[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 28 (Tuesday, February 10, 2026)]
[House]
[Page H2105]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





                         DECODING EPSTEIN FILES

  (Mr. Khanna of California was recognized to address the House for 5 
minutes.)
  Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, yesterday Congressman Massie and I went to 
the Department of Justice to read the unredacted Epstein files. We 
spent about 2 hours there, and we learned that 70 to 80 percent of the 
files are still redacted.
  In fact, there were six wealthy, powerful men that the DOJ hid for no 
apparent reason. When Congressman Massie and I pointed this out to the 
Department of Justice, they acknowledged their mistake. They have now 
revealed the identity of these six powerful men. These men are: 
Salvatore Nuara; Zurab Mikeladze; Leonic Leonov; Nicola Caputo; Sultan 
Ahmed bin Sulayem, CEO of Dubai Ports World; and Leslie Wexner, who was 
labeled as a co-conspirator by the FBI.
  My question is: Why did it take myself and   Thomas Massie going to 
the Justice Department to get these six men's identities to become 
public? If we found six men that they were hiding in 2 hours, imagine 
how many men they are covering up for in those 3 million files. The 
story gets worse.
  The reality is that Donald Trump's FBI scrubbed these files in March, 
long before   Thomas Massie and I passed the Epstein Files Transparency 
Act. My bill is clear. The Epstein Files Transparency Act requires them 
to unredact those FBI files. Yet, the Justice Department said to me and 
to Congressman Massie: We just uploaded whatever the FBI sent us.
  Guess what. The FBI sent scrubbed files. That means the survivors' 
statements to the FBI, naming rich and powerful men who went to 
Epstein's island, who went to his ranch, who went to his home and raped 
and abused underage girls or saw underage girls being paraded, are all 
hidden. They are all redacted.
  It is a little bit of a farce. They are inviting all the Members of 
Congress to go see the Department of Justice's ``unredacted files,'' 
but they have got all redacted files from the FBI.
  It is not the fault of the Justice Department attorneys. They were 
just told to upload things that Donald Trump's FBI had already 
scrubbed.
  It is a blatant violation of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, but 
it also asks a fundamental question: Who are they protecting? Why are 
they protecting these rich and powerful men, people I call part of the 
Epstein class? Why are we in a country where there is no elite 
accountability for people who do the most heinous things?
  We have in England the king now calling for an investigation and 
possible prosecution of his own brother. We have in Norway the princess 
who no longer has support to be the queen. Yet in the United States of 
America, we have someone in the Cabinet, Howard Lutnick, who is all 
over these Epstein files and who allegedly had business with Epstein 
after he was convicted of pedophilia, but is still in the Cabinet.
  We need to ask ourselves: Are we in America going to have the lead 
accountability? Are we going to call to account the rich and powerful 
people who broke the law or cavorted with a pedophile, a convicted 
pedophile?
  Are we going to have prosecutions for billionaires who went to this 
island and either raped underage girls or saw underage girls being 
raped and didn't say anything? Are we going to have investigations?
  I will tell you what this is about. It is not just about the 1,200 
survivors. It is about two tiers of justice in America. It is about 
people who can accumulate wealth and power and don't have to care about 
the rest of America.
  They have destroyed so much of this country. Income inequality is at 
a 60-year high. Workers' salaries are less than they have been for 75 
years as a part of GDP. Somehow, this country seems to be working for 
the rich and powerful; but it is not working for ordinary working-class 
Americans.
  I say enough. It is time to begin with accountability for the Epstein 
class. Hold in front of Congress those people who visited the island or 
did business with Epstein after he was a convicted pedophile. Let's 
investigate them, and let's prosecute them.
  Let's return to democratic accountability in the United States of 
America. Let's return to one system of justice in the United States of 
America. Let's return to a place where every American has a stake in 
this country.

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