Justice Department releases largest batch yet of Epstein documents, says
it totals 3 million pages
[January 31, 2026]
By ERIC TUCKER, MICHAEL R. SISAK and ALANNA DURKIN RICHER
NEW YORK (AP) — The Justice Department on Friday released many more
records from its investigative files on Jeffrey Epstein, resuming
disclosures under a law intended to reveal what the government knew
about the millionaire financier's sexual abuse of young girls and his
interactions with rich and powerful people such as Donald Trump and Bill
Clinton.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the department would be
releasing more than 3 million pages of documents along with more than
2,000 videos and 180,000 images. The files, posted to the department’s
website, include some of the several million pages of records that
officials said were withheld from an initial release in December.
Included were documents concerning some of Epstein's famous associates,
including Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Britain’s Prince
Andrew, and email correspondence between Epstein and Elon Musk and other
prominent contacts from across the political spectrum.
The documents were disclosed under the Epstein Files Transparency Act,
the law enacted after months of public and political pressure that
requires the government to open its files on the late financier and his
confidant and onetime girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell. Lawmakers
complained when the Justice Department made only a limited release last
month, but officials said more time was needed to review additional
documents that were discovered and to ensure no sensitive information
about victims was released.
Friday's disclosure represents the largest document dump to date about a
saga the Trump administration has struggled to shake because of the
president's previous association with Epstein. Criminal investigations
into the financier have long animated online sleuths, conspiracy
theorists and others who have suspected government cover-ups and
clamored for a full accounting, demands that Blanche acknowledged might
not be satisfied by the latest release.
“There’s a hunger, or a thirst, for information that I don’t think will
be satisfied by the review of these documents," he said.
After missing a Dec. 19 deadline set by Congress to release all the
files, the Justice Department said it tasked hundreds of lawyers with
reviewing the records to determine what needed to be redacted, or
blacked out. It denied any effort to shield Trump, who says he cut ties
with Epstein years ago after an earlier friendship, from potential
embarrassment.
Epstein's famous friends
The latest batch includes correspondence either with or about some of
Epstein's friends.
The records have thousands of references to Trump, including emails in
which Epstein and others shared news articles about him, commented on
his policies or politics, or gossiped about him and his family. Also
included was a spreadsheet created last August summarizing calls to the
FBI’s National Threat Operation Center or to a hotline established by
prosecutors from people claiming without corroboration to have some
knowledge of wrongdoing by Trump.
Mountbatten-Windsor's name appears at least several hundred times in the
documents, sometimes in news clippings, sometimes in Epstein’s private
email correspondence and in guest lists for dinners organized by
Epstein. Some records document an attempt by prosecutors in New York to
get the former prince to agree to be interviewed as part of their
Epstein sex trafficking probe.
The records also show Musk, the billionaire Tesla founder, reached out
to Epstein on at least two occasions to plan visits to the Caribbean
island where many of the allegations of sexual abuse purportedly
occurred.
In a 2012 exchange, Epstein asked how many people Musk would like flown
by helicopter to the island he owned.
“Probably just Talulah and me,” Musk responded, referencing his
then-partner, actress Talulah Riley. “What day/night will be the wildest
party on our island?”
Musk messaged Epstein again ahead of a planned Caribbean trip in 2013.
“Will be in the BVI/St Bart’s area over the holidays,” he wrote. “Is
there a good time to visit?” Epstein extended an invite for after the
New Year holiday.
It’s not immediately clear if the island visits took place. Spokespeople
for Musk’s companies, Tesla and X, didn’t respond to emails seeking
comment.
Musk has said he repeatedly rebuffed Epstein's overtures.
“Epstein tried to get me to go to his island and I REFUSED,” he posted
on X in 2025 when House Democrats released an Epstein calendar with an
entry mentioning a potential Musk visit.
Epstein also appears to have tried to connect New York Giants co-owner
Steve Tisch with women, according to emails. In one exchange, Tisch told
Epstein he had had lunch with one of Epstein’s assistant’s friends. He
described her as a “very sweet girl,” and asked if Epstein knew anything
about her.
