Ahead of this week’s House vote on legislation requiring the public release of the full Justice Department files related to Jeffrey Epstein, President Donald Trump issued an unexpected call on social media urging Republicans to support the measure, marking a significant shift from his earlier stance, reports the Baltimore Chronicle.
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Sunday evening that “House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide,” even though both he and House Speaker Mike Johnson had previously taken steps to prevent the vote from moving forward. The administration’s recent attempt to pressure Colorado Republican Lauren Boebert into withdrawing her name from the discharge petition—including a meeting in the White House Situation Room—failed, and she ultimately became one of four Republicans to join Democrats in pushing the petition to the required 218 signatures.
Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie, the leading GOP co-sponsor of the bill, told ABC News’ “This Week” that he now expects large-scale Republican support once the measure reaches the floor. He said lawmakers face a clear choice between protecting the political interests of the president and meeting the expectations of their constituents, asking how any member could justify a vote against transparency.
Massie emphasized that while Trump can offer political cover today through endorsements in Republican districts, such protection will not be available years from now, warning that opposing the release would amount to “voting to protect pedophiles.” He noted that the record of such a vote would long outlast Trump’s presidency. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said last week that emails released by House Democrats “prove absolutely nothing” and reiterated that no documents made public in civil litigation or in Ghislaine Maxwell’s trial contain allegations of wrongdoing by Trump. The president dismissed the email release as a Democratic “hoax” and accused some Republicans of falling for it.
Even if the House approves the measure, the bill would still need to clear the Senate and could face a veto from Trump unless Congress musters a two-thirds override. The increasingly public clashes between Trump and Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene in recent days reveal deeper divisions within the MAGA movement and may foreshadow its direction in a future political landscape without Trump at its center.
Greene has increasingly cast herself as a purist of the “America First” agenda and has argued that Trump has moved away from the issues that originally energized the movement. Their disagreements, which have been building for months, span foreign policy priorities, the administration’s support for Argentina, Trump’s position on H-1B visas, and Republican leadership’s handling of shutdown negotiations and health care. In an interview with CNN, Greene questioned whether Trump still represents the MAGA identity in the same way he once did, pointing to high living costs and soaring health insurance premiums as issues she believes are being overshadowed. She said the break with Trump became irreparable when she pushed to force the release of the Epstein files.
Earlier we wrote that Jay Clayton Leads Manhattan Investigation into Jeffrey Epstein Ties After Trump Directive.
