The US House has passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which, if passed in the Senate and signed by President Trump, would force the Department of Justice to release the Epstein files.
Many in the House broke out into cheers and applause upon passage of the bill.
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Clay Higgins was the only member who voted against the bill. He said in an X post:
I have been a principled “NO” on this bill from the beginning. What was wrong with the bill three months ago is still wrong today. It abandons 250 years of criminal justice procedure in America. As written, this bill reveals and injures thousands of innocent people – witnesses, people who provided alibis, family members, etc. If enacted in its current form, this type of broad reveal of criminal investigative files, released to a rabid media, will absolutely result in innocent people being hurt. Not by my vote. The Oversight Committee is conducting a thorough investigation that has already released well over 60,000 pages of documents from the Epstein case. That effort will continue in a manner that provides all due protections for innocent Americans. If the Senate amends the bill to properly address privacy of victims and other Americans, who are named but not criminally implicated, then I will vote for that bill when it comes back to the House.
This comes after Representatives Thomas Massie (R-KY), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), and Ro Khanna (D-CA) will hold a press conference this morning with Jeffrey Epstein victims to discuss their bill, after Khanna and Massie’s discharge petition to force a vote reached the required 218 signatures.
As The Gateway Pundit reported, President Trump on Monday said he would sign the bill into law if the House and Senate vote to pass it, adding that he’s “all for” a successful vote.
These comments came after he released a blistering statement demanding that House Republicans immediately vote to release the Epstein files, blasting Democrats for weaponizing the scandal as a distraction from his administration’s historic achievements.
“House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide, and it’s time to move on from this Democrat Hoax perpetrated by Radical Left Lunatics in order to deflect from the Great Success of the Republican Party, including our recent Victory on the Democrat ‘Shutdown,’” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
He added, “The Department of Justice has already turned over tens of thousands of pages to the Public on ‘Epstein,’ are looking at various Democrat operatives (Bill Clinton, Reid Hoffman, Larry Summers, etc.) and their relationship to Epstein, and the House Oversight Committee can have whatever they are legally entitled to, I DON’T CARE!”
Per CBS:
The House nearly unanimously approved a bill that would require the Justice Department to release files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, voting 427-1 to pass the legislation after months of stalling from GOP leaders.
The bill, known as the Epstein Files Transparency Act, would compel the Justice Department to publicly release files related to Epstein and his co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell within 30 days of it being signed into law, with some exceptions for survivors’ personal information and other sensitive material.
President Trump dropped his opposition to the bill earlier this week, opening the door for House Republicans to vote for its passage. Despite their ultimate support, many GOP lawmakers denounced the vote as a stunt, arguing Democrats were seeking the documents to attack the president.
The vote was the product of a lengthy effort to force the issue in the House, with four Republicans joining all Democrats last week to sign a petition to bring the matter to the floor. House Speaker Mike Johnson opposed the effort but ultimately supported final passage, saying he expects the Senate to fix what he called “serious deficiencies” in the bill.
House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters this morning that Senate Majority Leader John Thune will amend the discharge petition in the Senate and send the bill back to the House.
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This is a developing story.
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