The top Republican in the U.S. House said Tuesday he would dismiss lawmakers a day early for their five-week summer recess, sidestepping a potential showdown over calls to release government files on disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The move blocks a bipartisan push for a vote on a resolution urging the Justice Department and FBI to make public all documents related to Epstein, who died by suicide in jail in 2019.
“We refuse to take part in another of the Democrats’ political games,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. “This is a serious matter, and we won’t let it become a political battering ram.”
Supporters of President Donald Trump – many of whom have fueled conspiracy theories surrounding Epstein – were briefly encouraged when the administration pledged to release more documents, only to later announce that no evidence was found to support the claims.
That opened a rare breach between Trump and some in his Make America Great Again base. A majority of Americans – including many Republicans – believe the government is hiding details of the case, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling.
On Monday, Democrats sought to use a House Rules Committee meeting to force a vote on the Epstein resolution, introduced by Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif. The panel serves as a gatekeeper for floor-bound legislation. Republicans instead suspended the hearing, preventing the panel from advancing bills for floor consideration this week.
The House had been expected to hold its final votes of the week on Thursday.
But House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., the chamber’s No. 2 Republican, told reporters there would be votes Tuesday and Wednesday on lower-priority legislation considered under suspension of the rules.
Separately, a subcommittee of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee voted to subpoena Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite and Epstein’s longtime companion, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence after being convicted of sex trafficking in 2021.
Under mounting pressure from Trump supporters to release material, Attorney General Pam Bondi has asked a federal judge to unseal grand jury transcripts in the cases of both Epstein and Maxwell, who was convicted in 2021 of five federal charges related to her role in Epstein’s sexual abuse of underage girls.
