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Epstein Files Transparency Act

Properties2
tagstopic, legislation, congress, department-of-justice, document-release, 2025
aliasesEFTA, H.R. 4405, Public Law 119-38

18 min read

Long titleAn Act to require the Attorney General to release all documents and records in possession of the Department of Justice relating to Jeffrey Epstein, and for other purposes1
BillH.R. 4405, 119th Congress, introduced July 15, 2025 by Ro Khanna, for himself and Thomas Massie23
HousePassed November 18, 2025 on a motion to suspend the rules, 427–14
SenatePassed November 19, 2025 under a prior unanimous-consent order; no recorded vote56
EnactedNovember 19, 2025 as Public Law 119–38, 139 Stat. 6551
Release deadline30 days after enactment, that is December 19, 20251
Report to CongressSection 3 report dated February 14, 2026, published in the Federal Register on August 27, 20267

The Epstein Files Transparency Act is a federal statute, Public Law 119–38, enacted on November 19, 2025, which directs the Attorney General to make publicly available, within thirty days and in a searchable and downloadable format, all unclassified Department of Justice records relating to Jeffrey Epstein and to eight further enumerated categories.1 It was introduced in the House on July 15, 2025 as H.R. 4405 by Ro Khanna of California, for himself and Thomas Massie of Kentucky.23 The House passed it 427 votes to 1 on November 18, 2025 and the Senate passed it the following day without a recorded vote.46 The Department reported to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees on February 14, 2026 that it had released records in all nine statutory categories and had withheld only material that was privileged or that fell within the Act’s permitted withholdings.7 Members of both chambers have said on the floor since December 2025 that the release is incomplete.89101112

Background: the Department’s Epstein files before the Act

The state of the Department’s Epstein holdings was already a matter of public dispute when the bill was introduced. On February 27, 2025 the Attorney General wrote to the FBI Director on Office of the Attorney General letterhead, over her signature, recording that she had asked for the full Epstein files before he took office and had received “approximately 200 pages of documents, which consisted primarily of flight logs, Epstein’s list of contacts, and a list of victims’ names and phone numbers”; that she had been “repeatedly assured by the FBI that we had received the full set of documents”; and that she had learned the previous day that the FBI’s New York Field Office held thousands of pages relating to the investigation and indictment of Epstein.13 She directed that “[b]y 8:00 a.m. tomorrow, February 28, the FBI will deliver the full and complete Epstein files to my office,” with “no withholdings or limitations,” and undertook that any public disclosure would be made “in a manner to protect the privacy of victims and in accordance with law.”13 She further directed the Director to investigate why her earlier order had not been followed and to deliver “a comprehensive report of your findings and proposed personnel action within 14 days.”13 The letter is a direction, not a report; no report answering it appears among the documents cited on this page. The Department quoted the letter in a press release the same day, and Judge Paul A. Engelmayer’s opinion of August 11, 2025 sets both out.14

A joint Department and FBI memorandum, which the court dates July 6, 2025, then stated that a systematic review had “revealed no incriminating ‘client list’” and that it was “the determination of the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation that no further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted.”14 The court recorded that “[e]nsuing news accounts reported public and congressional dissatisfaction with the July 6, 2025 memorandum, and calls for the release of records held by the DOJ and FBI …”14 H.R. 4405 was introduced nine days later.2

Passage

On November 12, 2025 Tim Burchett of Tennessee asked unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 4405 and that the bill be considered immediately; the Chair declined to entertain the request because it had not been cleared by bipartisan floor and committee leadership.153 A draft FBI daily news briefing of November 17, 2025 summarised a BBC report of the previous day that the President had called on House Republicans to vote to release the files, reversing his earlier position, and that the House was expected to vote on the bill.16

