KY Rep. Thomas Massie urges release of Epstein files alongside victims

Rep. Thomas Massie took the fight to release the full files on infamous sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein to the steps of the U.S. Capitol Wednesday.

Massie held a news conference rallying support for a discharge petition to force the disclosure of investigative files related to the late financier and sex offender alongside several Epstein victims as well as his co-sponsor, California Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna.

With the support of House Democrats expected, the pair of congressmen publicly pushed their Republican colleagues to support the petition, which requires 218 signatures. A handful of Republican women, including Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, had joined them as of Wednesday morning, and they said they needed two more.

Massie told the massive crowd the U.S. Department of Justice’s failure to convict anyone aside from Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell is a tell.

“The Washington establishment is asking the American public to believe something that is not believable,” Massie said. “They’re asking you to believe that two individuals created hundreds of victims, and they acted alone, and that the DOJ has no idea of who else might have been involved, that nobody else did anything that rose to a criminal enterprise.

“The American people know that’s not true.”

Epstein, whose in-custody death in 2019 was ruled a suicide, has long been at the center of theories around the manner of his death and the connections he had to rich and powerful people like President Donald Trump and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.

Outrage across the political spectrum has festered, largely due to Trump and his administration’s reluctance to release the full files after campaigning on doing so.

Alongside Massie, only one Kentucky member of the U.S. House has signed the petition: Democratic Rep. Morgan McGarvey of Louisville.

“Congress is back in Washington, D.C. and Donald Trump is still afraid to release the Epstein files. Why? Let’s make them public and get it out there so people can find out. There are victims testifying right now about the heartbreaking ordeal they went through. That’s why we are forcing a vote to release this list and make it public,” McGarvey said in a statement to the Herald-Leader.

The politicians at the rally described their efforts on the discharge petition as a war between good and evil, as well as transparency and secrecy.

“I hope they encourage other survivors to come forward and to tell their stories, not just of Jeffrey Epstein and Maxwell, but anywhere in the country,” Massie said. “This is a message that we are sending. This is a litmus test. Can we drain the swamp? Are there people who are outside of the reach of the law? I don’t think there should be.

“So hopefully today, we’ll get two more signatures on the discharge petition. That’s all we need.”

The press conference took place around the same time that House Republican leadership, which has been oppositional to Massie’s petition, held their own event. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana, has said that the petition does not go far enough to protect the victims.

Another Kentucky congressman, Rep. James Comer, is playing a key role in the House GOP’s efforts to release information on the case. The House Oversight Committee he chairs recently released over 30,000 pages of documents related to the case. According to House Democrats, the vast majority of the files released were already public.

Comer has issued several subpoenas seeking information from Epstein’s estate as well as top government officials involved in the investigation and known associates of Epstein such as former Democratic President Bill Clinton.

A Comer spokesperson told the Herald-Leader he does not plan to vote for Massie’s petition.

“Congressman Comer will not be signing the petition and remains focused on leading the House Oversight Committee’s work to deliver accountability and transparency for the American people and the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s horrific crimes,” the spokesperson wrote in a statement.

Massie said at the press conference that his and Comer’s relationship was not oppositional.

“I appreciate the efforts of my colleague, James Comer, who’s leading the Oversight Committee. They may find some information, but they’re allowing the DOJ to curate all the information that the DOJ is giving them. If you’ve looked at the pages they’ve released so far, they’re heavily redacted. Some pages are entirely redacted,” Massie said.

A White House official told NBC News that a vote for Massie’s petition would be viewed as “very hostile” to Trump.

“Helping Thomas Massie and Liberal Democrats with their attention-seeking, while the DOJ is fully supporting a more comprehensive file release effort from the Oversight Committee, would be viewed as a very hostile act to the administration,” the official said.

Though the president’s relationship with Massie has often been rocky, Trump has expressed extreme displeasure with Massie at the same time the congressman has pushed for the release of the files. The president has publicly called for Massie to get a primary opponent, and a former Trump campaign official has been leading a PAC that’s running ads against Massie in his Northern Kentucky-centric 4th Congressional District.

Survivor stories

Most of the survivors featured at the press conference had gone public prior to Wednesday. They all forcefully supported Massie’s efforts on the petition, and urged House Republicans as well as Trump to change their posture.

About a half-dozen survivors of Epstein’s framed a vote for the petition as the best thing members of Congress could do for them, as it seeks to protect victims but not people related to the case who haven’t been charged with any crimes.

“Crucially, it forbids withholding documents simply because of embarrassment, reputational harm or political sensitivity. This is about ending secrecy wherever abuse of power takes root,” survivor Anouska de Georgiou said.

The press conference included testimony from one previously unidentified victim of Epstein’s, Marina Lacerda, who said she met him when she was 14 years old, and he requested a massage from her. She attributes her dropping out of high school to his abuse and insistence that she work long hours for him.

“Our government could have saved so many women, but Jeffrey Epstein was too important. And those women didn’t matter. Why? Well, we matter now. We are here today, and we are speaking, and we are not going to stop speaking.”

Brad Edwards, an attorney for the victims, mentioned Trump’s cooperation during the initial investigation into Epstein in the late ‘00s. He said that he hoped Trump would change his stance to support the efforts of Massie and Khanna.

“At this point in time, I would hope that he would revert back to what he was saying to get elected, which is, ‘I want transparency.’ This about face that occurred, none of us understand it. In fact, I don’t understand how this is an issue that’s even up for debate,” Edwards said.

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