Decoding Epstein Files

Floor Speech

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Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, yesterday Congressman Massie and I went to the Department of Justice to read the unredacted Epstein files. We spent about 2 hours there, and we learned that 70 to 80 percent of the files are still redacted.

In fact, there were six wealthy, powerful men that the DOJ hid for no apparent reason. When Congressman Massie and I pointed this out to the Department of Justice, they acknowledged their mistake. They have now revealed the identity of these six powerful men. These men are: Salvatore Nuara; Zurab Mikeladze; Leonic Leonov; Nicola Caputo; Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, CEO of Dubai Ports World; and Leslie Wexner, who was labeled as a co-conspirator by the FBI.

My question is: Why did it take myself and Thomas Massie going to the Justice Department to get these six men's identities to become public? If we found six men that they were hiding in 2 hours, imagine how many men they are covering up for in those 3 million files. The story gets worse.

The reality is that Donald Trump's FBI scrubbed these files in March, long before Thomas Massie and I passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act. My bill is clear. The Epstein Files Transparency Act requires them to unredact those FBI files. Yet, the Justice Department said to me and to Congressman Massie: We just uploaded whatever the FBI sent us.

Guess what. The FBI sent scrubbed files. That means the survivors' statements to the FBI, naming rich and powerful men who went to Epstein's island, who went to his ranch, who went to his home and raped and abused underage girls or saw underage girls being paraded, are all hidden. They are all redacted.

It is a little bit of a farce. They are inviting all the Members of Congress to go see the Department of Justice's ``unredacted files,'' but they have got all redacted files from the FBI.

It is not the fault of the Justice Department attorneys. They were just told to upload things that Donald Trump's FBI had already scrubbed.

It is a blatant violation of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, but it also asks a fundamental question: Who are they protecting? Why are they protecting these rich and powerful men, people I call part of the Epstein class? Why are we in a country where there is no elite accountability for people who do the most heinous things?

We have in England the king now calling for an investigation and possible prosecution of his own brother. We have in Norway the princess who no longer has support to be the queen. Yet in the United States of America, we have someone in the Cabinet, Howard Lutnick, who is all over these Epstein files and who allegedly had business with Epstein after he was convicted of pedophilia, but is still in the Cabinet.

We need to ask ourselves: Are we in America going to have the lead accountability? Are we going to call to account the rich and powerful people who broke the law or cavorted with a pedophile, a convicted pedophile?

Are we going to have prosecutions for billionaires who went to this island and either raped underage girls or saw underage girls being raped and didn't say anything? Are we going to have investigations?

I will tell you what this is about. It is not just about the 1,200 survivors. It is about two tiers of justice in America. It is about people who can accumulate wealth and power and don't have to care about the rest of America.

They have destroyed so much of this country. Income inequality is at a 60-year high. Workers' salaries are less than they have been for 75 years as a part of GDP. Somehow, this country seems to be working for the rich and powerful; but it is not working for ordinary working-class Americans.

I say enough. It is time to begin with accountability for the Epstein class. Hold in front of Congress those people who visited the island or did business with Epstein after he was a convicted pedophile. Let's investigate them, and let's prosecute them.

Let's return to democratic accountability in the United States of America. Let's return to one system of justice in the United States of America. Let's return to a place where every American has a stake in this country.

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