US Attorney General Pam Bondi testifies before a House Judiciary Committee hearing on "Oversight of the Department of Justice" on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on February 11, 2026.

Congressional Democrats have accused US Attorney General Pam Bondi of engaging in a "cover-up" of the Jeffrey Epstein files and turning the Department of Justice into an "instrument of revenge" for President Donald Trump.

Bondi, testifying before the House Judiciary Committee, defended the DOJ's handling of the records about the convicted sex offender at a fiery hearing attended by several Epstein victims.

Jamie Raskin, the panel's ranking Democrat, criticised the slow release of the Epstein investigative files and the redactions made to the documents.

"You're running a massive Epstein cover-up right out of the Department of Justice," Raskin said. "You've been ordered by subpoena and by Congress to turn over six million documents, photographs and videos in the Epstein files, but you've turned over only three million."

The Epstein Files Transparency Act, passed by Congress in November, compelled the DOJ to release all documents in its possession related to the disgraced financier within 30 days.

It required redaction of names or other personally identifiable information about Epstein's victims, who numbered more than 1000 according to the FBI.

But the powerful figures - including politicians like Trump and multiple business tycoons - who were friendly with Epstein could not be shielded, the law states.

No records can be "withheld, delayed, or redacted on the basis of embarrassment, reputational harm, or political sensitivity, including to any government official, public figure, or foreign dignitary," it says.

Raskin said the names of Epstein's "abusers, enablers, accomplices and co-conspirators" have nevertheless been redacted, "apparently to spare them embarrassment and disgrace".