The House took the bill up on November 18, 2025 on a motion to suspend the rules and pass, moved by Jim Jordan of Ohio.173 The recorded vote at 2:43 p.m. was 427 ayes to 1 no, with five members not voting; the sole vote against was cast by Clay Higgins of Louisiana.43 The Senate had already agreed by unanimous consent, earlier the same day, that when it received H.R. 4405 from the House it would “proceed to its immediate consideration and the bill be passed, with no intervening action or debate.”5 On November 19, 2025 the presiding officer put the bill under that order; it was read a third time and passed, and no roll call was taken.6 The President signed it the same day, and it became Public Law 119–38.1

What the Act requires

Section 2(a) requires the Attorney General, “[n]ot later than 30 days after the date of enactment,” to “make publicly available in a searchable and downloadable format all unclassified records, documents, communications, and investigative materials in the possession of the Department of Justice, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and United States Attorneys’ Offices,” relating to nine categories.1 They are: Epstein, including all investigations, prosecutions or custodial matters; Ghislaine Maxwell; flight logs and travel records for any aircraft, vessel or vehicle owned, operated or used by Epstein or a related entity; individuals, including government officials, named or referenced in connection with Epstein’s criminal activities, civil settlements, immunity or plea agreements, or investigatory proceedings; entities with known or alleged ties to his trafficking or financial networks; any immunity deals, non-prosecution agreements, plea bargains or sealed settlements involving Epstein or his associates; internal Department communications concerning decisions to charge, not charge, investigate or decline to investigate; communications, memoranda, directives, logs or metadata concerning the destruction, deletion, alteration, misplacement or concealment of records relating to Epstein, his associates, his detention and death, or any investigative files; and documentation of his detention or death, including incident reports, witness interviews, medical examiner files and autopsy reports.1

Section 2(b)(1) provides that “[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.”1 Section 2(c)(1) permits the Attorney General to withhold or redact the segregable portions of records that contain victims’ personally identifiable information or personal and medical files whose disclosure would be a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy; that depict or contain child sexual abuse material; that “would jeopardize an active federal investigation or ongoing prosecution, provided that such withholding is narrowly tailored and temporary”; that depict or contain images of death, physical abuse or injury; or that are properly classified under an executive order in the interest of national defence or foreign policy.1 Privilege is not among the five permitted grounds.1

Section 2(c)(2) requires that “[a]ll redactions must be accompanied by a written justification published in the Federal Register and submitted to Congress.”1 Section 2(c)(3) requires declassification “to the maximum extent possible,” with an unclassified summary where material cannot be declassified, and section 2(c)(4) requires that any decision to classify covered information after July 1, 2025 be published in the Federal Register with the date, the classifying authority and an unclassified summary of the justification.1 Section 3 requires the Attorney General, within fifteen days of completing the release, to report to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees listing all categories of records released and withheld, a summary of redactions and their legal basis, and a list of all government officials and politically exposed persons named or referenced in the released materials.1

The Department’s account of compliance

The Department’s Section 3 report is a letter of February 14, 2026 on the letterhead of the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, addressed to the chairmen and ranking members of the two Judiciary Committees and closing over the typed names of Attorney General Pamela J. Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. In the version published in the Federal Register the signature rule above the Deputy Attorney General’s name is empty and no manuscript signature appears above either name.7 The notice transmitting it is dated August 21, 2026 over the name of Associate Attorney General Stanley E. Woodward, Jr.7 It was published in the Federal Register on August 27, 2026, more than eight months after the statutory release deadline; a search of the Federal Register for the phrase “Epstein Files Transparency Act” returns only that notice, and a separate search for “119-38” returns forty-four documents, of which the notice is the only one that concerns the Act, the rest being unrelated numeric coincidences (fisheries amendments, airworthiness directives, a CERCLA listing, and the like).718

The report states that the Department “released all ‘records, documents, communications and investigative materials in the possession of the Department’ that ‘relate to’ any of nine different categories,” and refers for the detail to the Department’s submissions in the Epstein and Maxwell prosecutions in the Southern District of New York and to earlier letters to Congress of December 19, 2025 and January 29, 2026.7 On withholding, it states that “[t]he only category of records withheld were those records where permitted withholdings under Section 2(c) and privileged materials were not segregable from material responsive under Section 2(a),” and identifies the privileges as deliberative-process, work-product and attorney-client.7 Because privilege is not one of the Act’s five permitted grounds, the report gives as its legal basis that those privileges are “long-recognized and based in common law,” citing Federal Rule of Evidence 501 and the presumption against repeal of common-law principles.71

