Epstein files: DOJ Congress members’ searches
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi takes her seat before testifing before the House Judiciary Committee in the Rayburn House Office Building on February 11, 2026 in Washington, DC.
Win Mcnamee | Getty Images
The Department of Justice said Thursday that it “logs all searches” by members of Congress on its data systems holding evidence about sex offender Jeffrey Epstein to guard against the public release of information about his victims.
The DOJ’s statement came a day after a document contained in a binder used by Attorney General Pam Bondi at a House Judiciary Committee hearing indicated the DOJ had logged information about searches of the so-called Epstein files by Rep. Pramila Jayapal.
Jayapal, D-Wash., called the monitoring of her searches in the Epstein files “totally inappropriate,” and “outrageous.”
Several other members of Congress in recent days visited the DOJ to examine the Epstein files, including documents that were not among the more than 3 million files related to the predator that have been publicly released.
In a statement to CNBC on Thursday, a DOJ spokeswoman said, “DOJ has extended Congress the opportunity to review unredacted documents in the Epstein files.”
“As a part of that review, DOJ logs all searches made on its systems to protect against the release of victim information,” the spokeswoman said.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., on Wednesday night said he had not seen or heard anything about the DOJ logging Japayal’s searches of the Epstein files, “but that would be inappropriate if it happened.”
Jayapal at Wednesday’s hearing exchanged sharp words with Bondi after a group of women in the room who had been sexually abused by Epstein to indicate if they had been unable to meet with the DOJ.
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