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An email that was included in the U.S. Department of Justice release
of the Jeffrey Epstein files is photographed Friday, Jan. 30, 2026,
and shows a 2009 order of no contact in Palm Beach, Fla. (AP
Photo/Jon Elswick)
“no, but i will ask,” said Epstein, before inquiring if Tisch had
contacted another woman, crudely describing her physical features.
Tisch said in a statement that he had a “brief association” with
Epstein where they emailed about adult women and other topics. He
said he “never went to his island” and that he “deeply regrets” the
association.
The documents show that Steve Bannon, a conservative activist who
served as Trump’s White House strategist earlier in the president’s
first term, bantered over politics with the financier, discussed
get-togethers with him over breakfast, lunch or dinner and, on March
29, 2019, asked Epstein if he could supply his plane to pick him up
in Rome.
Epstein told him his pilot and crew “are doing their best” to
arrange that flight but if Bannon could find a charter flight
instead, “I’m happy to pay.” Apparently in France at the time,
Epstein sent a text message saying: “My guys can pick you up. Come
for dinner.” The exchange did not show how that played out.
In December 2012, Epstein invited Howard Lutnick, now Trump's
commerce secretary, to his private island for lunch, the records
show. Lutnick’s wife accepted the invitation and said they would
arrive on a yacht with their children. On another occasion in 2011,
the two men had drinks, according to a schedule shared with Epstein.
Lutnick has said he cut ties with Epstein long ago. A Commerce
Department spokesman said Lutnick had “limited interactions with Mr.
Epstein in the presence of his wife and has never been accused of
wrongdoing.”
Another Epstein contact surfacing in the records is former Obama
White House general counsel Kathy Ruemmler. In one of several
exchanges, Epstein emailed Ruemmler to advise that Democrats should
stop demonizing Trump as a Mafia-type figure even as he derided the
president as a “maniac.”
A spokesperson for Goldman Sachs, where Ruemmler is general counsel
and chief legal officer, said in a statement that Ruemmler “had a
professional association with Jeffrey Epstein when she was a lawyer
in private practice” and "regrets ever knowing him.”
Building on the earlier release
The tens of thousands of pages released last month included
previously released flight logs showing Trump flew on Epstein’s
private jet in the 1990s, before their falling-out, and several
photographs of Clinton. None of Epstein’s victims who have gone
public with their stories have publicly accused Trump, a Republican,
nor Clinton, a Democrat, of wrongdoing. Both have said they had no
knowledge he was abusing underage girls.
Epstein killed himself in a New York jail cell in August 2019, a
month after being indicted on federal sex trafficking charges.
In 2008 and 2009, Epstein served jail time in Florida after pleading
guilty to soliciting prostitution from someone under the age of 18.
At the time, investigators had gathered evidence that Epstein had
sexually abused underage girls at his Palm Beach home. The U.S.
attorney's office agreed not to prosecute him in exchange for his
guilty plea to lesser state charges.
A draft indictment from that period released Friday shows
prosecutors contemplated federal charges against not just Epstein
but three others who were his personal assistants and were suspected
of participating in a conspiracy to recruit underage girls to
perform lewd acts with Epstein.
In 2021, a federal jury in New York convicted Maxwell, a British
socialite, of sex trafficking for helping recruit some of his
underage victims. She is serving a 20-year prison sentence.
U.S. prosecutors never charged anyone else in connection with
Epstein's abuse of girls. One victim, Virginia Roberts Giuffre,
accused him in lawsuits of having arranged for her to have sexual
encounters at age 17 and 18 with numerous politicians, business
titans, academics and others. They all denied her allegations.
Among those accused was Britain's Prince Andrew, who was stripped of
his royal titles amid the scandal. Andrew denied having sex with
Giuffre but settled her lawsuit for an undisclosed sum.
Giuffre died by suicide last year at age 41.
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Tucker and Richer reported from Washington. Associated Press
journalists from around the country contributed to this report.
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