Bondi rebuffs Democrats on Trump role in handling Epstein files

Caitlin Reilly and Chris Strohm, Bloomberg News on May 29, 2026

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WASHINGTON — Former Attorney General Pam Bondi rebuffed questions about President Donald Trump’s involvement in the Justice Department’s handling of files from its investigation of accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, Democratic lawmakers said.

“She refused to answer any questions about President Trump,” Representative Robert Garcia, the top-ranking Democrat on the House panel investigating Epstein, told reporters Friday during a break in the committee’s closed-door questioning of Bondi.

Bondi also pushed any blame for missteps with Epstein-related documents onto Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, formerly deputy attorney general, Garcia said. He added that Democrats would seek to subpoena Blanche to testify before the panel.

Harmeet Dhillon, who heads the Justice Department’s civil rights division and acted as Bondi’s attorney at the deposition, said delegating such a responsibility “is common, and it was a very senior official, the number-two person.” Blanche was Trump’s personal attorney before he was appointed to the post.

Democrats and some Republicans have criticized the Justice Department for being slow to comply with a law forcing release of files and withholding key information.

The Justice Department released 3.5 million pages of related documents out of more than 6 million pages it identified as potentially relevant, according to a Jan. 30 memo, which indicated documents may have been withheld because they were privileged, subject to protective orders, or duplicative.

“What documents remain? Why haven’t they been turned over?” House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, a Kentucky Republican, told reporters ahead of Bondi’s testimony. “I want every document. I don’t want anything held back.”

Bondi, after initially resisting a congressional subpoena, met privately with the committee on Friday morning, ignoring reporters’ questions on her way in and out of the hearing room. She was in the room just under four hours.

The House panel is investigating the disgraced financier’s crimes and possible lapses in the law enforcement response.

Trump fired Bondi in April following a tumultuous tenure that was marked by missteps and mounting criticism, particularly involving the department’s handling of the Epstein files and response to a federal law requiring their release.

Bondi moved aggressively to reshape the Justice Department to pursue Trump’s agenda and under her watch prosecutors launched criminal investigations of the president’s perceived enemies.

Democratic and Republican members of Congress have blasted the department for missing legal deadlines to release records, making heavy redactions, leaving out materials referencing Trump, and in some cases failing to comply with legal requirements to protect the names of Epstein’s victims.

Bondi stoked controversy over the Justice Department’s handling of the Epstein case by declaring shortly after she became attorney general last year that Epstein’s client list was sitting on her desk for review. In July, however, the department denied such a list existed and said it would not release additional information gathered in its investigation of Epstein.

Congress responded with the law requiring release of Epstein-related files.

Bondi oversaw a secret review process that included flagging files that mentioned Trump. She also was in charge of the department when Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence for a 2021 sex-trafficking conviction, was moved to a lower-security federal prison camp in Texas last August.

Bondi referred questions about Maxwell’s prison transfer to Blanche and the Justice Department’s Bureau of Prisons, Garcia said. She told the panel she wasn’t aware of the transfer until after Maxwell was moved.

Several Epstein accusers congregated outside the hearing room during Bondi’s appearance, criticizing the Justice Department and former attorney general for revealing their personal information in the released files while redacting identifying details on alleged perpetrators of sexual abuse.

“We deserve more than closed-door, backroom deals,” said Danielle Bensky, who said she was abused by Epstein when she was a 17 year-old high school student.

Epstein pleaded guilty in 2008 to Florida state charges of procurement of a minor for prostitution in a deal negotiated with then-U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta to avoid more serious federal sex trafficking charges at the time.

Epstein died in a New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial on later federal sex trafficking charges involving underage girls. Authorities ruled the death a suicide.

The Epstein revelations have engulfed Trump and several of his key allies in political controversy but so far have fallen short of reviving criminal investigations inside the U.S.

Abroad, however, the revelations have rocked politics and the public in the U.K. The former royal prince, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, and the country’s ex-Washington ambassador, Peter Mandelson, were arrested in February on suspicion of misconduct in public office stemming from their ties to Epstein. Both men have denied any wrongdoing.