The federal government is in its second week of a shutdown, and the U.S. House is out of town until next week.
But the efforts to release more files connected to disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein aren’t going away.
House Speaker Mike Johnson sent the House home through October 13 as Democrats and Republicans remain locked in a stalemate over funding the government. The House’s extended recess periods have also meant that Rep-elect Adelita Grijalva of Arizona has still not been sworn in after winning a special election to Arizona’s 7th Congressional District on September 23, two weeks ago.
Some Democrats, along with Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, have charged there’s another reason Grijalva’s swearing-in has been delayed: the Epstein files. Grijalva would provide the last needed signature to advance a bipartisan effort led by Massie and Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna to direct the Department of Justice to release the full tranche of files it has connected to Epstein, who died by suicide while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges in 2019.
“The government is in full shutdown and the Republicans are refusing to call the House back into session,” Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York said Friday on X. “Want to know why? Because we have secured the final vote on releasing the Epstein Files and they don’t want it out.”
Johnson has said he supports releasing more of the files but opposes Khanna and Massie’s measure, citing the need to protect survivors’ personal information and the House Oversight Committee’s ongoing investigation into the Epstein matter. Khanna and Massie are aiming to circumvent leadership’s opposition with a procedural tool called a discharge petition to force a vote on the House floor. In a widely attended rally and news conference at the Capitol in early September, Epstein survivors said they supported the resolution.
“Contrary to what he says, @SpeakerJohnson is doing everything he can, including delaying the swearing in of the most recently elected member of Congress and spreading misinformation about the legislation, to block a vote in Congress on legislation to release the Epstein files,” Massie posted on X on Monday in response to an interview Johnson did on MSNBC.
Johnson engaged in a spirited back-and-forth over the issue with Democratic Sens. Ruben Gallego and Mark Kelly of Arizona outside his office at the Capitol on Wednesday. Gallego charged that Johnson wanted to “cover up for pedophiles” by not supporting the full release of the Epstein files and that he put members of his conference “in a rough position” with regard to the shutdown.
Johnson called Gallego’s assertions “absurd,” according to reports, saying that the timing of Grijalva’s swearing in “has nothing to do” with Epstein and that Democrats are “experts in red herrings.”
Trump was friendly with Epstein in the 1990s and early 2000s, but said he and Epstein had a falling out before Epstein became a convicted sex offender. In comments to reporters, he has dismissed the Epstein matter as “a hoax.”
The House Oversight Committee has obtained and released tens of thousands of documents connected to Epstein by subpoena. They include a book of messages compiled for Epstein’s 50th birthday that includes a suggestive poem and drawing that appears to have been signed by Trump. Trump denies making the drawing and has filed a $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal, which first reported on the drawing’s existence, and its parent companies.
Massie and Khanna’s resolution aims to compel the Justice Department to release all of the Epstein-related files in its possession, estimated at 100,000 pages.
Johnson on Tuesday appeared open to swearing in Grijalva before the government was reopened, saying in response to a reporter’s question that “we’ll schedule it, I guess as soon as she wants.” But then his office quickly clarified that any swearing-in was contingent on the Senate voting on a continuing resolution to fund the government.
Senate Democrats say they won’t provide the necessary votes to fund the government unless Republicans agree to deal on extending expiring health care subsidies to avoid sending Americans’ health care premiums skyrocketing.
Johnson’s office pointed to his statement from last week:
“The House will come back into session and do its work as soon as Chuck Schumer allows us to reopen the government,” Johnson said in a news conference Friday.
In an interview with journalist Don Lemon on Monday evening, Grijalva said she’s received no direct communication from Johnson’s office. She and other Democrats, including House Minority Whip Katherine Clark, had written letters to Johnson urging him to swear in Grijalva when the House briefly gaveled in for a pro forma session Tuesday. Some advocacy groups are also crying foul.
“Adelita Grijalva won the special election in a landslide, yet Republican leadership is unilaterally denying the people of Arizona’s 7th District a voice in Congress by delaying her swearing in yet again,” Athena Salman, director of Arizona campaigns at the abortion rights group Reproductive Freedom for All, said in a statement Monday. “This is partisan politics in its most grotesque form.”
Grijalva pointed out that two Florida Republicans elected to Congress in special elections this spring, Reps. Jimmy Patronis and Randy Fine, were sworn in within 24 hours of their victories in a pro forma session on April 2. Rep. James Walkinshaw, a Virginia Democrat who won a special election to replace the late Rep. Gerry Connolly, was also sworn into the House on September 10, the day after his election victory.
“For me, a Chicana from Tucson, with over nearly 40 points ahead of her nearest opponent, the results are very clear,” she said. “There is no date identified at all.”
As Massie and Khanna have gathered signatures for their discharge petition, top Justice Department officials have faced intense questioning on the Epstein files from Democrats on Capitol Hill. Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel have drawn scrutiny and criticism, including from Trump’s base, for not releasing more of the files.
Bondi appeared for a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday that turned combative at times. Bondi engaged in contentious exchanges with Democrats, including Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, over the Epstein files and whether the Department of Justice had investigated suspicious activity reports connected to Epstein.
Bondi largely deflected their questions and turned the questioning back on the Democratic senators and their associations with Reid Hoffman, a venture capitalist, tech founder and Democratic megadonor who crossed paths with Epstein through his work with the MIT Media Lab in the 2010s, following Epstein’s conviction. After Epstein’s death in 2019, Hoffman publicly apologized for his role in helping to “repair his reputation and perpetuate injustice.”
In the meantime, Grijalva remains in limbo.
“I’m a mom of three kids. I made flight plans for my kids to get to D.C. so we could be there together,” she told Lemon. “This is a very special moment as a mom and a wife. I want to share that with my family, and that was supposed to happen on the 7th, and then he canceled all of the votes, and now has made public statements that they will not be in session again.”
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