After fighting for months, Trump signed a bill to release Jeffrey Epstein case files

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed legislation requiring his administration to release files on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, bowing to political pressure from his party after initially resisting those efforts.

Trump could have chosen to reveal many of the files himself months ago.

He watches: Bundy avoids questions about Epstein files at press conference

“Democrats have used the Epstein case, which affects them far more than the Republican Party, to try to distract from our amazing victories,” Trump said in a social media post as he announced his signing of the bill.

Now, the bill requires the Justice Department to release all files and communications related to Epstein, as well as any information about the investigation into his death in federal prison in 2019, within 30 days. It allows redactions about Epstein’s victims in ongoing federal investigations, but the Justice Department cannot withhold information due to “embarrassment, reputational damage, or political sensitivity.”

It was a remarkable turn of events for what had previously been a long-shot effort to force an odd coalition of Democrats in Congress, one of the president’s GOP opponents, and a handful of former Trump loyalists to release the case files. Last week, the Trump administration summoned one of the Republican supporters of releasing the files, Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado, to the Situation Room to discuss the matter, although she did not change her mind.

But over the weekend, Trump sharply changed the files once it became clear that congressional action was inevitable. He insisted that the Epstein issue had become a distraction to the GOP agenda and signaled his desire to move forward.

Read more: What’s next for the Epstein files?

“I don’t want Republicans to take their eyes off all the victories we’ve had,” Trump said in a social media post Tuesday afternoon, explaining the rationale for his surprise U-turn.

The House passed the legislation by a vote of 427-1, with Rep. Clay Higgins, R-Los Angeles, the lone dissenter. He said the bill’s language could lead to the release of information about innocent people named in the federal investigation. The Senate later approved it unanimously, skipping a formal vote.

It has long been established that Trump was a friend of Epstein, the disgraced financier who was close to the world’s elite. But the president has consistently said he was unaware of Epstein’s crimes and cut ties with him long ago.

He watches: “Trump called me a traitor, but Epstein survivors are patriots,” Green says.

Before Trump returned to the White House for a second term, some of his closest political allies helped fuel conspiracy theories about the government’s handling of the Epstein case, asserting that potentially incriminating information in those files had been covered up.