A petition in the House of Representatives to force a vote to compel the Justice Department to release the so-called Jeffrey Epstein files on Wednesday secured the last signature required to trigger that action.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., within hours said that a full House vote on that effort will be held next week.
Rep. Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz., provided the 218th signature needed to approve the so-called discharge petition shortly after she was sworn in as a House member, after a seven-week delay. Griljalva won a special election to fill the seat vacated due to the death of her father, Rep. Raúl Grijalva, in March.
The Trump administration has been under fire for months for reneging on promises to release investigative files related to Epstein, a convicted sex offender who killed himself in 2019 after his arrest on child sex trafficking charges.
Epstein had been a friend of President Donald Trump for years before they had a falling out in the early 2000s.
Even if the effort passes in the House, it is unlikely to become law. The bill would have to pass in the Republican-controlled Senate, and Trump could veto it even if it survived a vote in that chamber.
The New York Times reported Wednesday that Rep. Lauren Boebert, a Colorado Republican, was summoned to the White House to meet with top Justice Department and FBI officials as Trump tries to head off the House vote, The New York Times reported.
Boebert is just one of four GOP House members who signed the discharge petition on the Epstein files. files.
Jennifer Freeman, an attorney for Epstein victim Maria Farmer, in a statement to MSNBC, said, "For decades, survivors of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell have been left in the dark, the government ignored or cast aside survivor reports of Epstein and Maxwell's crimes, and the vast majority of people who were implicated have yet to be held responsible."
"There's no time to waste – we urge lawmakers to do their part and vote on releasing the Epstein files once and for all," Freeman said.
House Democrats earlier Wednesday released more than 20,000 documents obtained from Epstein's estate under a subpoena.
The documents include emails and text messages in which Epstein talked about Trump.
"I know how dirty donald is," Epsten wrote in a 2018 email thread for Kathryn Ruemmler, who served as former President Barack Obama's White House counsel, after she sent Epstein an article about Trump's ex-personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen's pleading guilty to campaign finance violations and agreeing to cooperate in a federal investigation of the president.
In a separate April 2019 email released by Democrats, Epstein told author Michael Wolff that Trump "knew about the girls." It is unclear what the phrase "knew about the girls" meant.
In another newly released email that Epstein wrote to his now-convicted accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell in April 2011, Epstein wrote, "I want you to realize that the dog that hasn't barked is trump."
Epstein added in that same email that a person whom the Democrats identified as a victim of his, whose name was redacted in the email, "spent hours at my house with" Trump.
"He has never once been mentioned," Epstein added in that message.
It is not clear what Epstein was referring to in the email that said "the dog that hasn't barked."
CNBC has not independently verified the documents released by the Democrats.
Trump has denied having known about Epstein's sexual abuse of underage girls and young women when they were socializing with each other. The president has never been charged with wrongdoing in connection with Epstein.
Trump blasted the Democrats in a Truth Social post that accused them of using the Epstein documents to distract Americans from the cost of the U.S. government shutdown.
"The Democrats are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax again because they'll do anything at all to deflect on how badly they've done on the Shutdown, and so many other subjects," Trump wrote.
"Only a very bad, or stupid, Republican would fall into that trap," he wrote.
"The Democrats cost our Country $1.5 Trillion Dollars with their recent antics of viciously closing our Country, while at the same time putting many at risk — and they should pay a fair price," Trump said.
"There should be no deflections to Epstein or anything else, and any Republicans involved should be focused only on opening up our Country, and fixing the massive damage caused by the Democrats!"
