputational harm, or political sensitivity, including to any government official, public figure, or foreign dignitary.”

“I said in the hours leading up to this release that we will know if they are complying, if they implicate any of the other criminals that are involved and the suspects that are involved,” Massie said. “The witnesses … the victims themselves, have given [names] to the FBI, and they’ve never been mentioned.”

Brennan asked Khanna about Maria Farmer, who complained to the FBI about Epstein in 1996. “She said the disclosure makes her feel redeemed, and that this was one of the best days of her life to see these documents made public,” Brennan said “What action do you want taken around a case like this?”

“That was the single most important disclosure of what we got,” Khanna replied. He believes the FBI “selectively” withheld documents to protect the rich and powerful who witnessed the abuse of girls or participated in it.

“I know Maria’s sister. She sounded the alarm in 1996, she complained to the FBI,” Khanna continued:

The problem is that Epstein was so connected with law enforcement and powerful politicians, the FBI did nothing for a decade. Frankly, she deserves compensation. She deserves an explanation, but the broader point is, Blanche was on this morning saying that Massie and I have a problem, that it’s taking too long. That’s not the problem. The problem is, this was a slap in the face of survivors. What do they want? They want to know who are the rich and powerful men who visited Epstein’s rape island and covered up the abuse. And the key documents that our law basically said needed to be released — the 60-count indictment that actually implicates a lot of these people and the prosecution memo — were not released. It’s not about the timeline, it’s about the selective concealment.

Khanna called the redactions “excessive,” and said the “simple point” is, “Who raped these young girls, who covered it up, and why are they getting away with it?”

Going back to Massie, Brennan asked about the 20 survivors, which permitted Massie to name Jes Staley, former chieftain of Barclays bank. In March, he confessed to having sex with a member of Epstein’s staff. He said he was unaware of Epstein’s demonic sex crimes.

“[T]he survivors’ lawyers have told me those numbers, and they’ve described their professions and in general, but they’ve only given me one of those names, and I mentioned that in a congressional hearing, Jes Staley,” Massie said:

So I searched these documents, I didn’t see Jes Staley’s name, nor did I see 19 other names. And here’s why we shouldn’t be optimistic that Blanche or Bondi are going to release these things. They sent a six-page memo to Congress and said — they cited pre-existing laws as reasons that they weren’t going to follow our law. For instance, our law requires them to release information regardless of embarrassment, but they are trying to say that a previous law prevails when it doesn’t. Common sense says it doesn’t; the Privacy Act doesn’t protect them from that. And then also, as Ro said, internal communications … they’re using a FOIA standard that doesn’t apply because our law already says they have to give us internal communications.

A New American search of the files at justice.gov for “Jes Staley” returned 11 pages of documents, many of which were duplicated.

Bondi and Blanche, Massie said, claim that previous law vitiates the Epstein act. That isn’t the case, he argued. “That’s not the way this works,” he said. 

Asked whether he would attempt to force compliance with the law, Massie said “[t]he quickest way, and I think most expeditious way, to get justice for these victims is to bring inherent contempt against Pam Bondi, and that doesn’t require going through the courts. … Ro Khanna and I are talking about and drafting that right now.”

Khanna told Brennan that he and Massie are assembling a bipartisan consensus that would fine Bondi daily. 

“I’ll tell you why … this is such a slap in the face,” Khanna continued:

I’ve talked to the survivors. … One of the survivors said they released her name accidentally, but they still have not released the FBI file about the people who abused her, at her request. And the problem here is that there are rich and powerful people. We all know this. There are 1,200 victims. There are rich and powerful people who either engaged in this abuse, covered it up or were on this island. And what the American people want to know is, who are these people? And instead of holding them accountable, Pam Bondi is breaking the law. …

I guess the question the American people have, even to me, is, Is the system so corrupt, is the system so corrupt that Thomas Massie and you defy the odds, pass a bill through a discharge petition, get the Senate, get the president to sign it, and still, these rich and powerful people are being protected? Who has this kind of hold on our government? What are they hiding? Why are they not releasing this?