The report states that no records were withheld or redacted “on the basis of embarrassment, reputational harm, or political sensitivity,” and that, although the Act permits it, no material was withheld or redacted on the ground that it was properly classified.7 On victim protection it states that the Department, “in consultation with victim counsel and victims directly, engaged in an extensive process to identify and redact” four of the five categories listed in section 2(c)(1), that the engagement is ongoing, and that unredacted versions “are available for inspection at the Department by members of Congress,” some of whom have come to the Department to inspect them.7

The list required by section 3(3) runs to three pages of the report.7 The report notes that the Act does not define “politically exposed person,” that reviewers were directed to note all government officials and politically exposed persons named or referenced in any document reviewed, and that a name was listed if the person is or was a government official or politically exposed person and appears in the released files at least once.7 It cautions that names appear “in a wide variety of contexts”: some individuals had extensive direct email contact with Epstein or Maxwell, “while other individuals are mentioned only in a portion of a document (including press reporting) that on its face is unrelated to the Epstein and Maxwell matters.”7 A footnote adds that “[a]ny omissions from the list are unintentional and … a result of the volume and speed with which the Department complied with the Act,” and that individuals whose names were redacted “for law-enforcement sensitive purposes are not included.”7 Law-enforcement sensitivity is not among the grounds enumerated in section 2(c)(1).1

Disputes about completeness

On December 18, 2025, the day before the deadline, Ro Khanna said on the House floor that “tomorrow at midnight is the deadline” and that a Department official who did not comply would be subject to prosecution for obstruction of justice, and the Attorney General to inherent contempt of Congress or impeachment.8 On January 6, 2026 the Senate Democratic leader said that eighteen days had passed since the statutory deadline, that fifteen days had passed since any Epstein documentation had been released, and that “the Department of Justice says it has released less than 1 percent of the files.”19

Further material was released in the weeks that followed: the Section 3 report refers to a letter to Congress of January 29, 2026, and floor statements of February 2 and 4, 2026 refer to “these new releases” and to “another trove.”7209 On February 2, 2026 Chuck Schumer said that “[t]hese new releases expose the identity of nearly 100 victims in over 1,000 instances,” described it as “wanton negligence,” and said the Department had taken pages down and then restored them “without redacting the information of the victims.”20 On February 4, 2026 Deborah Ross said that the Department “claims it is in full compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, but that is simply not true,” that “the DOJ has only released half of the files,” and that “in this latest release, some of the survivors’ names and images were exposed while the men who abused them remained redacted.”9

On February 10, 2026 Khanna reported to the House that he and Massie had spent about two hours at the Department the previous day reading unredacted files, and said that “70 to 80 percent of the files are still redacted”; that they identified six men whose identities the Department had withheld; and that the Department, on having this pointed out, acknowledged a mistake and released those identities.10 He said the Department had told them it had “just uploaded whatever the FBI sent us,” and that the FBI files had been reviewed and redacted before the Act passed.10 On March 18, 2026 Daniel Goldman of New York said that the Department had disclosed “3 million or so documents … to Congress under the Epstein Files Transparency Act,” excluding “the nearly 3 million pages that the DOJ is refusing to turn over.”11 On August 31, 2026 Massie said that “the government continues to withhold over 3 million files.”12 The Department’s answer to these claims, so far as it appears in a document, is the Section 3 report’s statement that it released all responsive material and withheld only privileged and permitted material.7 That report describes the victim-redaction process as extensive and ongoing but does not address the allegation that identities were exposed, and no other Department response to that allegation appears among the documents cited on this page.7

Two pairs of follow-on bills were introduced in July 2026. On July 14, 2026 companion bills in each chamber proposed “a private cause of action for exposure of personally identifiable information of victims or victims’ personal or medical files … in releasing documents under the Epstein Files Transparency Act.”21 On July 15, 2026 companion bills proposed to amend the Act “with respect to enforcement by an attorney general of a State.”22

Contemporaneous accounts inside the release

The released files themselves contain FBI daily news briefings and New York Field Office situation reports produced in the days around enactment. These are summaries of press reporting compiled in coordination with the FBI’s Office of Public Affairs; they record what an outlet published, not what the Bureau found, and each is described here that way.

