Congress Votes To Release Epstein Files

"The House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to compel the release of federal investigative materials on notorious sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, after Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) urged the Senate to 'correct' the bill and provide 'proper protections for the innocent,'" reported the New York Post on Tuesday. The vote was 427 to 1, with 5 absent. The lone vote against the bill was cast by Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) who objected to the unfettered release of records because of the possibility of innocent people--"witnesses, people who provided alibis, family members, etc."--being smeared by "a rabid media". Thus the call from Johnson for the Senate to make changes. However, the Senate also passed the bill on Tuesday on a unanimous vote, and angering Johnson because the Senate did not make any amendments to the bill.

    Matt Taibbi probably expressed the real concern of some of those in government: "A character like Epstein can only thrive in a world where law enforcement and intelligence are fully intertwined with financial and sexual corruption, to the point where one has to entertain the idea that significant numbers of politicians are compromised, perhaps even in a form of systemic blackmail." But I have to imagine that the most incriminating, most damaging of the information has already been removed or, more likely, never even made it to the evidence locker.