Several members of Congress who began reviewing unredacted documents from the Epstein investigation on Monday question whether some names have been hidden.
"I saw the names of many people who have been masked for mysterious, puzzling or inscrutable reasons," said Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland.
There are many names of other people who enabled and collaborated with Jeffrey Epstein that have just been erased for no apparent reason.
“Quite high-profile”
Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky, said he had seen the names of six men whose identities had been redacted from the released documents. He said one of them was “quite high-ranking in a foreign government.”
Democrat Ro Khanna sees no explanation for the withholding of these people's names. According to him, one of them is "a fairly prominent person."
Both Massie and Khanna suspect that redactions were made by the FBI or prosecutors before the documents reached the Justice Department.
Convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein had connections to top business executives, politicians, celebrities and academics. He was found dead in his New York cell in 2019. His former partner Ghislaine Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex trafficking of underage girls for Epstein.
1,000 affected
In November, Congress decided by a large majority that all material from the investigation into convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein would be made public.
The order requires that names or personally identifiable information about Epstein's victims be redacted, but that no documents be "withheld, delayed, or redacted due to embarrassment, reputation, or political sensitivity, including for government officials, public figures, or foreign dignitaries."
According to the FBI, over 1,000 people have been affected by Epstein's crimes.