A situation report of November 24, 2025 summarised a Politico report of November 21 that the Department had renewed its effort to unseal grand jury records from the Epstein and Maxwell prosecutions, arguing that the newly signed Act “now requires public release of nearly all investigative files held by the Justice Department and the FBI” and superseded ordinary grand jury secrecy rules; the same summary recorded that judges in Florida and New York had previously rejected unsealing requests and had noted that the Department already held large amounts of material it could release without court action.23 The same situation report summarised a Bloomberg report of the same date that FBI agents had spent months at the Bureau’s Central Records Complex in Winchester, Virginia reviewing and redacting the Epstein material, described as “over 300 gigabytes,” before sending processed records to the Attorney General, and that the Bureau had deployed uniformed officers to guard the facility after online comments about it were assessed as potentially threatening.23

A situation report of the following day summarised a Fox News report of November 24 to the same effect on the guarding of the records complex, and recorded that report’s account of the Act: that it required the Department to release unclassified Epstein materials within thirty days, that the President had signed the measure, and that he had asserted the Department had already provided Congress with nearly 50,000 pages.24 A daily news briefing of November 21, 2025 summarised a report in The Hill that Republican senators had warned the Attorney General not to delay, that members of both parties were concerned the Department might withhold files by citing ongoing investigations, and that she had pledged to “follow the law” and release additional files within thirty days.25 That was a statement of intention; what the Department produced is recorded in its Section 3 report and in the floor statements set out above.7

Footnotes

  1. Epstein Files Transparency Act, Public Law 119–38, 139 Stat. 655 (Nov. 19, 2025). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/PLAW-119publ38/html/PLAW-119publ38.htm ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6 ↩7 ↩8 ↩9 ↩10 ↩11 ↩12 ↩13 ↩14 ↩15

  2. H.R. 4405, 119th Congress, as introduced in the House, July 15, 2025. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/BILLS-119hr4405ih/html/BILLS-119hr4405ih.htm ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  3. U.S. House of Representatives, Office of the Clerk, Member Data. https://clerk.house.gov/xml/lists/MemberData.xml ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  4. U.S. House of Representatives, roll call vote 289, 119th Congress, 1st session, November 18, 2025, on the motion to suspend the rules and pass H.R. 4405: 427 ayes, 1 no, 5 not voting. https://clerk.house.gov/evs/2025/roll289.xml ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  5. Congressional Record, November 18, 2025, Daily Digest, Senate, p.D1147. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2025-11-18/html/CREC-2025-11-18-pt1-PgD1147.htm ↩ ↩2

  6. Congressional Record, November 19, 2025, p.S8211. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2025-11-19/html/CREC-2025-11-19-pt1-PgS8211-6.htm ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  7. U.S. Department of Justice, “Report Under Public Law 119–38,” 91 Fed. Reg. 55356 (Aug. 27, 2026), and the appendix to that notice, being the letter of February 14, 2026 from the Office of the Deputy Attorney General to the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Committees on the Judiciary, report pp.1–6. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/08/27/2026-17533/report-under-public-law-119-38 ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6 ↩7 ↩8 ↩9 ↩10 ↩11 ↩12 ↩13 ↩14 ↩15 ↩16 ↩17 ↩18

  8. Congressional Record, December 18, 2025, p.H6099, “Deadline to Release Epstein Files” (Mr. Khanna). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2025-12-18/html/CREC-2025-12-18-pt1-PgH6099-3.htm ↩ ↩2

