The Republican-controlled United States Congress has voted almost unanimously to force the release of justice department files on the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, an outcome US President Donald Trump had fought for months before ending his opposition.
Two days after Trump's abrupt about-face, the House of Representatives passed the measure with a vote of 427-1, sending a resolution requiring the release of all unclassified records on Epstein to the Republican-majority Senate, which swiftly approved it, setting the stage for the bill to go to Trump for his signature.
Trump plans to sign the bill when it reaches his desk, a senior White House official said.
The White House was caught off guard by how quickly the measure passed through Congress, having expected it to take longer in the Senate, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter.
The public and increasingly bitter feud among Republicans over the Epstein files had fractured relations between Trump and some of his most ardent supporters.
Before the House vote, about two dozen survivors of Epstein's alleged abuse joined a trio of Democratic and Republican politicians outside the US Capitol to urge the release of the records.
Survivors of Epstein's alleged abuse stood outside the US Capitol to urge the release of the records. Source: SIPA USA / Bill Clark
Afterwards, they stood to applaud politicians from the house's public gallery, some of them crying and hugging each other.
The Epstein scandal has been a political thorn in Trump's side for months, partly because he amplified conspiracy theories about Epstein to his own supporters.
Many Trump voters believe his administration has covered up Epstein's ties to powerful figures and obscured details surrounding his death, which the FBI ruled a suicide, in a Manhattan jail in 2019.
Epstein pleaded guilty to a Florida state felony prostitution charge in 2008 and served 13 months in jail.
The US justice department charged him with sex trafficking of minors in 2019. Epstein had pleaded not guilty to those charges before his death.
Trump calls journalist who asked about Epstein 'terrible person'
Despite his changed position on the bill, Trump remains angry about the attention paid to the Epstein matter.
On Wednesday, he called a reporter who asked about it in the Oval Office a "terrible person" and said the television network the journalist worked for should have its licence revoked.
"I have nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein," Trump told reporters while hosting a visit by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Donald Trump socialised and partied with Jeffrey Epstein in the 1990s and 2000s, but the US president says a rift formed between them. Source: Getty / Davidoff Studios
Trump socialised and partied with Epstein in the 1990s and 2000s before what he calls a rift, but the old friendship has become a rare weak spot for the president with his supporters.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll this week found 44 per cent of Republicans approve of Trump's handling of the matter, well below the 82 per cent who approve of his overall performance.
"Please stop making this political, it is not about you, President Trump," Jena-Lisa Jones, who alleged Epstein sexually abused her when she was 14, told a press conference outside the Capitol a few hours before the vote.
"I voted for you, but your behaviour on this issue has been a national embarrassment."
Trump has said he had no connection to Epstein's crimes and has started calling the issue a "Democratic hoax", despite some Republicans being among the loudest voices calling for the release of the records from criminal investigations of Epstein.
Thomas Massie, the Kentucky Republican who led the effort to force the vote, accused the justice department from the house floor of "protecting pedophiles and sex traffickers".
"How will we know if this bill has been successful?" he said before the vote.
"We will know when there are men, rich men, in handcuffs, being perp-walked to the jail. And until then, this is still a cover-up."
Trump's opposition soured relations with one of his strongest Republican supporters in Congress, Marjorie Taylor Greene, of Georgia, who has expressed anger at the justice department not releasing more details on Epstein.
She said Trump pressured her to withdraw her support for the resolution and publicly called her a traitor after she doubled down.
She joined Massie and Democratic representative Ro Khanna at the Capitol before voting in favour of the resolution, telling reporters: "A traitor is an American that serves foreign countries and themselves. A patriot is an American that serves the United States of America, and Americans like the women standing behind me."
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