With a vote on releasing files related to Jeffrey Epstein just days away, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) said this weekend that it was clear President Donald Trump was “at the center of a child sex ring,” and that the president’s behavior over the past week made it clear that the files contained “something especially and specifically incriminating.”
“What we've already seen is immensely incriminating; clearly, Donald Trump was at the center of a child sex ring,” Murphy said, speaking over the weekend with The Bulwark Managing Editor Sam Stein during a panel. “That is heartbreaking that the president of the United States was involved in that kind of gross, craven immorality.”
The House is poised to vote on a bill this week that could force the Justice Department to release all of its files on Epstein, much of it collected when law enforcement raided his private island and New York home shortly after his death in 2019 while incarcerated and awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges.
Trump has aggressively pursued a pressure campaign to block the vote, though unsuccessfully, leading him to announce a new investigation into Epstein and his ties to former President Bill Clinton and other prominent Democratic figures.
His increasingly frantic behavior, Murphy argued, made it clear that he had reason to oppose Epstein files being released.
“He is in daily panic mode as we get closer to the moment where these files and the fullest truth that we have available to us is going to be made public, and it is clearly the biggest scandal in presidential history,” Murphy said.
“...It stands to reason that he wouldn't be fighting so hard to spin against this story, or bullying Republicans in the House to prevent the release of these files if there wasn't something especially and specifically incriminating in that information.”
Recent releases of files related to Epstein have all come from the Epstein estate, and not from the DOJ, which almost certainly has a significantly larger share of files related to the disgraced financier. The files have been released by the House Oversight Committee, which has the power to subpoena individuals or entities, compelling them to fork over documents or appear to testify under oath.
“I think the scandal in and of itself could bring him down,” Murphy said.
Sen. @ChrisMurphyCT says "clearly, Donald Trump was at the center of a child sex ring," and that his pushback on the Epstein files vote made clear that "something especially and specifically incriminating" exists within them. pic.twitter.com/m9DUna0B0U
— Alexander Willis (@ReporterWillis) November 16, 2025