The House Oversight Committee moved to subpoena Attorney General Pam Bondi in a rare bipartisan vote on Wednesday as Republican lawmakers increasingly criticize her handling of the release of the Epstein files.
The panel voted 24-19 to force Bondi to testify before the committee, with five Republicans crossing party lines to advance the motion. It’s not yet clear when Bondi may appear for testimony, but it underscores a growing frustration among some Republicans demanding transparency about investigative materials they say is missing from the Justice Department’s tranche of Epstein evidence.
The effort was led by Rep. Nancy Mace, one of the four Republicans who joined Democrats to force a vote on compelling the DOJ to release all materials related to its investigation into convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The Justice Department began publishing its materials earlier this year, but Mace has accused the agency of removing some documents after they were initially released.
“The Epstein case is one of the greatest cover-ups in American history. His global sex trafficking network is larger than what is being revealed,” Mace, R-S.C., said in a post on X announcing her plans to subpoena. “Three million documents have been released, and we still don’t have the full truth. Videos are missing. Audio is missing. Logs are missing. There are millions more documents out there. We want to know why the DOJ is more focused on shielding the powerful than delivering justice.”
Four Republicans joined Mace to move the subpoena forward: Reps. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Michael Cloud of Texas, Scott Perry of Pennsylvania and Tim Burchett of Tennessee.
The subpoena comes after a tense hearing with Bondi last month during which the attorney general sidestepped questions about her handling of the files release. After that hearing, Mace went to the DOJ to view the Epstein materials in person, after which she said there were documents missing or heavily redacted.
Mace has argued the Justice Department failed to release all the files in its possession as required by the Epstein Transparency Act passed by Congress last year. The DOJ has so far released 3 million documents, but has since said it would not publish the remaining documents, which lawmakers say could be up to 1.45 million pages.
The Justice Department said unpublished materials likely included duplicated files, materials that are protected by attorney-client privilege, materials that depict violence, or items that are unrelated to the Epstein case.
But lawmakers have raised questions about some of the materials that were originally published and later taken down, including those containing accusations about President Donald Trump. The Department has taken down more than 47,000 files as of late February, equaling about 65,500 pages, according to CBS News.