President Donald Trump's Justice Department is scrambling to recruit hundreds of lawyers to wade through a staggering 5.2 million more pages of documents in the Jeffrey Epstein case, according to a new report.
The New York Times reported Wednesday that the DOJ is seeking to enlist about 400 lawyers to review the documents, and the massive effort is pulling in heavy hitters from national security and criminal divisions, including prosecutors from New York and Florida.
The figure is significantly larger than what officials previously disclosed.
Congress gave the Justice Department a hard deadline: release the Epstein investigation files by Dec.19. DOJ officials dumped about 100,000 pages that day, then admitted a million more needed reviewing. Since late November, nearly 200 national security lawyers have grinded away, scrubbing victim info and anything that could blow ongoing investigations or national security concerns.
The document marathon isn't expected to wrap until at least Jan. 20, and the Trump administration is already taking heat from Democrats and some Republicans for blowing past the legal deadline.
The Justice Department fired back: “We have lawyers working around the clock to review and make the legally required redactions to protect victims, and we will release the documents as soon as possible.”
