Attorney General Todd Blanche abandoned his months-long claim of compliance with an order regarding the Epstein files one day before a frustrated judge's deadline and appealed the order instead.
The notice of appeal, filed Sunday in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, acknowledged that the order requiring Epstein files to be handed over to the court may not even be appealable. Senior U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan had given Blanche until August 25 to hand over Epstein-related documents.
The filing came 11 days after Sullivan used a courtroom hearing to put Blanche on notice — invoking the last time he held Department of Justice attorneys in contempt of court, a 2009 case later affirmed on appeal.
Sullivan told Blanche's attorney that no one at the DOJ was in trouble — yet, USA Today reported.
"I'm not interested in doing that at all," Sullivan said of a contempt finding. "But I will do it to make sure justice is administered fairly. That's not a threat. It's a promise."
At that August 13 hearing, DOJ attorney Andrew Block had no answers for why Blanche had not produced handwritten FBI notes the court had ordered released. Block also had no answer for why the DOJ had not published a legally required redaction log — overdue since December 2025.
"Christmas is forthcoming," Sullivan shot back, after Block said the log would be "forthcoming," USA Today reported.
Sullivan called his August 6 order — which laid out exactly what he wanted produced — "straightforward" and "unambiguous," the report said.
Independent journalist Katie Phang sued Blanche in April, arguing he had violated the Epstein Files Transparency Act — a 2025 law requiring the release of all Justice Department files on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Sullivan granted Phang a preliminary injunction on June 25, according to NOTUS.
"By not responding substantively, the Attorney General has conceded Ms. Phang's merits arguments," the judge wrote.
Blanche entered a notice of compliance, but the August 6 order showed Sullivan found his responses fell short — Blanche had offered assertions, not the documentation the court required.
Phang's lawyers accused Blanche of seeking delays the court had already refused, writing that his conduct "lacks any legal basis, and it also has no basis in reality."
A separate court deadline — requiring Blanche or a DOJ official to submit a sworn written statement on the status of the redaction log — is set for September 3, according to the proposed order.
