{"id":703512,"date":"2026-05-30T03:44:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T03:44:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/703512\/"},"modified":"2026-05-30T03:44:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-30T03:44:13","slug":"pam-bondi-refuses-to-answer-questions-about-donald-trumps-involvement-in-epstein-files-release","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/703512\/","title":{"rendered":"Pam Bondi refuses to answer questions about Donald Trump’s involvement in Epstein files release"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former US Attorney-General Pam Bondi refused to answer questions from Congress about whether Donald Trump was aware of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s illegal activities, Democratic politicians have said.<\/p>\n

She also denied to say whether or not the US president directed her to redact Justice Department files that were made public.<\/p>\n

US watchdog announces Epstein files audit<\/a><\/p>\n

The audit follows months of controversy over censorship, missed deadlines and the publication of survivors’ details.<\/p>\n

Several survivors of Epstein’s abuse gathered outside the Capitol office where the interview was taking place and made their presence known to Ms Bondi as she entered the room.<\/p>\n

In the closed-door interview before the House of Representatives Oversight Committee on Friday, local time, Ms Bondi said Todd Blanche, who now serves as acting attorney-general, had been responsible for the documents’ release.<\/p>\n

“I did not lead every aspect of this effort or conduct that document review myself. I delegated oversight over this process to Deputy Attorney-General Todd Blanche,” she said in a prepared statement.<\/p>\n

Democratic politicians said that in her statement, Ms Bondi told them she would not speak about the president in the interview and that she could decline those questions because she had agreed to appear before the committee voluntarily.<\/p>\n

If you or anyone you know needs help:1800 Respect National Helpline<\/a>: 1800 737 732Men’s Referral Service<\/a>: 1300 766 491Lifeline<\/a> (24-hour crisis line): 13 11 14Full Stop Australia<\/a>: 1800 385 578Bravehearts<\/a>: counselling and support for survivors of child sexual abuse: 1800\u00a0272\u00a0831<\/p>\n

“The bottom line is: justice and transparency in this matter have been delivered at the direction of President Trump and his administration,” she said.<\/p>\n

“It’s a sham in there,” said Democratic representative Dave Min of California during a break in the interview.<\/p>\n

“They are not answering any questions.”<\/p>\n

Democratic representative James Walkinshaw of Virginia said he had asked Ms Bondi whether Mr Trump had any knowledge of Epstein’s crimes before they became public.<\/p>\n

He said her response was: “I’m not certain of the extent of his knowledge.”<\/p>\n

Mr Trump fired Ms Bondi<\/a> on April 2, in part due to her handling of the Epstein files.<\/p>\n

Epstein killed himself in a New York City jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial for trafficking and sexually abusing underage girls.<\/p>\n

Mr Trump was friends with Epstein in the 1990s and early 2000s, but has said he cut ties with him years before Epstein pleaded guilty to Florida state charges in 2008 for soliciting prostitution from a minor.<\/p>\n

Survivors tried to confront Bondi<\/p>\n

Before Ms Bondi’s testimony began, chairman James Comer of Kentucky told reporters: “We will be asking today about why documents still are not released \u2026 what documents remain and why they haven’t been turned over.”<\/p>\n

Survivors of Epstein’s abuse were in the building and criticised Ms Bondi’s handling of the material.<\/p>\n

They held posters that had documents from the Epstein files that feature Mr Trump’s name, among others, and they made their presence known to Ms Bondi as she entered the room.<\/p>\n

\"an<\/p>\n

Sharlene Rochard, a survivor of Jeffrey Epstein, speaks outside the room. (Reuters: Jonathan Ernst)<\/p>\n

Several survivors said they were shoved aside by police officers.<\/p>\n

“It boggles my mind that the Department of Justice released nude photos \u2026 the Department of Justice released pornography. That is unacceptable,” survivor Sharlene Rochard told reporters outside the committee hearing room.<\/p>\n

“I just hope that she does have a moment where she remembers her own humanity and our humanity and finds her compassion and remembers that this is a bigger story than political rhetoric,” said Danielle Bensky, another survivor.<\/p>\n

The survivors also implored lawmakers to hold Ms Bondi accountable for the handling of the Epstein case files’ release, which included the personal information of potential victims.<\/p>\n

\"a<\/p>\n

Committee chairman James Comer speaks with Epstein survivors. (Reuters: Kylie Cooper)<\/p>\n

Representative Robert Garcia of California, the top Democrat on the committee, told reporters Ms Bondi refused to answer questions pertaining to the US president.<\/p>\n

He said a Justice Department lawyer sitting next to her “stepped in and told the former attorney-general that she was not going to answer those questions”.<\/p>\n

Under her tenure, the Justice Department said it would not release information that exposed victims or compromised ongoing investigations.<\/p>\n

Ms Bondi faced sharp criticism<\/a> from Democrats and some Republicans during her tenure for her handling of the release of millions of documents related to Epstein.<\/p>\n

The Epstein files revealed the financier’s ties to powerful people including Mr Trump, former US president Bill Clinton and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the former Duke of York. All have said they had no knowledge of Epstein’s alleged sex trafficking.<\/p>\n

Democrat Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico said Ms Bondi told the committee that the Justice Department had released 3 million out of 6 million Epstein-related documents.<\/p>\n

“This is a cover-up,” she said.<\/p>\n

Reuters\/AP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former US Attorney-General Pam Bondi refused to answer questions from Congress about whether Donald Trump was aware of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703513,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9338,57097,342460,2490,143651,43,5634,44,128911,176539,41800,41,39,42,40,78257],"class_list":["post-703512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-congress","tag-democrats","tag-documents-release","tag-donald-trump","tag-epstein-files","tag-headlines","tag-jeffrey-epstein","tag-news","tag-pam-bondi","tag-sex-abuse","tag-testimony","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-us-congress"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703512\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}