WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Pam Bondi will be grilled by lawmakers on Wednesday about the Justice Department’s handling of documents related to Jeffrey Epstein that, despite being redacted, exposed sensitive private information about the victim.
Bundy faces a new wave of criticism that has dogged her tenure since the release of millions of additional pieces of information revealed by Epstein, which victims criticized as sloppy and incomplete.
It will be the attorney general’s first appearance before Congress since a chaotic hearing in October in which she repeatedly dodged questions and used political attacks of her own to counter Democratic criticism of her conduct.
Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee are expected to question Bondi about how the Justice Department decides what should and should not be made public under the Epstein Documents Transparency Act. The bill passed Congress after the Justice Department abruptly announced in July that it would not release further documents, even as it stoked the hopes of conservative influencers and conspiracy theorists.
Bundy has been trying to overcome the backlash over his handling of the Epstein documents since he distributed the binder to a group of social media influencers at the White House last February. The binders contained no new information about Epstein, leading supporters of President Donald Trump to call for the documents to be released.
The hearing comes days after some lawmakers visited Justice Department offices to view unredacted versions of the documents. As part of an arrangement with the Ministry of Justice, lawmakers have access to more than 3 million public documents in a reading room equipped with four computers and can take handwritten notes.
Democrats accuse the Justice Department of redacting information that should have been made public, including information that could have led to scrutiny of Epstein’s associates. Victims, meanwhile, have criticized the department for inconsistent or nonexistent redactions that resulted in nude photos and other private information about victims being inadvertently leaked.
The department defended the latest release of more than 3 million pages of documents, as well as more than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. The Associated Press and other media organizations are still reviewing millions of pages of documents, many of which were previously classified.
While investigators gathered ample evidence that Epstein sexually abused underage girls, they found little evidence that the well-connected financier led a sex-trafficking ring that catered to powerful men, an AP review of records shows. A prosecutor wrote in a 2025 memo that videos and photos seized from Epstein’s homes in New York, Florida and the Virgin Islands did not show victims being abused or suggest anyone else was involved in his crimes.
