Congress

The Epstein files fight is finally coming to the House floor

Published

8 months ago

November 12, 2025

The monthslong bipartisan effort to sidestep Speaker Mike Johnson and force the release of all Justice Department files on the late sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein is kicking into high gear this week, setting up a December floor battle that President Donald Trump has sought to avoid.

The cascade of action is set to begin Wednesday evening, when Johnson will swear in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva right before the House votes to end the government shutdown, ending a 50-day wait following the Arizona Democrat’s election. Shortly afterward, Grijalva says she will affix the 218th and final signature to the discharge petition led by Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) to force a vote on the full release of DOJ’s Epstein files.

That in itself will be the culmination of months of drama that blew up into a full crisis for Johnson this summer, with a GOP mutiny grinding the floor to a halt and forcing leaders to send the House home early for August recess. The uproar over a possible Epstein cover-up faded but never disappeared entirely.

The completion of the discharge petition, a rarely used mechanism to sidestep the majority party leadership, will trigger a countdown for the bill to hit the House floor. It will still take seven legislative days for the petition to ripen, after which Johnson will have two legislative days to schedule a vote. Senior Republican and Democratic aides estimate a floor vote will come the first week of December, after the Thanksgiving recess.

The discharge petition tees up a “rule,” a procedural measure setting the terms of debate for the Epstein bill’s consideration on the House floor. This gives the effort’s leaders greater control over the bill, which will still require Senate approval if it passes the House.

Senate Republican leaders haven’t publicly committed to bringing up the Epstein measure if the House passes it. Republicans expect it will die in the Senate, but not before a contentious House fight.

While Johnson has options to short-circuit the effort before it gets to the floor, he said in an interview last month he would not seek to do so. Republicans on the Rules Committee have also warned Johnson they will not help him kill the bill in the panel, and he’s in turn privately assured some of them the Epstein measure will get floor consideration if the petition reaches 218 signatures.

At that point, the speaker can only defeat it if he siphons away enough Republican votes — a tall order in a majority where Johnson has only a two-vote margin after Grijalva is sworn in.

“I’m certain the House vote will succeed,” Massie said in an interview. “Some Republican members who are not signers of the petition have told me they will vote for the measure when the vote is called. I suspect there will be many more.”

He added, “I even wonder if Speaker Johnson might advise politically vulnerable members to vote for it.”

GOP leadership circles estimate several dozen Republicans are considering backing the effort on the floor, even after Trump officials convinced several hard-liners to keep their signature off the discharge petition.

Republicans and Democrats are closely watching three GOP women who made the rare move to buck party leadership and sign onto Massie’s effort. Reps. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Nancy Mace of South Carolina are still supportive of the measure, despite an intense pressure campaign by White House officials and senior Republicans in recent months to undercut Massie’s push.

“They’re all still on board,” Massie said.

But Trump has repeatedly tried to downplay the Epstein matter as a “Democratic hoax” and blasted Republicans on Capitol Hill and even his own voters for exacerbating the controversy about the files. He claimed in September the Justice Department had already “done its job” and released all the information it could.

Massie predicted a “last, desperate effort” from Trump officials to undercut the discharge petition. “But I expect that effort to fail,” he said.

“Even if one signer were to remove their name, there will be another member showing up later that will get us to 218,” Massie added, referring to a December special election in a safe Democratic seat in Texas. ”All that matters is we reach 218.”

Johnson in recent weeks has pivoted to trying to convince House Republicans to oppose the measure once it comes to the floor.

“The bipartisan House Oversight Committee is already accomplishing what the discharge petition, that gambit, sought — and much more,” Johnson said at a news conference last month.

All “credible information” would be released to the public as part of the panel’s monthslong probe into the matter, he said, while precautions are taken to protect Epstein’s accusers.

House GOP leadership has pointed to the Oversight Committee probe to argue that the effort led by Massie is unnecessary. The panel issued a subpoena to the Justice Department for materials related to Epstein’s case in August, and the administration has begun handing them over.

But the investigation, led by Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.), has hit some roadblocks, too.

The Justice Department said earlier in the shutdown that it would resume cooperation with the House investigation only after Congress votes to reopen the government. As a result, the department has submitted few additional materials to congressional investigators since the probe began.

The Oversight Committee has turned to Epstein’s estate for a number of documents and materials, including the so-called “birthday book” that included a note apparently signed by Trump celebrating Epstein’s 50th. Trump denies drafting the letter and has sued the Wall Street Journal, which was first to report on its existence.

