| President Donald Trump and House Republican leaders can’t get out from under the shadow of the Epstein files. Under a blistering sun outside the US Capitol today, a group of survivors of the late Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking crimes delivered emotional calls for the release of any and all records held by the government, beyond the thousands of documents already made public. “Lift the curtain on these files and be transparent,” pleaded Haley Robson, who said she was 16 when Epstein abused her and then recruited her to bring him other underage girls.  Epstein survivors outside the Capitol. Photographer: Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg Robson and the other women told their stories as Republicans are split over how to handle the furor over records about Epstein’s crimes. They were joined by Republican Representatives Thomas Massie, a sometime Trump foil, and Marjorie Taylor Greene, a MAGA stalwart, along with progressive Democrat Ro Khanna. They’ve formed an unlikely alliance trying to compel a House vote on legislation to force the Justice Department to release all the government’s files on Epstein. They need at least two more Republicans to sign on to bring the bill to the House floor. Speaker Mike Johnson sent the House on its August break early to avoid dealing with Epstein-related legislation. He instead wants to leave the matter in the hands of his allies on the Oversight Committee. Trump, after the release of redacted and previously disclosed files by the Department of Justice earlier this year only stoked the furor, has been trying to get his supporters to move on. As the survivors spoke today, he dismissed the continuing demands for disclosure as “a Democratic hoax.” But it may be difficult to assuage the anger over the case from Trump’s own supporters, many of them animated by conspiracy theories that the government was withholding evidence about the involvement of prominent people in Epstein’s crimes. Greene, who has been one of the president’s most ardent supporters, told the victims that if they compiled a list of the rich and powerful men who participated in Epstein’s abusive operation, she would read out their names on the floor of the House. Massie used a label Trump often deployed when he criticized Washington. “This is a litmus test,” Massie said. “Can we drain the swamp?” — Jamie Tarabay | 
