- - DOJ Releases New Epstein Files Featuring New Photos But Heavily Redacted Court Documents

Greta BjornsonDecember 20, 2025 at 6:42 AM

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Andrew Harnik/Getty; Neil Rasmus/Patrick McMullan via Getty

Attorney General Pam Bondi and Jeffrey Epstein -

The Department of Justice has released additional files related to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein

The release comes after Congress voted to pass a bill calling on them to do so, which was then signed by President Donald Trump

Trump, whose named reportedly appears multiple times in the files, was openly resistant to releasing them before proclaiming he had "nothing to hide"

After a bill passed in Congress and was later signed by President Donald Trump, the long-awaited Epstein files have been released.

The Justice Department has released more files related to investigations into the late sex trafficker, who died by suicide in jail in 2019. The files, which dropped on the DOJ website on the afternoon of Friday, Dec. 19, feature thousands of records, including images of Jeffrey Epstein with confidante Ghislaine Maxwell and others, including Michael Jackson and former President Bill Clinton.

Some images show Clinton, 79, swimming in a pool with Maxwell, while another shows him in a hot tub with a woman whose face has been redacted. In another image, the former president appears to be on a private plane with a woman on his lap, and is also photographed dining with Mick Jagger and Maxwell in another image.

Clinton has not been accused of wrongdoing and his inclusion in the files does not implicate him. Clinton's spokesperson Angel Ureña previously denied any wrongdoing on Clinton's behalf.

In a July 2019 statement, Ureña said, “President Clinton knows nothing about the terrible crimes Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to in Florida some years ago, or those with which he has been recently charged in New York.”

He added that Clinton was on Epstein's jet a total of four times and in his Harlem office once, all while accompanied by his Secret Service detail. "He’s not spoken to Epstein in well over a decade, and has never been to Little St. James Island, Epstein’s ranch in New Mexico, or his residence in Florida," he said.

Ureña did not immediately respond to PEOPLE's request for comment on Friday.

The documents also include grand jury testimony, call logs and transcripts from interviews, many of which are heavily redacted, including a 119-page grand jury filing. Among the documents is a "Massage for Dummies" book; Epstein is accused of recruiting girls to his home to perform massages.

While the DOJ released a trove of documents on Friday, they did not release all of the information required by the bill signed by Trump; Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said earlier in the day that “several hundred thousand” pages of materials would not be released by the Dec. 19 deadline.

The effort to release more files was first sparked by a bill proposed in the House that was sponsored by Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna and cosponsored by Republican Rep. Thomas Massie.

The bill, officially titled the Epstein Files Transparency Act, called on the Justice Department to publish "all unclassified records, documents, communications, and investigative materials in DOJ's possession that relate to the investigation and prosecution of Jeffrey Epstein."

The House passed the bill in a near-unanimous 427-1 vote on Tuesday, Nov. 18. Louisiana Republican Rep. Clay Higgins was the only House member to vote against the measure. Just hours later, the bill passed in the Senate and was then sent to the president's desk.

Trump had long resisted the release of the files, repeatedly calling the Epstein case "a hoax," which he claimed was created by Democrats to distract from his administration's accomplishments and divert attention from the government shutdown, which became the longest in history before coming to an end in early November.

However, Trump said days before the House vote on the bill that he didn't "care" about the release of the files, and even encouraged House Republicans to vote to release them not long after.

"We have nothing to hide, and it’s time to move on from this Democrat Hoax,” he said in a Nov. 16 Truth Social post.

The message was a sharp shift in tone from the president, who had been sparring with one of his key supporters in Congress over the Epstein issue. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has been stumping for Trump for years, has criticized the president for his handling of the Epstein case and broken ranks with him publicly and vocally.

Greene was one of four House Republicans who signed a petition forcing the Nov. 18 vote on the Epstein Files Transparency Act. The list also included Massie, Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert and South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace.

Rick Friedman/Rick Friedman Photography/Corbis via Getty

Jeffrey Epstein in Cambridge, Mass., on Sept. 8, 2004

The latest batch of files released by the DOJ comes after the department released documents related to Epstein earlier this year. In February, Attorney General Pam Bondi released flight logs from Epstein featuring Trump's name a total of seven times.

At the time, Bondi also shared an evidence list, redacted pages from a contact book and redacted pages of a masseuse list as part of the first phase of "declassified Epstein files"; she did not release a second phase.

The Wall Street Journal reported in July that the DOJ warned Trump that his name appeared multiple times in the Epstein files in May before the department chose not to release further information related to the case.

Senior administration officials told the outlet at the time that that Bondi and Blanche met had with Trump at the White House and informed him he was among many high-profile names included in the files.

During the meeting — which officials described as a routine briefing — Bondi and her deputy told Trump that the files featured "what officials felt was unverified hearsay about many people," including the president, the Journal reported.

Bondi and her deputy reportedly told Trump during the meeting that the DOJ would not release more information related to the Epstein case because the material contained child pornography and personal information of victims.

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The information most recently released by the DOJ is different from the thousands of documents previously released by the administration to the House Oversight Committee in early November.

The committee previously released documents from the Epstein estate in which Trump was mentioned multiple times by the disgraced financier. Epstein questioned the president's mental state and implied he "knew about the girls" being trafficked by him and Maxwell.

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