The Justice Department last week released over 3 million files related to its investigations of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein over the past two decades, with revelations that have rattled the highest level of governments and the tech, business and sports worlds.
They have also caused trauma for a number of Epstein's victims who said they were assured their names wouldn't be included in the disclosures — and were anyway. In other instances, other investigative documents were so heavily redacted that it's impossible to know what's in them.
Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., one of the co-authors of the law that led to the files' production, said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press" that the Justice Department has "released at best half the documents" it's supposed to under the law. "But even those shock the conscience of this country," Khanna said.
An NBC News review of the files continues, but here are some of the notable takeaways from the most recent — and by far the largest — release of the Epstein files to date.
DOJ temporarily removed a Trump reference
President Donald Trump, who'd known Epstein since the 1990s, had been mentioned and shown in previous file releases, including in a photo that the Justice Department initially took down and then reposted.
A similar incident happened in the latest release, in which the Justice Department removed and then republished a file that included a spreadsheet summary of complaints made to the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center that included references to Epstein and Trump. There is no indication that the tips were verified, and the complaints were made over an unspecified period.
The Justice Department didn't respond to questions about why the file was removed and why it was compiled.
According to the complaint summaries, at least eight of the 16 complainants didn't include their contact information when they made the complaint. A note with the summary says, “Some of these individuals are reporting second-hand information.” Thirteen of the 16 complaints mention Trump personally.
Trump has denied any wrongdoing, and law enforcement hasn't accused him of wrongdoing in connection with Epstein. He says he cut ties with Epstein sometime in the early 2000s because he thought he was "a creep."
Lutnick and Epstein discussed a possible trip
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told the New York Post in October that he thought Epstein, his former next-door neighbor, was "disgusting" and that he and his wife agreed that they wanted nothing to do with him after he made an inappropriate comment while he was giving them a tour of his mansion in 2005.
"[M]y wife and I decided that I will never be in the room with that disgusting person ever again. So I was never in the room with him socially, for business or even philanthropy. That guy was there, I wasn’t going ’cause he is gross,” Lutnick said.
The newly released files show Lutnick and Epstein emailing in 2012 about a possible boat trip to Epstein's private island.
“Hi Jeff, We are landing in St. Thomas early Saturday afternoon and planning to head over to St. Bart’s/Anguilla on Monday at some point. Where are you located (what is exact location for my captain)? Does Sunday evening for dinner sound good?” Lutnick, then the chief executive at Cantor Fitzgerald, wrote in an email on Dec. 19. He said that he had another couple with him and his wife and that both couples had their four kids with them, ages 7 to 16.
Epstein invited them to a Sunday lunch. “See you then," Lutnick responded.
Asked for comment, the Commerce Department said in a statement, “Secretary Lutnick had limited interactions with Mr. Epstein in the presence of his wife and has never been accused of wrongdoing.”
Bannon asks Epstein if he's the 'devil'
Former White House adviser Steve Bannon makes numerous appearances in the files, trading emails with him and interviewing him on video in 2019 for a documentary Bannon was filming called “The Monsters: Epstein’s Life Among the Global Elite.”
In the video, Bannon presses Epstein about whether his money is “dirty.” Epstein responds, “No ... because I earned it.”
Bannon questioned Epstein about morality and asked him, “Do you think you’re the devil himself?”
“No, but I do have a good mirror,” Epstein responded. Asked again, Epstein said: “No, the devil scares me.”
Bannon didn't respond to a request for comment.
Musk asked about visiting Epstein's island
Billionaire Elon Musk, former head of the Department of Government Efficiency who has been a longtime Epstein critic, told Vanity Fair in a 2019 interview that Epstein “tried repeatedly to get me to visit his island. I declined.”
Emails from 2012 and 2013 released last week show Musk asking Epstein about a potential visit to his island.
In a November 2012 email, Epstein wrote to Musk, “how many people will you be for the heli to the island.” Musk responds: “Probably just Talulah and me. What day/night will be the wildest party on your island?”
In December 2013, Musk wrote, “Will be in the BVI/St Bart’s area over the holidays. Is there a good time to visit?” Epstein wrote back, “any day 1st — 8th. play it by ear if you want. always space for you.”
NBC News hasn't verified whether Musk traveled to the island. He isn't accused of any wrongdoing.
Musk posted Sunday on X, "Nobody has fought harder for full release of the Epstein files and prosecutions of those who abused children more than I did."
