Judge Corners DOJ for Covering Up Files on Trump's 13-Year-Old Accuser [View all]

Dozens of files related to the FBI’s interviews with Trump’s 13-year-old accuser are reportedly still sealed.

A federal judge has cornered the Justice Department for withholding files on FBI interviews with the woman who accused Donald Trump of sexually assaulting her when she was 13.

U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan ordered acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to release unredacted versions of several Jeffrey Epstein files, or explain why the DOJ should be allowed to keep them secret, as he sided with investigative journalist Katie Phang, who had accused Blanche of violating the Epstein Files Transparency Act. He gave the government until July 2 to comply.

Sullivan’s decision covers FBI notes from interviews with a woman who claimed that Epstein introduced her to Trump in 1984, when she was about 13 years old, and that Trump forced her to perform a sexual act on him. Trump has denied the allegation.

Trump spent much of last year working to dissuade Republicans from voting for the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which mandates a full disclosure of the files, until Congress passed the bill, and the president—knowing the numbers were not on his side—was forced to sign it into law.

The South Carolina woman’s allegations were revealed in documents released as part of the DOJ’s Epstein files dump, including redacted FBI documents summarizing the interviews, but The Post and Courier reports that dozens of pages on the interviews have yet to be released.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/judge-corners-doj-over-covering-up-files-on-trumps-13-year-old-accuser/