House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) issued a subpoena to Attorney General Pam Bondi on Tuesday, demanding she testify before lawmakers over her handling of the Epstein files.
The move came after five Republicans on the committee joined their Democratic colleagues in supporting Rep. Nancy Mace’s (R-S.C.) motion to call on Bondi to testify earlier this month.
In a letter to Bondi, Comer wrote that “the Committee has questions regarding the Department of Justice’s handling of the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein and his associates” and its compliance with a law passed by Congress last year compelling the DOJ to release the documents.
“As Attorney General, you are directly responsible for overseeing the Department’s collection, review, and determinations regarding the release of files pursuant to the Epstein Files Transparency Act, and the Committee therefore believes that you possess valuable insight into these efforts,” he wrote.
The subpoena comes after Bondi sparred with lawmakers during a House Judiciary Committee hearing last month, repeatedly declining to answer questions about her handling of the documents and instead hurling insults at lawmakers who challenged her.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) — a regular GOP critic of the administration who led the charge to pass the Epstein Files Transparency Act along with Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) — said after the hearing that he had lost confidence in Bondi as the nation’s top law enforcement official.
Comer’s committee has subpoenaed former President Bill Clinton and former first lady Hillary Clinton as a part of its ongoing investigation into Epstein, as well as other influential individuals named in the files.
Separately, a press release from the committee said that Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche will give a closed-door briefing to committee members Wednesday.
House Democrats said last month they also have the votes to subpoena Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who acknowledged during a Senate hearing last month that he visited the convicted sex offender’s island in the Caribbean with his family in 2012. Lutnick denied any knowledge of Epstein’s crimes and has not been personally accused of any wrongdoing.
Comer said last week he was “in communication” with Lutnick about a possible hearing date, adding that his committee hoped to see both Bondi and Lutnick testify “very, very soon.”
Bondi has faced growing criticism from Democrats and some Republicans over the DOJ’s handling of millions of files related to Epstein, who died by suicide in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges.
But backlash targeting Bondi over the Epstein files goes back months before Trump signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act into law; the attorney general drew uproar from MAGA firebands last summer after the DOJ said it had no plans to publish more documents following a limited release of files, most of which were already public, last February.
