Democratic legislators in the United States Congress have launched an investigation into allegations that the US department of justice withheld files from the Jeffrey Epstein investigation in which a minor accused Donald Trump of sexual abuse.
Robert Garcia, the most senior Democrat on the House committee on oversight and government reform, on Tuesday said the department of justice appeared to have broken a law requiring disclosure of all unclassified material in the Epstein case.
Democrats on the committee have in recent weeks been investigating the FBI’s handling of allegations of sexual abuse of a minor by the president, Garcia said.
“The department of justice appears to have illegally withheld FBI interviews with this survivor who accused president Trump of heinous crimes. Oversight Democrats will open a parallel investigation into this,” he added.
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Garcia’s comment came after National Public Radio reported the justice department failed to release Epstein material including allegations that Trump sexually abused a minor – and that it eliminated some files in which the president is mentioned as part of claims against the late sex offender.
The department of justice said Democrats on the oversight committee “should stop misleading the public while manufacturing outrage from their radical anti-Trump base”, according to a post on X.
The department “has repeatedly said publicly AND directly to @NPR prior to deadline – NOTHING has been deleted. If files are temporarily pulled for victim redactions or to redact Personally Identifiable Information, then those documents are promptly restored online and are publicly available”, it added.
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All Epstein documents “have been produced” unless the material is a duplicate, privileged or part of a federal investigation, the department of justice said.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Garcia’s inquiry intensifies scrutiny of the department of justice as it faces criticism for missing the congressionally mandated deadline to release all Epstein files and for initially botching redactions that in some cases revealed victims’ names while shielding “co-conspirators”.
US attorney-general Pam Bondi earlier this month came under sustained attack from legislators during a congressional hearing for her department’s handling of the Epstein material – including for not meeting some of the victims.
Bondi told the House judiciary committee she was “deeply sorry for what any victim ... has been through” and that “any accusations of criminal wrongdoing will be taken seriously and investigated”.
Trump has struggled to quash criticism, including from some Republicans, over the department of justice’s handling of the Epstein files, which have revealed links between the disgraced financier and senior figures in politics, entertainment and business.
The president has been seldom mentioned in the trove of documents released by the department of justice. Bondi earlier this month told the House judiciary committee there was “no evidence that Donald Trump has committed a crime”.
Democratic representative Ted Lieu accused Bondi of lying under oath, to which she responded: “Don’t you ever accuse me of a crime.” – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026
