Thousands of new documents linked to the case of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein were made available Tuesday by the US Department of Justice (DOJ), amid mounting criticism over the pace of the publication and heavy redactions.
At least 8,000 files were posted online, including hundreds of videos or audio recordings, notably surveillance footage from August 2019, the month Epstein was found dead in his jail cell while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.
The DOJ posted around 11,000 links to new documents online, but some of them appeared to lead nowhere.
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The Epstein Files Transparency Act (EFTA), passed nearly unanimously by Congress and signed by President Donald Trump, mandated the complete release of the Epstein files by Friday of last week.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has blamed the delay on the need to redact the identities of Epstein’s more than 1,000 victims from the hundreds of thousands of documents and photos in the government’s possession.
EFTA co-sponsors Ro Khanna, a Democrat, and Thomas Massie, a Republican, threatened over the weekend to bring contempt of Congress charges against Attorney General Pam Bondi for failing to comply with the law.