WASHINGTON — Women who were abused by the late sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein called out President Donald Trump outside the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday ahead of a House vote on legislation to make the government’s files on Epstein public.
Jena-Lisa Jones held up a photo of herself at age 14, when she said she’d first met Epstein, who died in 2019 after being charged with sex trafficking minors. Jones slammed Trump for his refusal to release the files and his claim that the entire Epstein saga is a “Democrat hoax.”
“I beg you, President Trump, please stop making this political,” Jones said. “It is not about you, President Trump. You are our president. Please start acting like it. Show some class, show some real leadership, show that you actually care about the people other than yourself. I voted for you, but your behavior on this issue has been a national embarrassment.”
Jones spoke alongside the House members who have successfully forced the House to hold a vote, scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, to require the Justice Department to make the files from its Epstein investigation public. Despite furious lobbying by the White House, the so-called discharge petition to force a vote on the legislation won the 218 signatures needed, including from four Republicans.
“The founders set up our government with three branches and two branches of Congress, and I don’t think it’s any coincidence that this fight is being started and it’s being won in the House of Representatives,” Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) said.
The bill is expected to sail through the House on Tuesday after Trump gave his blessing for Republicans to vote for it — something he only did after it was clear his efforts to block the legislation had failed. Trump was friends with Epstein and is reportedly named repeatedly in the files. Epstein mentioned the president multiple times in emails that were separately obtained by House investigators from Epstein’s estate.
It seemed the disclosure bill would die in the Senate, but Trump said Monday he would sign it into law, scrambling the Capitol Hill calculus. It’s possible the bill will also clear the Senate but that the Justice Department could cite ongoing investigations, personally directed by Trump, into Democrats named in the files as a pretext for withholding the documents.
“The real test will be, will the Department of Justice release the files, or will it all remain tied up in investigations?” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said Tuesday.
Greene, previously one of Trump’s biggest supporters in the House, noted that Trump repeatedly called her a “traitor” for advocating for the legislation.
“I was called a traitor by a man that I fought for five, no, actually, six years for, and I gave him my loyalty for free,” Greene said.
“I fought for him, for the policies and for America First, and he called me a traitor for standing with these women and refusing to take my name off the discharge petition,” Greene said. “Let me tell you what a traitor is. A traitor is an American that serves foreign countries and themselves. A patriot is an American that serves the United States of America and Americans like the women standing behind me.”
Another Epstein survivor, Haley Robson, held a photo of her younger self on Tuesday.
“This is who Congress is fighting for. This is who the House of Representatives are fighting for, and hopefully the Senate will fight for us too,” Robson said. “To the president of the United States of America, who is not here today, I want to send a clear message to you: While I do understand that your position has changed on the Epstein files, and I’m grateful that you have pledged to sign this bill, I can’t help to be skeptical of what the agenda is.”