"I knew that I would be smeared relentlessly, despite never having attended his parties or been on his 'Lolita Express' plane or set foot on his creepy island or done anything wrong at all," the post said.
Epstein claimed he was Bill Gates’ ‘right hand’
In a series of emails from 2013 that Epstein sent to himself, he claimed he had been Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates’ “right hand” and participated in things for him that were “ethically unsound.”
In one email with multiple typos referring to Gates, Epstein wrote, “In my role as his right hand I had been asked on mulitple occassion and in hindsight , wrongly acquiesced into participating in things that have ranged from the morally inappropriate , to the ethically unsound and had been repeatedly asked to do other things that get near and potentially over the line into the illegal.”
He said those activities included “helping Bill to get drugs, in order to deal with consequences of sex with russian girls, to facilictating his illicit trysts, with married women,to being asked to provide adderal.”
A spokesperson for Gates denied the allegations in a statement, saying, “These claims are absolutely absurd and completely false.”
“The only thing these documents demonstrate is Epstein’s frustration that he did not have an ongoing relationship with Gates and the lengths he would go to entrap and defame,” the statement said.
In an interview with Nine News Australia posted Wednesday, Gates acknowledged that he had a “number of dinners” with Epstein beginning in 2011 centered on raising money for his foundation but said the allegations in the email were “false.”
“It just reminds me, every minute I spent with him I regret, and I apologize that I did that,” he said.
Gates’ ex-wife, Melinda French Gates, told NPR’s “Wild Card” podcast Tuesday that she felt “unbelievable sadness” seeing his name mentioned in new batch of files.
“Whatever questions remain there ... for those people, and for even my ex-husband, they need to answer to those things, not me,” she said. “And I am so happy to be away from all the muck that was there.”
Melinda and Bill Gates were married for 27 years and divorced in 2021.
A new photo of the former Prince Andrew
Previously released records appeared to include email exchanges between Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, who lost his British titles of prince and Duke of York because of his ties to Epstein.
One of Epstein’s victims, Virginia Giuffre, claimed that Epstein and Maxwell trafficked her to the prince in the early 2000s when she was 17. Andrew has denied having had sex with Giuffre and any wrongdoing connected to Epstein, and he has never been charged. Giuffre died by suicide in April.
The new release includes an image that appears to show the former prince kneeling on all fours over someone who is lying on the ground. Both are clothed, and the other person's face is blacked out. It is unclear where or when the photograph was taken.
A spokesman for Buckingham Palace said the palace wouldn't provide any additional comment. In October, the palace said Mountbatten-Windsor “continues to deny the allegations against him.”
Epstein's secret friendship with a wellness influencer
Emails in the release show Epstein was in regular contact with wellness influencer Peter Attia. They communicated about Epstein’s medical results and often scheduled calls or visits — and sometimes discussed women in crude terms.
In one email, Attia lamented that he had to keep his friendship with Epstein quiet.
“The biggest problem with becoming friends with you? The life you lead is so outrageous, and yet I can’t tell a soul,” Attia wrote in the June 2015 email, seven years after Epstein's 2008 conviction in Florida for soliciting prostitution with a minor.
He acknowledged having a yearslong relationship with Epstein in a lengthy post on X but asserted he wasn't involved in criminal activity.
“I apologize and regret putting myself in a position where emails, some of them embarrassing, tasteless, and indefensible, are now public, and that is on me. I accept that reality and the humiliation that comes with it,” he wrote.
Giants co-owner discussed women with Epstein
New York Giants co-owner Steve Tisch had multiple email exchanges with Epstein in which they discussed women, the newly released records show.
In one 2013 exchange, Tisch asked for information about a friend of Epstein’s assistant whom he'd met at a lunch at Epstein's house.
Epstein wrote back that he didn't have any but asked “did you contact the great ass fake tit [redacted], she’s a character, short term, has an older boyfriend going to acting school, a 10 ass. I am happy to have you as a new but obviously shared interest friend.”
Tisch asked “pro or civilian?” In a later message, he wrote, “send me a number to call I dont like records of these conversations.”
In another 2013 exchange, Tisch asks whether Epstein has anyone in New York he wants him to meet. Epstein gave a name and described the person as “tahitian speaks mostly french, exotic.” Tisch responded, “working girl?”
In a statement over the weekend, Tisch said he and Epstein had a “brief association where we exchanged emails about adult women, and in addition, we discussed movies, philanthropy and investments.”
"I did not take him up on any of his invitations and never went to his island. As we all know now, he was a terrible person and someone I deeply regret associating with.”
