Epstein files fallout continues for rich and powerful | The Excerpt
Epstein files fallout continues for rich and powerful | The Excerpt
Zulekha Nathoo, USA TODAYFri, February 27, 2026 at 3:37 PM UTC
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On the Friday, February 27, 2026, episode of The Excerpt podcast: Will more people be named and charged from the investigation of the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein? USA TODAY White House Correspondent Bart Jansen joins The Excerpt to share his recent reporting.
Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.
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Zulekha Nathoo:
The arrest of the former Prince Andrew last week has ignited a firestorm of speculation. Will he face charges? Will more people be named and charged from the investigation of the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein? And will Epstein's victims ever see full accountability? Hello and welcome to USA TODAY's The Excerpt. I'm producer and host, Zulekha Nathoo. Today is Friday, February 27th, 2026. Here to help us unpack some of the many issues at play here is USA TODAY White House Correspondent Bart Jansen. Thank you so much for joining me today, Bart.
Bart Jansen:
Thanks for having me.
Zulekha Nathoo:
I want to start with the closed-door hearings that are happening with regards to the Epstein files. Who's testifying? What might be learned from these hearings?
Bart Jansen:
Hillary Clinton, the former Secretary of State and First Lady is giving a closed-door deposition to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee up in Chappaqua, the city in New York where she lives, on Thursday. And the lawmakers want to ask her basically why Epstein helped raise money for her family foundation and why Epstein attended her daughter Chelsea's wedding, among other things. And they basically want to get to the heart of how Epstein was able to cultivate this circle of high-power, high-profile figures from around the world as he simultaneously allegedly ran a network of sex trafficking. In addition, former President Bill Clinton, Hillary's husband, of course, is set to give a deposition on Friday to the same committee also in Chappaqua.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Well, I mean, you mentioned around the world, just looking across the pond, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested last week on suspicion of sharing confidential information with Jeffrey Epstein while serving as Britain's trade envoy. And Peter Mandelson, the UK's former ambassador to the United States was arrested this week on similar charges. So based on the Epstein documents released so far, what do we know about their involvement with Epstein?
Bart Jansen:
Well, their names, and in Andrew's case, many pictures have been released among those 3 million documents that the Justice Department has released under a new law that Congress passed that President Trump signed calling for the release of all Epstein materials. Well, they're still muddling through how much of that file is going to be released. Right now it's somewhere in the vicinity of half. There are still millions of documents that have not been publicly released. But among the documents are pictures of Andrew visiting Epstein. And in one provocative picture, he is on the floor of a room bending over a woman who is lying on the floor.
What's interesting about the arrest on suspicion of criminal charges is that they deal with confidential government records, both his and Mandelson's, rather than sexual allegations. So part of what investigators are looking for as they look through all the documents that have been released, and in the case of lawmakers who can look at the documents that are still under seal at the Justice Department, is whether there are other co-conspirators that could potentially face criminal charges in the sex trafficking that Epstein was accused of conducting. So for right now, Andrew's and Mandelson's criminal exposure is more toward confidential government records and we'll have to see whether that leads toward any sexual allegations.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Well, that's an interesting contrast, and bringing it back home to the U.S., another interesting contrast is how the Department of Justice is handling the investigations compared to the UK. The Department of Justice has not announced any new charges or investigations. So how do you think that approach compares or contrasts with how we're seeing things unfold in Europe?
Bart Jansen:
Some lawmakers have been critical about how the Justice Department has handled this case. Representative Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky, and Representative Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California, joined forces and forced the release of Epstein files because the Justice Department had said last July they had released all that they were going to, and that's it. Attorney General Pam Bondi has said that they didn't want to release the names of any of the women who have accused Epstein of abuse. They didn't want to jeopardize any potential future criminal investigations. So that was it.
In response, these lawmakers and what wound up being strong majorities in all of Congress approved a law that required the release of the documents. About 3 million documents have been released and we're still waiting for millions of pages more. The department has said it has completed its review and is not expecting to release more. And President Trump has said the country should move on, but lawmakers and women who have accused Epstein of abuse continue to press for the release of all the documents that don't name those women and that wouldn't jeopardize criminal cases.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Another name has come up in those files. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick acknowledged visiting Epstein's private island with his family, but he said he saw no inappropriate behavior. What more are you hearing about that?
Bart Jansen:
Well, Nancy Mace walking into the deposition with Hillary Clinton, Mace a Republican from South Carolina and one of the key lawmakers who helped get that legislation approved to release the records, has said she is going to be asking Hillary Clinton about Howard Lutnick. Now, Lutnick has testified before a senate committee saying he has nothing to hide, that he didn't see anything bad happening at the island when he had lunch there with his family in 2012. But Mace says that she has an email that suggests that there might have been some sort of message between Clinton and Lutnick and she's going to be asking about it. So we're going to be hearing more about Lutnick in the future.