  9. Congressional Record, February 4, 2026, p.H2013, “Another Trove of Epstein Files” (Ms. Ross). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-02-04/html/CREC-2026-02-04-pt1-PgH2013-4.htm ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  10. Congressional Record, February 10, 2026, p.H2105, “Decoding Epstein Files” (Mr. Khanna of California). The statement names the six men; those names are not reproduced here. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-02-10/html/CREC-2026-02-10-pt1-PgH2105.htm ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  11. Congressional Record, March 18, 2026, p.H2557, “Concealing President’s Involvement With Epstein” (Mr. Goldman of New York). The same statement recounts a complainant’s allegations, which are not reproduced here. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-03-18/html/CREC-2026-03-18-pt1-PgH2557.htm ↩ ↩2

  12. Congressional Record, August 31, 2026, p.H5349, “Bring Epstein Perpetrators to Justice” (Mr. Massie). The same statement names individuals the member would have investigated; those names are not reproduced here. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-08-31/html/CREC-2026-08-31-pt1-PgH5349-3.htm ↩ ↩2

  13. Attorney General Pamela Bondi to FBI Director Kash Patel, February 27, 2025. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02847765 ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  14. United States v. Maxwell, No. 20 Cr. 330 (PAE) (S.D.N.Y.), Opinion & Order of August 11, 2025 (Engelmayer, J.), pp.6–8. https://epstein-data.com/DOJ-OGR-00015133 ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  15. Congressional Record, November 12, 2025, p.H4595, “Request to Consider H.R. 4405, Epstein Files Transparency Act.” https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2025-11-12/html/CREC-2025-11-12-pt1-PgH4595-2.htm ↩

  16. FBI Daily News Briefing (draft), November 17, 2025, summarising the BBC of November 16, 2025. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01655527 p.3. ↩

  17. Congressional Record, November 18, 2025, pp.H4725–H4730. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2025-11-18/html/CREC-2025-11-18-pt1-PgH4725-2.htm ↩

  18. Search of federalregister.gov for documents whose text contains “Epstein Files Transparency Act”, and separately “119-38”, across all agencies and all dates, run September 4, 2026. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/search?conditions%5Bterm%5D=%22Epstein+Files+Transparency+Act%22 ↩

  19. Congressional Record, January 6, 2026, p.S21, “Jeffrey Epstein,” in the remarks recognised at p.S20 as those of the Democratic leader. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-01-06/html/CREC-2026-01-06-pt1-PgS21.htm ↩

  20. Congressional Record, February 2, 2026, p.S433, “Epstein Files” (Mr. Schumer). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-02-02/html/CREC-2026-02-02-pt1-PgS433-4.htm ↩ ↩2

  21. H.R. 9679 (Ms. Jayapal), Congressional Record, July 14, 2026, p.H4466, and S. 4977 (Mr. Booker), Congressional Record, July 14, 2026, p.S3938. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-07-14/html/CREC-2026-07-14-pt1-PgH4466.htm and https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-07-14/html/CREC-2026-07-14-pt1-PgS3938.htm ↩

  22. H.R. 9694 (Mr. Massie, for himself, Mr. Khanna and Ms. Leger Fernandez), Congressional Record, July 15, 2026, p.H4543, and S. 5005 (Mr. Merkley, for himself and Mr. Luján), Congressional Record, July 15, 2026, p.S4106. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-07-15/html/CREC-2026-07-15-pt1-PgH4543-4.htm and https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2026-07-15/html/CREC-2026-07-15-pt1-PgS4106-3.htm ↩

  23. FBI New York Field Office situation report, November 24, 2025, summarising Politico and Bloomberg of November 21, 2025. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01650531 p.2. A duplicate of the same situation report is in the release at https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01656921. ↩ ↩2

  24. FBI New York Field Office situation report, November 25, 2025, summarising Fox News of November 24, 2025. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01660806 p.2. ↩

  25. FBI Daily News Briefing, November 21, 2025, summarising The Hill of November 20, 2025. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01655548 p.4. ↩

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