House Judiciary Committee Democrats accused Attorney General Todd Blanche of possibly committing “criminal obstruction of justice” to protect President Donald Trump from the Jeffrey Epstein scandal, and they are now calling for an independent special counsel to investigate both of them.
The allegation appears in an unsigned staff report of more than 50 pages that lays out what Democrats call “the case against Donald Trump emerging in the Epstein Files and DOJ’s desperate efforts to cover it up,” reported MS NOW.
“Attorney General Blanche may have engaged in criminal obstruction of justice while acting on a mission to protect Trump,” the report says.
Democrats focus heavily on Blanche’s meeting with Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s convicted accomplice, and they argue the meeting “potentially constituted witness tampering and obstruction of an official proceeding.”
“Blanche’s apparent instructions not to discuss a specific Epstein victim, and how that victim could implicate Donald Trump, could easily run afoul of 18 U.S.C. § 1512,” the report states. That law forbids hindering the flow of information about potential federal crimes to law enforcement and corruptly influencing testimony in official proceedings, including congressional investigations.
The report also accuses DOJ officials, Blanche among them, of “doing everything they can to keep the American people in the dark.” Democrats additionally fault the department for being reluctant to share evidence with state and foreign law enforcement.
“The women who survived Epstein deserve to be heard,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), the committee’s top Democrat. “Congress must have the complete files required by law, and an independent special counsel must investigate Epstein’s co-conspirators and DOJ’s cover-up.”
Blanche’s handling of the files has already run into trouble in court. In June, a federal judge found that he had effectively conceded the DOJ was violating the Epstein Files Transparency Act by not producing certain unredacted and foreign-language documents. The department is appealing that ruling.
Blanche has bristled at claims that the DOJ is hiding anything. He maintains the department “undertook a Herculean task to review millions and millions of potentially responsive files” and met its obligations “expeditiously.” A DOJ spokesperson did not immediately respond to MS NOW’s request for comment on the new report.
The report also alleges that Trump was “an active participant in Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse of young women in the mid-to-late 1990s.” That includes at least one new allegation, though the only evidence the report provides for it is the woman’s own conversations with committee staff.
The report also repeats several longstanding, unsubstantiated allegations. Trump has long denied any sexual misconduct involving women connected to Epstein and has said he knew nothing about Epstein’s crimes.
The White House dismissed the report entirely.
“This ‘report’ is nothing more than a desperate attempt by crazed Democrats to distract Americans from the surging Republican momentum driven by President Trump’s historic achievements,” spokesperson Lauren Bis told MS NOW. She insisted Trump “has been fully exonerated of anything related to Epstein.”
