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DOJ says it’s ‘reviewing’ whether Epstein reports were improperly withheld

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The Department of Justice says they are now “reviewing” whether some interview reports were “improperly tagged in the review process” and omitted from the public release of the Epstein files. 

The statement comes after ABC News and other outlets previously reported that the DOJ appears to have withheld dozens of pages of witness notes and reports about an alleged victim of Jeffrey Epstein who, according to Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., accused President Donald Trump of assaulting her when she was a minor.

The DOJ vowed to publish any documents “found to have been improperly tagged in the review process.” 

This photo illustration shows redacted documents from the Epstein Library files released by the US Department of Justice in Washington, DC, on February 18, 2026. The Epstein Files Transparency Act (EFTA), passed overwhelmingly by Congress in November 2025, compelled the Justice Department to release all of the documents in its possession related to the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein within 30 days.

Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images

“Several individuals and news outlets have recently flagged files related to documents produced to Ghislaine Maxwell in discovery of her criminal case that they claim appear to be missing,” a DOJ account on X said on Wednesday. “As with all documents that have been flagged by the public, the Department is currently reviewing files within that category of the production. Should any document be found to have been improperly tagged in the review process and is responsive to the Act, the Department will of course publish it, consistent with the law.”

Rep. Garcia, the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, said he reviewed unredacted evidence at the Department of Justice on Monday and determined that notes about the witness who accused President Trump of sexual abuse when she was a minor were withheld.

Trump has consistently denied all allegations.

The DOJ on Tuesday initially accused Garcia and other Democrats on the House Oversight Committee of “manufacturing outrage” about the withheld documents. 

“If files are temporarily pulled for victim redactions or to redact Personally Identifiable Information, then those documents are promptly restored online and are publicly available,” a DOJ account said on Tuesday.  “ALL responsive documents have been produced unless a document falls within one of the following categories: duplicates, privileged, or part of an ongoing federal investigation.” 

An index of witness materials prepared in advance of the trial of Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell suggests that FBI agents interviewed the woman identified by Garcia four times in 2019, but an ABC News search of the DOJ’s vast public archive of Epstein files found a report about just one of the meetings.

An analysis of the index and materials in the public database suggests that three FBI reports — known as 302s — and notes from three interviews were withheld, appearing to total more than 50 pages of material.

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