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Floor Speech

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Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, would my colleague from Maryland yield for a question?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I would.

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Mr. MERKLEY. Did I understand you to say that the President of the United States has put forward the possibility of a favor to someone who could testify about Epstein's conduct over many years?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. The President of the United States, when asked if he could pardon Ghislaine Maxwell, said, yes, he has the power to do that pardon, to make that pardon. Her attorneys have made very clear through multiple public remarks that they would welcome that. Of course her attorneys would welcome that. She would love to get out of jail free.

This is why the President, today, should make very clear that he will not pardon Ghislaine Maxwell because she was a close associate in the crimes that she and Jeffrey Epstein committed.

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Mr. MERKLEY. In any ordinary world, wouldn't this be considered witness tampering?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Certainly. If the President of the United States is signaling to Ghislaine Maxwell and her attorneys that he would provide a pardon without any possible reason to do so other than for her to give testimony--in this case, it would be false testimony because we know about the close association between Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein--that would clearly be witness tampering.

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Mr. MERKLEY. To my colleague from Maryland, did you also mention that the FBI redacted President Trump's name from certain documents?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I did, indeed. This is a report that just came out. The headline is ``The FBI Redacted Trump's Name in the Epstein Files.'' It is a Bloomberg report, and it is just one more example of what appears to be an effort to cover up any role that Donald Trump may have played in these crimes. Again, we don't know, and the best way for us all to know is to support your effort here, to support our mutual efforts, which is to just release the files.

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Mr. MERKLEY. I so much appreciate your amendment, which we advocated for, which you presented very well in the Appropriations Committee, that said that all the files have to be retained so that nothing is destroyed--no missing minutes on a White House tape or anything equivalent. Why is it necessary to express this concern?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. The concern, of course, is that the Trump administration would be tempted to destroy these files for the purposes of getting rid of evidence. As I indicated, reports today indicate that the FBI--and, again, I don't know if they were instructed to do so. I do not know all the circumstances. What we do know are the reports from Bloomberg that Donald Trump's name was stricken from the files.

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Mr. MERKLEY. If that is accurate, I am just trying to understand why they would do so. If his name is in the files and it is simply in the context of he attended a certain event, something of that nature, or maybe Mr. Epstein went to an event at one of the President's properties, that would be a completely innocent role. Why would the FBI redact such a reference?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I think that is a question for all of us to ask the FBI, and we should follow up and ask the FBI.

In the meantime, though, the best way, as you pointed out and all of us have pointed out and even Attorney General Bondi at one point pointed out, is just release the damn files. That is how we would get to the bottom of all of this. And don't redact anything from the files except--except--to protect victims. But perpetrators should not have their names redacted from the files.

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Mr. MERKLEY. Absolutely. I so appreciate your bringing this additional information to bear.

Our colleague across the aisle who objected noted the Republicans also voted for this amendment--your amendment--in committee. So I am wondering, if we bring it back as a UC, as a bill to pass right now, saying all information is to be retained, I wonder if our Republican colleagues would join us in that effort.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Well, that is a very good point, Senator Merkley.

We had a unanimous bipartisan vote in the Senate Appropriations Committee on an amendment to do exactly that--to make sure the records were preserved so nobody tried to destroy evidence--and it required an exhaustive report, detailing many of the questions that we have all raised regarding the Epstein files.

As I said, the appropriations process takes a very long time to wind through the U.S. Congress, and there is no reason to wait on this. Again, if a majority of the Appropriations Committee--not just a majority--but if a unanimous vote in the Appropriations Committee took place, we could actually get this out right away, and, hopefully, the House would pass that, and then we could send it right to the President's desk.

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Mr. MERKLEY. Well, I do hope you will bring that back as a unanimous consent request later today based on your amendment to retain all of the files. We have already heard our colleague's objection to releasing the files, but, certainly, they should join us in a unanimous way in retaining all of the evidence.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. We, certainly, more importantly, the American people, and especially the victims deserve to know that nobody will tamper with the files between now and the moment they are released.

Again, the fastest way to address this issue, to meet the concerns, to meet the terrible, terrible abuse that was visited upon these young women and girls, is simply to release the files and do it now.

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Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, as a point of information, are we going to proceed with the vote at 12 noon?

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Mr. MERKLEY. At 12:46? I thank the Presiding Officer for that information.

Mr. President, I believe Senator Markey has come to the floor to make some comments, so I will just close with this notation.

All across America, ordinary men and women know that, if they commit a crime, they will pay the fine. If they commit a crime, they will do the time. They don't have fancy lawyers. They don't have friends in high places. They don't have the FBI redacting their names from documents. They don't have one caucus of the U.S. Senate blocking information from being released.

On behalf of every ordinary citizen across America, we are going to continue to press for the powerful and the rich to be accountable. If they, in fact, participated in the abuse of young women and in the rape of young women, we want them to be brought to justice no matter what political party they are from or what bank account they have or what part of the country they live in or what friends they have.

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