Despite the president’s apparent inclusion in the book, GOP lawmakers have argued the results of the Oversight probe exonerate Trump from wrongdoing. Still, Democrats have sought to stoke division among the president’s base by arguing his administration was slow-walking the release of information as part of a larger conspiracy.

The issue is likely to be a persistent headache for the GOP in the coming months. Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell, who sat for an interview with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche in July, is preparing a commutation application for the administration to consider.

Trump has declined to rule out any sort of reprieve for Maxwell, a convicted sex offender now serving a 20-year sentence. Johnson said in a recent interview with Piers Morgan that he did not support a pardon.

Congress

Mitch McConnell is still in the hospital after medical episode, his office says

Published

11 minutes ago

July 2, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Sen. Mitch McConnell remains hospitalized, his office said in a statement Thursday — without offering details about a recent medical episode that has renewed concern about the health of the former Republican majority leader.

McConnell “continues his recovery in the hospital” and “continues to improve,” his office said.

“Senator McConnell appreciates the outpouring of support he’s receiving while he continues his recovery in the hospital,” the statement said. “The Senator continues to improve, and is working closely with his staff on Kentucky and Senate matters while the Senate is out of session.”

The statement did not explain why he was hospitalized last month.

The update comes after multiple outlets reported details of a first responder dispatch call indicating emergency medical personnel responded to McConnell’s home last month to treat an unconscious person who had experienced “cardiac arrest.”

Blue Light News has not independently verified the dispatch call.

The 84-year-old senator, who is retiring at the end of this term, has experienced multiple medical incidents in recent years. On two occasions in 2023, he froze while speaking with reporters. He has also suffered multiple falls and temporarily used a wheelchair, a move his office described at the time as a precautionary measure.

Congress

House Ethics says it doesn’t have information to share on lawmaker sexual misconduct settlements

Published

8 hours ago

July 2, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The House adopted a resolution Tuesday requiring the House Ethics Committee to release information on taxpayer funds used to pay out sexual misconduct settlements with lawmakers — but the committee now says it has no information it can share.

In a statement Thursday, the committee reiterated it does not manage sexual harassment lawsuits or their settlements; taxpayers have not footed the bill for those payments since 2018.

Since that time, according to the statement, “the Committee has not been notified of any awards or settlements relating to allegations of sexual harassment, sexual abuse, or other sexual misconduct by a Member.”

Instead, the bipartisan Ethics Committee said it was up to the Office of Congressional Workplace Rights to publicly release a list of each member who has received settlements for sexual misconduct allegations, as mandated by the resolution championed by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.).

The committee, in the Thursday statement, said it “fully supports the release of information about sexual misconduct settlements and calls on OCWR to abide by [the resolution] and make publicly available information about Member sexual misconduct matters resulting in payment of taxpayer funds.”

Massie, in a text message Thursday, said “OCWR can release it.”

The OCWR did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The bipartisan Ethics Committee has been under pressure in recent months to show it takes allegations of sexual misconduct against colleagues seriously. Two former House members — Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) and Tony Gonzales (R-Texas) — were forced to resign earlier this year amid serious accusations against them.

The renewed reckoning has prompted new questions about whether the House is up to the task of policing its own. The resolution earlier this week was adopted nearly unanimously, with just one member, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), voting “present.”

House Ethics Chair Michael Guest (R-Miss.) said in an interview earlier this week that while he would support Massie’s resolution, the relevant “information was already out in the public domain.”

Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.

Congress

AOC endorses El-Sayed in Michigan Senate race

Published

10 hours ago

July 2, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) endorsed Abdul El-Sayed’s campaign for Michigan’s open Senate seat on Thursday, a decision that comes as progressives look to capitalize off a series of recent high-profile primary victories in New York, Colorado and elsewhere.

Her endorsement could provide El-Sayed with a critical boost just over a month before the state’s Aug. 4 primary. The former public health official is locked in a heated contest against Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow for the right to take on Republican Mike Rogers in the general election.

It also comes as El-Sayed has risen to the top of the pack in recent public polling.

Virtually any Democratic path to flipping the Senate in this year’s midterms would see the party hold the open Michigan Senate seat, with two-term Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.) retiring at the end of his term.

The race has emerged as perhaps the largest battleground over the ideological future of the party. El-Sayed, who unsuccessfully ran for governor in 2018, has collected endorsements from progressives, while Stevens has the tacit backing of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, with AIPAC also boosting her candidacy.

El-Sayed, Ocasio-Cortez said in an interview with The New York Times, is her party’s best chance.

“Despite our ideological differences and whatever disagreements there are in the party, every single one of us sees this moment as existential,” she said. “And I think many people are willing to put aside differences in order to give us the best chance at winning. And I think that Abdul gives us that right now.”