Editorial: Epstein debacle keeps getting worse for Trump. The only solution is transparency

The Miami Herald Editorial Board, Miami Herald on Nov 14, 2025

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The drumbeat to release the Epstein files just got a lot louder. Emails from disgraced financier and sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein released by House Democrats Wednesday say President Donald Trump “knew about the girls” and “spent hours” with a victim at Epstein’s house. Those allegations, whether true or not, must be addressed — this is the president we’re talking about.

The way to do that is to release the full Epstein files, including those from the FBI and Department of Justice. Two batches of emails from the Epstein estate were released Wednesday — about 23,000 by the House committee, followed by thousands more from Republicans — but a clean sweep is necessary. That means releasing all the files the government has.

House Democrats are highlighting three emails that were part of Epstein’s 2008 Florida plea deal, the focus of the Herald’s Perversion of Justice series. The emails were released as part of the House Oversight Committee’s investigation into Epstein and his confidant, Ghislaine Maxwell.

Trump has long maintained that he was unaware that Epstein was trafficking girls and young women, and he has denied participating in any of Epstein’s crimes.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the emails prove nothing and accused the Democrats of “selectively” leaking emails to create a “fake narrative to smear President Trump.” Leavitt said one victim, whose name is redacted from an email, is the late Virginia Giuffre, who has said she didn’t think Trump had been involved in Epstein’s crimes. Leavitt called the emails an effort to distract from Trump’s accomplishments.

Is that true? There’s one way to find out: Americans should be allowed to judge for themselves — and that means seeing the documents, all of them. Wednesday’s emails were a start, but we’re talking about a broader disclosure of the government’s Epstein investigations.

The emails we know about so far make the case for transparency more urgent. There’s this, from the 2011 email released Wednesday, in which Epstein tells Maxwell that Trump spent “hours” at his house with a victim whose name was redacted: “I want you to realize that that dog that hasn’t barked is Trump.”

And in a 2019 email, Epstein tells author Michael Wolff, “Of course he knew about the girls as he asked ghislaine to stop.”

A federal judge in Florida did deny a request in July by the Trump administration to unseal grand jury documents in multiple investigations into Epstein in 2005 and 2007. The judge said federal law prohibited the release of grand jury testimony except in narrow circumstances that did not apply in that case.

Questions about Epstein and who knew about his sex trafficking have plagued this country long enough. Attorney General Pam Bondi said she had a mountain of evidence in the Epstein case, and then effectively closed the files, saying there was nothing to see. Trump supporters were outraged; many thought once Trump was in office, the records would finally be out in the open.

South Florida has a particular stake in this situation. Trump lives in Florida. Epstein had a home here, too. Alex Acosta was the U.S. attorney in South Florida when Epstein secured that 2008 plea deal to avoid sex-trafficking charges.

Now there’s the growing possibility that the U.S. House will force a congressional vote — in a newly reopened government — to release all the files on Epstein. The release of the emails is no doubt designed to build pressure to vote.

Epstein, the figure at the center of all of this political turmoil, is long gone. He died in a New York City jail cell in 2019, prior to his trial on sex-trafficking charges. His death was ruled suicide, but a Federal Bureau of Prisons investigation said cameras in his unit were not working properly and guards had fabricated reports.

Maxwell, though, is still part of the drama. She’s serving a 20-year prison sentence on sex-trafficking charges — and she’s reportedly planning to ask Trump to commute her sentence. Leavitt said a pardon isn’t something the president is “talking about or even thinking about at this moment in time. I can assure you of that.”

But if there’s one thing we have learned from the Epstein case, it’s that reassurances — whether they’re about commuting sentences or releasing files — don’t always hold true.

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