Aaron Blake writes:

We don’t know why the Trump administration suddenly reversed itself this summer on its promises to release extensive new documents about the Jeffrey Epstein case.

What we do know is that the administration has responded to a bipartisan outcry over its handling of the matter by repeatedly doing things that might seem on paper like significant steps toward transparency, but have proven to be far less than meets the eye. Many of them point to what a judge recently suggested was the “illusion” of transparency.

The situation appears to be coming to a head. On Wednesday came an emotional press conference featuring Epstein victims pleading with Congress to agree to an effort led by Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, which the Trump administration opposes, to force the Justice Department to release the documents.

“To be clear: The only motive for opposing this bill would be to conceal wrongdoing,” Epstein accuser Anouska de Georgiou said.

The scene followed yet more evidence of the administration’s reluctance to cede to those demands.

That began on Tuesday with the official launch of Massie’s effort, called a discharge petition, to force a vote in the House on releasing the Epstein files, which Speaker Mike Johnson also opposes.

As the administration faced the prospect that a small number of House Republicans could join with Democrats to force the issue, the GOP-controlled House Oversight Committee suddenly released an initial tranche of 33,000 pages of Epstein documents it had subpoenaed from the Justice Department. It seemed like an effort to mollify the Republicans who might support Massie’s measure, which is being co-led by Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna.

But like the binders of Epstein documents the White House gave right-wing influencers earlier this year, the documents were overwhelmingly old news. House Oversight Democrats and Massie estimated that 97% of the documents had already been released, while the rest were heavily redacted. No media outlet has found anything revealing in them.

Massie claimed it amounted to about 1% of what the Justice Department has. [Continue reading…]

The Daily Beast reports:

The White House has warned Republican rebels in Congress that pushing for the full release of the Jeffrey Epstein pedophile abuse files would be seen as “a very hostile act” by President Donald Trump.