Trump at ‘risk of becoming the deep state’ after Epstein file omissions

Extensive redactions and the limited number of documents released related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein angered some Republicans and did little to defuse a scandal threatening the party ahead of the 2026 midterm election.\nThe Trump administration touted this week’s release of a cache of Epstein-related files as a show of transparency, but a handful of Republican lawmakers and right-wing media figures joined Democrats in blasting Friday’s disclosures as inadequate and possibly in violation of a law that prompted their release.\nWhile the criticism fell short of a broader party backlash, it underscored that the Epstein controversy was far from being put to rest and was likely to linger into next year when Republicans will be fighting to keep control of Congress.\nThe release of files, starting on Friday and followed by a second, much smaller batch released on Saturday, is intended to comply with a bipartisan law passed by Congress in November that mandated the disclosure of all Epstein files held by the Justice Department, despite a months-long effort to keep them sealed by US President Donald Trump, who once counted Epstein as a close friend.\nThe new disclosure represented only a fraction of the total data the FBI and Justice Department have said they possess related to Epstein and was heavily redacted, including several documents of 100 pages or more that were entirely blacked out.\nAlso notable was the dearth of references to Trump, who had a well-publicised friendship with Epstein in the 1990s and early 2000s. Instead, the released files extensively featured former president Bill Clinton, a Democrat and political foe.\n\nBrian Darling, a Republican strategist and former Senate aide, said the limited disclosures would fuel conspiracy theories about Epstein as well as legitimate transparency concerns, potentially dampening turnout among Trump voters.\n“The heavily redacted disclosures of the Epstein documents added more fuel to the fire of controversy,” Darling said. “This remains a political risk for all Republicans in swing seats going into the midterms.”\nThe US Justice Department on Friday released some 300,000 pages of documents, photos and other materials from the government’s investigations into Epstein, who died by suicide in a jail cell in 2019 as he faced federal charges of sex trafficking of minors.\nThe wealthy financier’s history of hobnobbing with prominent figures has fuelled speculation about whether anyone in his social circle was involved with his alleged sexual activity. One person, British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, has been convicted on Epstein-related charges to date.\nThe Epstein scandal resonates with much of Trump’s base because it reinforces their belief in a corrupt establishment – often labelled the “deep state” – willing to protect itself at all costs, a narrative Trump has repeatedly promoted.\nRachel Blum, a political-science professor at the University of Oklahoma, said the lack of fuller disclosures could erode support among some Trump backers, including young men who swung to him in 2024 in part over their distrust of government.\n“He’s at risk of becoming the deep state,” Blum said. “I think this has the potential to damage his credibility more than a lot of the other scandals he’s gone through.”\n\nThe Justice Department’s initial disclosure fell short of the law’s mandate that all investigative files involving Epstein be released by Friday. The law allowed for records to be withheld or redacted if the information posed a threat to national security or identified victims of sexual abuse.\nDeputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said on Friday that the deadline was missed due to the massive volume of data and the need for careful redactions to protect victims. He promised to release more files “over the next couple of weeks”.\nDemocrats criticised the administration for not releasing all the files and for the extensive redactions. Representative Ro Khanna of California, who co-authored the law requiring full disclosure, floated possible impeachment of Blanche and Attorney General Pam Bondi over the failure to release the files on time.\nRepresentative Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky who worked with Khanna on the legislation, said he, too, believed that Bondi was in violation of the law, warning in a social media post that she and others could face criminal charges in the future when the Justice Department was in Democratic hands.\nRepresentative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a House Republican who split with Trump last month over her efforts to compel disclosure of the Epstein files, cited the failure to release all the documents as well as the heavy redactions as among actions she considered inconsistent with Trump’s Make America Great Again (Maga) movement.\n“People are raging and walking away,” she wrote on social media.\n\n\nSome conservative commentators also criticised the Justice Department’s decision not to disclose more.\nKyle Seraphin, a right-wing podcaster and former Federal Bureau of Investigation agent, reposted an old social media post by Bondi praising the Trump administration as the most transparent in history, saying, “One gets the feeling that this is tongue-in-cheek at this point.”\nOwen Shroyer, a podcaster who was pardoned by Trump for his role in the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol but has since become a critic of the president, said he believed the Justice Department was intentionally slow walking disclosures.\n“They covered up the Epstein Files. No other way to put it now,” Shroyer wrote on social media after Friday’s release.\n