Rep. Daniel Goldman has accused the Justice Department of shielding Jeffrey Epstein’s sidekick Ghislaine Maxwell while ignoring survivors of alleged abuse who want to speak with federal investigators.
In a sharply worded post on X directed at Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, the New York Democrat said a “room full of Epstein survivors” stood during February’s House Judiciary Committee hearing on the DOJ’s handling of the Epstein files.
Survivors of Epstein and Maxwell’s trafficking network, along with relatives of deceased victims, including the family of the late Virginia Giuffre, attended the hearing, where former Attorney General Pam Bondi was testifying.
During the hearing, several of those survivors, who were seated behind Bondi, raised their hands when Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal asked who had still been unable to meet with Justice Department officials. This came after Blanche had said, “Any victim that wants to speak with the department has done so.”
Bondi dismissed the exchange as “theatrics.”
Goldman accused Bondi of failing to follow up after promising to do so, and said Blanche had not followed up either.
“I understand you view your job as the people’s lawyer to be a continuation of your previous job as the President’s personal attorney,” Goldman wrote, “but is there a reason you continue to stonewall them other than covering up for Trump?”
In a separate video statement, Goldman escalated the accusation, saying the Justice Department was “taking good care of Ghislaine Maxwell” while refusing to meet with other alleged victims who want to share their stories.
“Why? Well, it’s obvious. It is a massive, massive coverup,” he said.
Goldman pointed to testimony from Jeffrey Epstein’s former personal assistant Sarah Kellen, who testified in Congress last week in a closed-door deposition.
Goldman said Kellen had described years of grooming and abuse tied to Epstein and others in her testimony.
“Victims want to tell their stories and they’re not being allowed to,” he added.
“They do want to speak with the Department of Justice. They do want to tell their stories and they’re not being allowed to,” Goldman said, adding that attempts to shift public attention “with slush funds and wars in Iran” would not stop scrutiny of the case.
“This coverup is going to be uncovered one way or another,” he said.
It comes after a group of Epstein survivors publicly accused Blanche of refusing to meet with them after he appeared before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee last week.
In their statement, the survivors accused the Justice Department of repeatedly forcing them to revisit traumatic experiences while offering little transparency about files tied to Epstein and his alleged associates.
They argued that DOJ officials should sit down directly with survivors and their attorneys—not to make them “start over.”
During the same hearing, Blanche said he would not support a pardon for Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence for sex trafficking.
Blanche was previously sent by the Trump administration to interview Maxwell as pressure mounted to release more Epstein-related records. Soon afterward, Maxwell was transferred from a low-security prison in Florida to a minimum-security facility in Texas, an unprecedented move.
Blanche denied Tuesday that Trump personally directed him to interview her and said he was unaware of any special treatment at the facility.
Rep. Goldman has long advocated for the release of the Epstein files.
Almost six months after President Trump signed legislation requiring the Justice Department to release files tied to Epstein, roughly 2.5 million records are still being kept from public view, while many of the documents that have been released remain heavily redacted.
Rep. Goldman argued on The Daily Beast Podcast that the slow, selective release of the files points to a broader effort to conceal damaging information.
“Based on the way that they released, and poorly and… illegally redacted, as well as what they covered up, even within those documents, it is clear that the Department of Justice is covering up for Donald Trump,” Goldman said.
Trump, who appears thousands of times in the Epstein files, has said that he wasn’t “friendly” with Epstein and was “never” on his plane.
The Justice Department has defended its withholding of documents by arguing that some materials are protected by privilege, tied to active investigations, or merely duplicate records. Goldman rejected that explanation, saying, “If they’re duplicates, turn them over.”
Last month, Blanche suggested the department should move beyond the Epstein controversy altogether, stating that “to the extent the Epstein files was a part of the past year of this Justice Department, it should not be a part of anything going forward.”
