House Speaker Mike Johnson publicly split with Donald Trump over Jeffrey Epstein Tuesday by calling for Attorney General Pam Bondi to release all records related to the sex offender.
Johnson said Tuesday that the Republican base being in an uproar over the Trump administration’s handling of the matter shows the need for “transparency.”
“It’s a very delicate subject, but we should put everything out there and let the people decide,” he told serial plagiarist Benny Johnson on his podcast.
“[Pam Bondi] needs to come forward and explain it to everybody. I like Pam. I mean, I think she’s done a good job,” Johnson continued. “We need the DOJ focusing on the major priorities, so let’s get this thing resolved so they can deal with violent crime and public safety and election integrity and going after ActBlue and the things that the president is as concerned about as we are. So I’m anxious to get this behind us.”
Johnson added that he trusted Donald Trump—although it was the president who had demanded silence on Epstein.
“He put together a team of his choosing and they’re doing a great job,” he said, noting that the White House is “privy to facts that I don’t know.”
Trump has publicly defended Bondi and tried to quell discontent among his supporters by telling them to just move on.
“What’s going on with my ‘boys’ and, in some cases, ‘gals?’” he wrote Saturday on Truth Social. “They’re all going after Attorney General Pam Bondi, who is doing a FANTASTIC JOB! We’re on one Team, MAGA, and I don’t like what’s happening. We have a PERFECT Administration, THE TALK OF THE WORLD, and ‘selfish people’ are trying to hurt it, all over a guy who never dies, Jeffrey Epstein.”
But it’s the administration’s prior statements that have contributed to the public’s dissatisfaction. Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel, for instance, had said they would make the “Epstein files” public. Earlier this month, though, the Justice Department and FBI announced that “no further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted.” That development sent shockwaves through the right-wing ecosystem.
While Johnson said Tuesday that the DOJ should be an open book regarding Epstein, his Republican colleagues in the House have been blocking the release of relevant files.
The GOP-controlled House Rules Committee, in a 6-5 vote Monday, rejected a Democratic amendment to have Congress vote on whether the department must make the Epstein documents public. Only one Republican, Rep. Ralph Norman, voted for it.
Then on Tuesday, the full House voted 211-210 against having a vote on California Rep. Ro Khanna’s measure to make the department put its Epstein files online within the next month. All Republicans present rejected the measure.
