Attorney General Todd Blanche admitted in a court filing that he violated the Epstein files law, according to the journalist suing him.
Journalist and lawyer Katie Phang made the claim in a Saturday video posted on her YouTube channel, "Katie Phang News," as she walked viewers through Blanche's answer to her lawsuit seeking the unredacted Epstein files.
The key passage, she said, came in Blanche's response to her complaint, which alleged the Justice Department pulled previously released documents relating to President Donald Trump. Blanche admitted that "at times specific discrete documents were removed from the Epstein library," citing material posted "without redaction where redaction was appropriate whether by a victim or a member of the public."
Phang argued nothing in the law allows that.
"Where in the Epstein Files Transparency Act did it say that Todd Blanche could redact or withhold because it revealed the name of a member of the public?" she asked.
"There is now an admission in a federal case that Todd Blanche has violated the Epstein Files Transparency Act," Phang said. "Again, I mean, not like we needed any more proof, but there's his own admission that he's violated the law."
Phang also mocked Blanche's description of Trump in the filing as "the leader of the most transparent presidential administration in the history of this great nation."
"Even when Todd Blanche is being sued, he can't take off his a— kisser hat, can he?" she said.
She said Blanche's answer to her complaint turned personal. In one section, Blanche called an allegation from the files, that a woman accused Trump of abusing her as a minor, "sensationalized and spurious." He said it appeared "only to be a vehicle" for Phang and her attorneys "to attack their political opponents." Trump has long denied wrongdoing in connection with Epstein.
Blanche also argued in an affirmative defense that Phang's "ability to do her job has been unchanged," noting she "has even appeared on cable TV to discuss this case." Phang said that misstates her claim.
"I am not restrained from speaking about this topic, but I am most certainly prevented from being able to do my job to investigate further," she said.
She added that the tone of the filing only encouraged her.
"Frankly, I'm tickled pink that these people have now made it so personal that they want to attack me in their answer," Phang said. "Now that he has answered, we are more than one step closer to a final resolution of this lawsuit."