House members call for inquiry into justice department’s record of their Epstein files research | House of Representatives
Members of Congress called for an investigation after discovering that the Justice Department created records of investigative activities while reviewing files linked to Jeffrey Epstein.
Photos taken by Reuters during Wednesday’s congressional hearing show U.S. attorney Pam Bondi holding a document titled “Jayapal Pramila Search History” that lists files that Democratic U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal accessed while reviewing the Epstein materials.
Access to unredacted Epstein materials was made available to lawmakers earlier this week under the Epstein File Transparency Act. Many members of Congress are demanding the justice department halt the pursuit, claiming the department is violating the separation of powers.
“This is a disgrace [the justice department] Members are following their investigative steps,” said Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House judiciary committee, who announced he would ask the justice department inspector general to open an investigation into what he called “this outrageous abuse of power.”
raskin described He said a review process was designed from the beginning for oversight. Members of Congress who want to review the files must go to the justice department’s annex, sit down at one of four department computers, navigate what he calls “a cumbersome and complex software system” and read the documents while justice department staff watch over their shoulders.
“This is the perfect setup for this. [the justice department] To spy on members to review, monitor, record and log every document we choose to seize,” Raskin said in a statement. “Today, photos of Attorney General Bondi’s ‘burnt notebook’ confirmed my suspicions.”
The document Bondi brought to the hearing appeared designed to help the congresswoman anticipate Jayapal’s questions based on files she had reviewed; As attorney general, Raskin called it a practice of using information “for shameful polemical purposes.”
In his letter to MPs Obtained by NBC NewsThe Ministry of Justice said it would “keep a record of the dates and times of all members’ reviews”. But the extent of that pursuit, including specific search queries and accessed documents, was only revealed when Bondi attended a custody hearing on Wednesday.
“Bondi showed up today with a logbook containing a printed search history of exactly the emails I was looking for,” Jayapal wrote about X. “This is outrageous and I plan to go after it and stop this spying on members.”
Jayapal called the practice “completely inappropriate and contrary to the separation of powers.” [justice department] “To spy on us while we search for the Epstein files.”
Rep. Suhas Subramanyam of Virginia wrote on social media: “As I said yesterday, [justice department] It kept a history of all the files we viewed. “Now we know why.”
The Justice Department did not immediately return a request for comment.
Rep. Nancy Mace, a South Carolina Republican and one of the party’s most vocal critics of the Epstein files, said it was “scary” and detailed the review process.
“There’s a couple of people there [justice department] It’s watching you as you sit in front of these computers, Mace told NPR. “There is a technical person who logs you into the computer. They allow you to log into the computer because they give you your own ID. They track all the documents that members of Congress open, and they track everything you do in that room.”
Jayapal told reporters that she had discussed the issue with House Speaker Mike Johnson, adding: “I think there’s a bipartisan agreement that we should be able to review these files without the Justice Department spying on us.”
Responding to reporters’ questions about surveillance, Johnson said such practices were “inappropriate” if they occurred, but he declined to directly criticize the justice department, saying he had not personally seen surveillance reports and did not want to comment on an “unproven allegation”.
Raskin, for his part, cited multiple failures: the withholding of records in violation of the law, the zero charges against Epstein employees, and the monitoring of members who now do surveillance.
“Let’s use this disparaging remark about the Attorney General’s work ethic to reset the Epstein cover-up once and for all,” he said.