Epstein bought gifts for former Obama White House counsel
Kathy Ruemmler, a White House counsel during the Obama administration who’s now chief legal counsel for Goldman Sachs, appears in scores of email exchanges with Epstein and his assistant, some of which show her offering public relations and legal advice and others showing he bought her lavish gifts on multiple occasions.
For her birthday in 2017, Epstein bought Ruemmler a Fendi bag, and he got her another one the next year, pairing it with a coat, the emails show. The total price tag for the 2018 gift was $6,790, according to the emails. Later in 2018, an email shows, Epstein bought her a $1,399 Hermes version of the Apple Watch.
In an email on Christmas Day 2015, Epstein told his assistant to “please organize Kathy’s first class trip to geneve or wherever.” The next day, the assistant emailed Ruemmler asking for travel dates and told her, “I can book for you on Jeffrey’s CC.” Ruemmler told the assistant the day she’d like to go to Geneva and said of Epstein earlier in the exchange: “I adore him. It’s like having another older brother!”
Goldman Sachs spokesman Tony Fratto told NBC News in a statement Wednesday that the plane ticket “was, in fact, related to a business meeting with their mutual client that Epstein referred to Latham and Watkins,” the firm Ruemmler worked for at the time of the exchanges.
As for the presents, Fratto said, “It’s well known that Epstein often offered unsolicited favors and gifts to his many business contacts.”
In a statement the same day, Ruemmler said, “I did not represent Epstein, nor did I ever advocate on his behalf to any third party — not to a court, not to the press, not the government.”
“I got to know him as a lawyer and that was the foundation of my relationship with him. One of his clients became my client too, we regularly worked together, and he asked me for advice as many people do. Of course, I was friendly with him in that context -- it was a professional services business -- and I dealt with him in the same open and informal way as I deal with most people,” Ruemmler said.
“I had no knowledge of any ongoing criminal conduct on his part, and I did not know him as the monster he has been revealed to be,” she added.
Ruemmler worked at the White House from 2011 to 2014.
Survivors say their privacy was violated
According to the terms of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the Justice Department was supposed to make all of the documents public by Dec. 19 while protecting survivors' identities by redacting their information.
The bulk of the files weren't released until Friday, a delay the Justice Department attributed to the care it was taking in redacting survivors' information.
Attorneys for a group of survivors said the Justice Department instead "committed what may be the single most egregious violation of victim privacy in one day in United States history.” There were "thousands of redaction failures on behalf of nearly 100 individual survivors," attorneys Brittany Henderson and Brad Edwards wrote in a letter to the judge who presided over Epstein's case.
Jay Clayton, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, responded in a letter Monday that the department was working diligently to solve the problem and "has taken down several thousands of documents and media that may have inadvertently included victim-identifying information due to various factors, including technical or human error."
On the other side of the coin, lawmakers complained that some of the newly released documents were too heavily redacted, including 81 pages of an 82-page document that refers to Epstein’s psychological review. Another seven-page document was completely redacted and later appeared to have been removed from the Justice Department website.
“We have seen a blanket approach to redactions in some areas, while in other cases, victim names were not redacted at all,” Khanna and his co-author, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., complained in a joint letter to the Justice Department.
More to come?
Despite the massive amount of materials being released, the Justice Department acknowledged it's not the entirety of the files.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a letter last week that the department had identified "more than 6 million pages" of "potentially responsive" documents in review but that a large number of those were duplicative.
He also said the department "withheld or redacted files covered by various privileges, including deliberative process privilege, the work-product doctrine, and attorney-client privilege. In total, approximately 200,000 pages have been redacted or withheld based on various privileges."
Blanche said in an interview Sunday on ABC's 'This Week' that while it's possible more documents could be released, the department's review of the files is "over."
"There are a small number of documents, as I said on Friday, that we’re waiting for a judge to say we can, we’re allowed to release because of a protective order," he said. He added: "This review is over. I mean, we reviewed over 6 million pieces of paper, thousands of videos, thousands — tens of thousands — of images."
But Trump suggested Monday that the Justice Department should just move on. "It’s like, this is all they’re supposed to be doing," he told reporters in the Oval Office. "And frankly, the DOJ, I think, should just say we have other things to do."
That has rankled some members of Congress, including Khanna and Massie. The law requires the release of “Internal DOJ communications, including emails, memos, meeting notes, concerning decisions to charge, not charge, investigate, or decline to investigate Epstein or his associates.”
