Mike Johnson, House speaker, insists President Trump has ‘clean hands’ in Epstein case

House Speaker Mike Johnson says the push to release the Epstein files is nothing more than a “political exercise” meant to make President Trump look bad.

“They’re doing this to go after President Trump on this theory that he has something to do with it. He does not,” Mr. Johnson said on “Fox News Sunday,” insisting the president has “clean hands.”

The late Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier, and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell were convicted of sex trafficking underage girls. Epstein died in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial, sparking conspiracy theories about whether he was killed and whether he kept a secret client list that could expose influential people.

Mr. Trump was once friends with Epstein, but says he cut ties with him in the early 2000s. Last year, then-candidate Trump said he’d be open to releasing the Department of Justice’s files on the case.

Since then, he’s reversed course. The DOJ announced earlier this year that it was closing the investigation after finding “no incriminating client list.”

Mr. Trump has fought against releasing the files, even as Reps. Thomas Massie, Kentucky Republican, and Ro Khanna, California Democrat, have successfully forced a House vote on the issue.

Mr. Massie is predicting 100 or more Republican lawmakers will vote to back the release. He is framing the vote as a test of loyalty: stand with Mr. Trump or stand against pedophiles, saying the vote will last longer than the Trump presidency.

“I have never said that these files will implicate Donald Trump,” Mr. Massie said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” “I really don’t think that they will.”

“I really think he is trying to protect a bunch of rich and powerful friends, billionaires, donors to his campaign, friends in his social circles,” he added. “That is my operating theory on why he is trying so hard to keep these files closed.”

Mr. Massie said Mr. Trump’s recent threats to investigate Democrats tied to Epstein could be a last-ditch effort to tie up the entire case in court.

Mr. Trump, meanwhile, has endorsed Mr. Massie’s primary opponent and withdrawn his support of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a longtime ally.

On CNN’s “State of the Union,” Ms. Greene said Mr. Trump is cutting ties with her because she supports releasing the Epstein files.

“Why fight this so hard?” the Georgia Republican said Sunday.

If the House passes the proposal, it would move on to the GOP-controlled Senate, where it faces an uphill battle.

“They want to make President Trump a lame duck president,” Sen. John Barrasso, Wyoming Republican, said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Mr. Johnson, meanwhile, reiterated that if Democrats and others truly cared about the case, they would have fought to release all the files when President Joseph R. Biden was in office and Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress.

Mr. Johnson downplayed the vote as a “political exercise.”

Still, polls show most Americans want more transparency — and many are left wondering why Mr. Trump is so determined to keep the files under wraps