Republican Rep. Thomas Massie stated Sunday there may very well be “a deluge of Republicans” who vote in favor of forcing the Division of Justice to launch all of the Jeffrey Epstein recordsdata.
“There may very well be 100 or extra. I am hoping to get a veto-proof majority on this laws when it comes up for a vote,” Massie informed ABC Information’ “This Week” co-anchor Jonathan Karl. Massie was considered one of 4 Republicans who defied President Donald Trump and joined Democrats in signing the discharge petition which compelled the vote this week.
The vote comes after the Home Oversight Committee launched over 20,000 paperwork, together with e-mail and textual content messages from Epstein, a lot of which point out Trump. The president has responded by calling the recordsdata a “hoax” and he pressed Legal professional Normal Pam Bondi to open an investigation into a number of outstanding Democrats over their connections to Epstein.
“I’ve one other concern about these investigations that he is introduced. If they’ve ongoing investigations in sure areas, these paperwork cannot be launched. So this is perhaps an enormous smokescreen, these investigations to open a bunch of them to–as a final ditch effort to stop the discharge of the Epstein recordsdata,” Massie stated.
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., seems on ABC Information’ “This Week” on Nov. 16, 2025.
ABC Information
Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy additionally mentioned the Epstein recordsdata on “This Week,” calling Trump’s name for Legal professional Normal Pam Bondi to research Democrats “each heartbreaking and completely unsurprising.”
“The Division of Justice has simply grow to be a safety racket for Donald Trump and a witch hunt operation in opposition to his political opponents. This is the reason our democracy is in such peril proper now, is that for the primary time in our historical past, the Division of Justice operates as a way to attempt to punish and lock up anyone that criticizes Donald Trump,” Murphy stated.
Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., seems on ABC Information’ “This Week” on Nov. 16, 2025.
ABC Information
Trump claimed earlier this yr that he ended his affiliation with Epstein within the early 2000s after discovering that Epstein was allegedly poaching workers from Mar-a-Lago. Trump has not been accused of any crimes associated to the Epstein case.
Listed here are extra highlights from Massie and Murphy’s interviews:
On the outlook within the Senate
Massie: I simply hope [Senate Majority Leader] John Thune will do the suitable factor. Look, our personal speaker tried to push this invoice by unanimous consent final week inside quarter-hour of me getting the 218th vote as a result of he was making an attempt to save lots of folks from a vote. If he is able to move it by unanimous consent, then the Senate chief ought to be as effectively. Simply carry it up. However the strain goes to be there if we get an enormous vote within the Home.
On the importance of the Epstein scandal
Murphy: It is true that Donald Trump is making an attempt to cowl up for, I feel, a number of actually highly effective and wealthy folks, however he is frankly not that selfless. He would not be going via all of this effort to attempt to cease the discharge of those recordsdata if he wasn’t significantly implicated in these recordsdata. That is almost certainly the most important corruption scandal within the historical past of the nation.