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Zulekha Nathoo:
A steady stream of rich and powerful men, and even some women continue to be mentioned and named in the Epstein files and it can be hard for people at home to keep up with it all. So can you give us a round up of those who stand out to you that people at home should know about?
Bart Jansen:
On Thursday, the head of the World Economic Forum, that's the group that holds an annual meeting with top political and business leaders from around the world, resigned as CEO because emails disclosed a social relationship that this leader had with Epstein. He has not been accused of wrongdoing. That decision came a day after Larry Summers, a former U.S. Treasury Secretary resigned his position at Harvard University because he had been seen in emails, exchanging messages, multiple messages with Epstein, including asking for advice on his love life.
Bill Gates just this week, the founder of Microsoft was giving a town hall to his family's Gates Foundation and was asked about his relationship with Epstein. He also showed up in emails and he acknowledged having two affairs with Russian women, but he has denied abusing teenage girls. The revelations just basically caused him more embarrassment about his relationship. He said he should not have been involved with Epstein and has apologized for that. So the fallout continues to grow.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Yeah. And lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee recently questioned Attorney General Pam Bondi on whether or not the DOJ will name any co-conspirators. Ro Khanna read the names of alleged co-conspirators on the House floor, what needs to happen for more names to be released?
Bart Jansen:
Yeah, it's unclear how Congress will try to basically compel more information from the Justice Department. They did not get any clear answers from Bondi about whether additional alleged co-conspirators would be named. The problem from the Justice Department side is that a reluctance to name people with criminal allegations unless charges have been filed. So one of the key documents that lawmakers have tried to get from the Justice Department, it has not yet been released publicly, is a draft indictment, a federal indictment that was never released against Epstein naming other people.
And then there's another document called a prosecution memo that explains the legal reasoning behind the investigation of Epstein and why they chose some charges other than others when he was charged, federally indicted in 2019, shortly before his death by suicide while jailed awaiting trial on those charges. So there are definitely documents that name additional people. The Justice Department has said most of what remains sealed is because it contains legal reasoning from inside the department and that it is privileged and so not subject to release. Lawmakers disagree. They still want those documents and we're waiting for next steps from the lawmakers to see how they could get them.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Well, I want to go back to something that you mentioned earlier when you said there are still millions of Epstein files that have not been released yet, and NPR is reporting that up to 50 pages of FBI victim interviews are among them as well as alleged conversations with a woman who claims that Donald Trump sexually abused her when she was a minor. Democrats are accusing the Department of Justice of illegally withholding FBI interviews. Will these files ever see the light of day, do you think?
Bart Jansen:
Well, again, we're going to have to wait and see what Congress can do to try to compel that release. There have been several documents that included Trump's name, but they have been dismissed as not being credible because they involved accusations that were made during the 2020 campaign and basically years after the events would've occurred and after Epstein's death. So they came through as basically unfiltered complaints to the FBI and the response from the Justice Department has been they were reviewed and found to be not credible. But what this revelation from NPR followed up by the New York Times is that there were follow-up interviews with at least one of these women, and it is the basically summary or transcript of those interviews that have not yet been released.
And so this is adding to the pressure on the Justice Department to release more. Well, if there's nothing to hide, then release them and basically show the American public why those accusations were not found credible. And that's basically the state where we're at now waiting to see whether either Congress can force the release of more documents or whether the Justice Smart would release them themselves.
Zulekha Nathoo:
And in all of this, the most important people to consider are Epstein's victims. And there are said to be over a thousand of them. A key moment during the judicial hearing with Bondi earlier this month was when she was asked to apologize to the survivors in the room, and she did not. Will Epstein's victims ever see justice?
Bart Jansen:
Well, they are some of the strongest voices to advocate for the release of more of these documents. They have continued to press their case. They say they want accountability. More than a dozen of them arrived at the President's State of the Union speech on Tuesday to basically serve as a physical presence, a reminder that they are pressing for the release of more of these records. They want to get the names of more of the people in Epstein's circle that they suspect could be pursued as co-conspirators for criminal choices or just to let people know that they socialized with this person who has since been accused of such horrific crimes. So their push continues, but it's not clear in the congressional or the legal realms what more they will be able to accomplish if the Justice Department refuses to release the documents.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Well, thank you so much for all your insights, Bart, and for joining us today. Bart Jansen is a USA TODAY White House correspondent.
Bart Jansen:
Thanks for having me.
Zulekha Nathoo:
Thanks to our senior producer Kaely Monahan for her production assistance. Our executive producer is Laura Beatty. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending a note to podcasts@usatoday.com. Thanks for listening. I'm USA TODAY producer and host, Zulekha Nathoo. We'll be back Monday morning with another episode of USA TODAY's The Excerpt.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Bill Gates apologized and Larry Summers forced to resign this week | The Excerpt
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