WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Pam Bondi will face questions from lawmakers Wednesday about the Justice Department’s handling of files related to Jeffrey Epstein that exposed sensitive private information about victims despite redaction efforts.
Bondi is facing a new wave of criticism that comes from the political saga that has kept its term after the release of millions of additional disclosures of Epstein that the victims said as sloppy and incomplete.
It will be the attorney general’s first appearance before Congress since a tumultuous October hearing in which she repeatedly deflected questions and countered Democratic criticism of her actions with her own political attacks.
Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee are expected to grill Bondi about how the Justice Department decided what should and should not be made public under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which was passed by Congress after the department abruptly announced in July that no more files would be released despite raising the hopes of conservative influencers and conspiracy theorists.
Bondi has continually struggled to weather the backlash against her handling of the Epstein files since she distributed binders to a group of social media influencers at the White House last February. The binders did not include any new revelations about Epstein, prompting even more calls from President Donald Trump’s base for the files to be released.
The hearing comes days after some lawmakers visited a Justice Department office to seek unredacted versions of the files. As part of an arrangement with the Justice Department, lawmakers were given access to more than 3 million released files in a reading room with four computers and were allowed to take handwritten notes.
Democrats have accused the Justice Department of writing information that should have been made public, including information that could lead to scrutiny of Epstein’s associates. Meanwhile, victims have sued the department for inconsistent or non-existent redactions that allowed the inadvertent release of nude photos and other private information about victims.
The department defended the latest introduction of more than 3 million pages of documents along with more than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. The Associated Press and other media organizations are still reviewing millions of pages of documents, many of them previously confidential.
An AP review of records shows that while investigators gathered ample evidence that Epstein sexually abused underage girls, they found little evidence that the well-connected financier ran a sex-trafficking ring that catered to powerful men. Videos and photos seized from Epstein’s homes in New York, Florida and the Virgin Islands do not show victims being abused or implicate anyone else in his crimes, a prosecutor wrote in one 2025 memo.