The folders contain audio and video footage from police searches and interviews with victims, but Democrats say most information was already known
A US House Committee has released more than 33,000 pages related to the sex trafficking investigations into Jeffrey Epstein, including video and audio files.
The House Oversight Committee on Tuesday publicly posted the batch, related to Epstein and his former girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell, which it had received from the Justice Department.
The folders contained video files appearing to be body cam footage from police searches, as well as law enforcement interviews with victims with their faces obscured.
The files included audio of an Epstein employee describing to a law enforcement official how âthere were a lot of girls that were very, very youngâ visiting the home but couldnât say for sure if they were minors.
The Justice Department released the files to the committee in response to a subpoena, but the files mostly contain information that was already publicly known.
The move comes amid pressure for US politicians to act to force greater disclosure in the case.
House Republican Speaker Mike Johnson is trying to quell an effort by Democrats and some Republicans to force a vote on a bill that would require the Justice Department to release all the information in the so-called Epstein files, with the exception of the victimsâ personal information of the victims.
âThe objective here is not just to uncover, investigate the Epstein evils, but also to ensure that this never happens again and ultimately to find out why justice has been delayed for these ladies for so very long,â said Johnson, after he emerged from a two-hour meeting with six of the survivors.
âIt is inexcusable. And it will stop now because the Congress is dialed in on this,â he added.
However Democrats said the public âshouldnât be fooledâ by the release and that â97% of the documents were already publicâ.
âThe 33,000 pages of Epstein documents James Comer has decided to âreleaseâ were already mostly public information. To the American people â donât let this fool you,â Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the committe, said, according to CNN.
âThere is no mention of any client list or anything that improves transparency or justice for victims.â
The files â containing thousands of pages and videos â were released via a Google Drive, leaving it to readers and viewers to decipher the information on their own.
The disclosure also left open the question of why the Justice Department did not release the material directly to the public instead of operating through Capitol Hill.
The case of Epstein, who died by suicide in prison in 2019, has caused a political headache for US President Donald Trump, after many of his supporters embraced a slew of conspiracy theories.
A July Reuters/Ipsos poll found that majorities of Americans and of Trumpâs Republicans believe the government is hiding details on the case.
With agencies
