'We got played again': MAGA turns on House Republicans over 'fake' Epstein files release

The Republican-led House Oversight Committee was promptly ridiculed Tuesday night into Wednesday morning for its release of 33,000 files on Jeffrey Epstein; the vast majority of which, critics have noted, were either redacted or already public.

“Literally 97% of the ‘Epstein files’ just released by the House Oversight Committee were already public,” wrote Evan Kilgore, formally an ambassador for the far-right nationalist group Turning Point USA, in a social media post on X Tuesday to his more than 130,000 followers. “We got played again.”

The Trump administration has faced growing scrutiny in recent months over its handling of its investigation into Epstein, the disgraced financier who died in 2019 awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges, and is alleged to have run a blackmail operation targeting powerful individuals. Amid growing pressure, the House Oversight Committee released a trove of Epstein files Tuesday evening, but its release has only prompted increased scrutiny.

“Oh my god, Republicans just fake released the Epstein files again,” wrote Kyle Kulinski, host of the Kyle Kulinski Show, in a social media post on X to his more than 500,000 followers.

Democratic lawmakers joined in on the pile on as well, with Rep. Robert Garcia, the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, labeling the file drop as a dud, and urging Americans not to consider the matter settled.

“The 33,000 pages of Epstein documents [House Oversight Chair and Republican Rep.] James Comer has decided to ‘release’ were already mostly public information,” Garcia said, speaking with the Washington Post in a report published Wednesday.

“To the American people – don’t let this fool you. After careful review, Oversight Democrats have found that 97% of the documents received from the Department of Justice were already public. There is no mention of any client list or anything that improves transparency or justice for victims.”

The Trump administration faced similar criticism back in February, when it released what it called “Phase 1” of the Epstein files to a select-few far-right influencers. Like the House Oversight Committee’s recent file drop, those too were largely already public, and in some cases, more redacted than past releases of the same documents.

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) has joined with Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) to circumvent the House Oversight Committee by pursuing a discharge petition, a legislative tool that would force a vote on releasing all files related to Epstein currently held by the Justice Department.