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The officials with the Attorney General’s Office said Wednesday that they were working around the clock over the holidays to review and redact reams of documents in the Epstein files, ahead of their mandatory public release.
Assistant Attorney General Todd Blanche released a statement on X noting Ministry of Justice DOJ attorneys from Main Justice, FBI, SDFL and SDNY are “working around the clock” over Christmas and New Years to review the documents, ensuring that sensitive victim information is redacted from the impending release.
“This is truly a participatory approach and we are asking as many attorneys as possible to dedicate their time to reviewing the remaining documents,” Blanche wrote in her post. “The redactions necessary to protect victims take time, but they will not prevent the publication of these documents.”
Blanche’s update comes amid recent threats of legal action after the department failed to meet a Dec. 19 deadline set by the Epstein Files Transparency Act to release all of its documents related to the disgraced financier. Jeffrey Epstein.
The Justice Department released a trove of Epstein documents on December 19 after President Trump signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act in November. (Joe Schildhorn/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)
He had previously argued that there was “settled law” supporting missing the deadline because other legal requirements in the bill had to be met before publication, including the removal of the victim’s identifying information.
“THE The goal of the Attorney General and this administration is simple: transparency and protection of victims,” Blanche wrote on Wednesday.
The Epstein files transparency law, signed on November 19 by the president Donald Trumprequired the DOJ to withhold information that could identify potential victims or compromise ongoing investigations or litigation.
A view of the resort on Epstein Island in the US Virgin Islands. (House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform)
DOJ RESTORES TRUMP PHOTO IN EPSTEIN FILES AFTER DETERMINING NO VICTIM REPRESENTED
It also allowed officials to exclude material deemed sensitive to national defense or foreign policy.
Although it is unclear how many records remain to be reviewed, the DOJ confirmed last week that the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York recently submitted more than 1 million additional pages of potentially sensitive documents related to Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwellsex trafficking cases.
Former President Bill Clinton was seen in photos with Jeffrey Epstein amid the release of DOJ Epstein files on Friday, December 19. (Ministry of Justice)
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Officials said reviewing the “massive volume” of material could take weeks, further delaying their release, promised by Blanche on a “rolling basis,” Fox News Digital previously reported.
Ashley Oliver of Fox News Digital contributed to this report.
