Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters he’s not hearing any talk in the Senate about backing an effort led by conservative Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) to force the Trump administration to release files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Thune indicated on Thursday that even if the House passes a resolution demanding that the Justice Department release files about Epstein, it would not gain much traction in the Senate.
Asked if there’s any support among Senate Republicans to force the disclosure of the Epstein files, Thune told reporters: “I’m not hearing it.”
Massie is working with Democrats to try to force a vote in the House on whether the administration should release more information about Epstein. He has filed a discharge petition to force the issue to come to the House floor.
Thune on Monday said he would leave decisions about whether to release additional Epstein-related documents and information to Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel.
“I’ll leave that up to DOJ and to the FBI. I think that’s in their purview. I think the president’s expressed his views on it, and so I’ll just leave it at that,” Thune said.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) told The Hill on Monday that Bondi has been forthcoming enough.
“With anything in government, I always urge the greatest of transparency,” he said. “I’m not saying they’re coming up short there, but that’s just a good principle of government, as far as I’m concerned.”
President Trump has repeatedly dismissed the calls for law enforcement agencies to release more information about Epstein and associates who may have engaged in sexual activity with underage girls at Epstein’s private island.
“I don’t understand why the Jeffrey Epstein case would be of interest to anybody. It’s pretty boring stuff,” Trump told reporters on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland earlier this week.
But not all Republican senators are willing to cede the issue entirely to the Department of Justice and FBI, which announced in a two-page memo earlier this month that it did not have additional information to provide about Epstein.
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, on Wednesday called on the senior Trump officials to “just release the damn files.”
“I have to disagree with the president. I don’t think human trafficking of young teenage girls being exploited by billionaires on a private island is boring. I think it’s despicable and I believe that anybody who had anything to do with it or knowledge of it should be held accountable,” Tillis told a Charlotte-based radio talk show.