Despite a December 2025 deadline for the complete release of all the Epstein documents, the Justice Department did not release its next batch of files until January 30, 2026. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the release, saying it included some 3,000,000 pages, 2,000 videos, and about 180,000 images.

Blanche indicated that this release would be the last major release of documents from the Department of Justice. U.S. Reps. Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie, the bipartisan authors of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, formally requested to review all the unredacted files to ensure that the government was in compliance with the law.

Epstein survivors expressed outrage and frustration at the latest release. In a statement a group of 18 women said, “Once again, survivors are having their names and identifying information exposed, while the men who abused us remain hidden and protected.”

The release again included prominent names in the world of business, politics, and society. Being named in the documents does not imply wrongdoing. Some of those featured in the latest release include:

• Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor: The former prince is shown in a new photograph kneeling over a fully clothed woman who is lying on the ground. Her face has been obscured to protect her identity. The latest revelation led to the highly unusual act of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer calling on Mountbatten-Windsor to appear before Congress.
• U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick: The files show that Lutnick, who has been associated with Epstein before, had planned a visit to Epstein’s island in 2012. Previously, Lutnick said that he had no contact with Epstein after about 2005. However, he admitted in congressional testimony that he had lunch with Epstein on the island in 2012 with his wife and four children.
• Woody Allen and Soon-Yi Previn: The files indicate that the couple sought Epstein’s help in getting their daughter into college. A January 2017 email from Woody Allen’s account but seemingly written by Previn reads, “I can’t thank you enough for getting Bechet into Bard.” 
• New York Giants co-owner Steven Tisch: The release shows email exchanges between Tisch and Epstein in 2013. In a statement Tisch acknowledged that they sometimes discussed “adult women.”
• Federal Reserve chair nominee Kevin Warsh: Warsh’s name appears on a guest list for an event titled “St. Barth’s Christmas 2010.”
• Google cofounder Sergey Brin: The documents show Brin, one of the richest men in the world, corresponding with Ghislaine Maxwell. Multiple people had previously claimed that Brin had visited Epstein’s island.

Earlier in January Bill and Hillary Clinton refused to testify before the House Oversight Committee about what they knew about Epstein. The Clintons sent an eight-page letter to the committee chair, Republican Rep. James Comer, saying that they considered the subpoenas “invalid and legally unenforceable.” In a second letter the former president and secretary of state said:

Every person has to decide when they have seen or had enough and are ready to fight for this country, its principles and its people, no matter the consequences. For us, now is that time.

The committee voted to hold the Clintons in contempt of Congress. Then, in early February, just days before the full House would have voted to hold them in contempt, the Clintons relented and agreed to testify.

In a speech on the floor of the House of Representatives on February 10, 2026, Khanna read into the congressional record the names of six individuals whose identities had been revealed as part of the unredacting of the files. The presence of their names in the files is not indicative of wrongdoing, and the details of what relationships the men had with Epstein are unclear. Here are the names and what is known about them:

• Les Wexner: the billionaire retail magnate had a long-standing relationship with Epstein, who managed Wexner’s finances, which proved to be a key source of Epstein’s wealth.

• Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem: a Dubai-based businessman and the brother of the head of Formula 1 racing’s governing body, he and Epstein apparently exchanged emails that reference a “torture video.”

• Nicola Caputa: possibly an Italian politician, although that is not clear.

• Salvatore Nuara: Nothing is known about this person and their possible connection to Epstein.

• Zurab Mikeladze: Nothing is known about this person and their possible connection to Epstein.

• Leonic Leonov: Nothing is known about this person and their possible connection to Epstein.

Then in February 2026, the scandal took yet another stunning turn when Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested on suspicion that he shared confidential official documents with Epstein. The arrest came months after Charles III stripped the former Prince Andrew of his title. Buckingham Palace has sought to distance itself from allegations that Andrew was involved in the sexual abuse of Virginia Giuffre, which Mountbatten-Windsor has long denied.

The charges stem from the January 30 release of Epstein files documents  that included new emails exchanges between Mountbatten-Windsor and Epstein. In one instance it appears that he forwarded to Epstein confidential reports from his visits to Hong Kong, Vietnam, and Singapore in 2010 that were the product of his role as a British trade envoy. King Charles acknowledged the arrest a statement that was stunning in its directness. The king said, in part: “Let me state clearly: the law must take its course.”

On February 26 and 27, 2026, Hillary and Bill Clinton submitted to their much-debated testimony to the House Oversight Committee. Hillary Clinton testified for more than six hours despite the fact that she said she had never met Epstein and “never flew on his plane or visited his island, homes or offices.”

The following day Bill Clinton became the first former president ever compelled to testify before Congress. He, too, was questioned for about six hours, telling members of the committee “I saw nothing, and I did nothing wrong.” He went on to reference his own childhood experiences to reiterate that he was unaware of Epstein’s activities. “As someone who grew up in a home with domestic abuse, not only would I not have flown on his plane if I had any inkling of what he was doing – I would have turned him in myself and led the call for justice for his crimes, not sweetheart deals.”

In the wake of the Clintons’ testimony, there were renewed calls for the committee to depose Commerce Secretary Lutnick and on March 3, 2026, Oversight Committee Chair Rep. James Comer of Kentucky announced that Lutnick had agreed to testify. The next day the same committee issued a subpoena for Attorney General Bondi to appear. The move came as a surprise as five Republicans had to break with Comer and join forces with Democrats to secure the subpoena, which Republican Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina had introduced. Later in March the Department of Justice made public a number of previously unreleased documents in which an unidentified woman made unsubstantiated claims to the FBI after Epstein’s 2019 arrest that she was sexually abused as a young teenager by Epstein and Trump. The president has repeatedly said he did nothing wrong as part of his long-standing friendship with Epstein. In April, Trump fired Bondi and installed Blanche as Acting Attorney General. Bondi subsequently declined to testify because she was no longer attorney general. Nonetheless, in May, she agreed to sit for a behind-closed-doors interview with members of the House Oversight Committee. According to news reports, she denied she played an integral role in the management of the release of the Epstein files, instead saying that various aspects were handled by Blanche and FBI director Kash Patel.

In April 2026, Melania Trump delivered a rare public address from the White House to deny “lies linking me to the disgraceful Jeffrey Epstein.” The first lady’s statement, in which she denied being a “victim” of the convicted sex offender, also denied having any knowledge of crimes committed by Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell. She acknowledged that she and her husband attended social events with Epstein and Maxwell and that she exchanged emails with Maxwell which she described as “trivial.” There are numerous photographs of the two couples together, including at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate but she also addressed what she called the “numerous fake images and statements about Epstein and me have been circulating on social media for years now.” The first lady called on Congress to hold hearings to allow the survivors of Epstein’s abuse to testify on the record. It was not clear what prompted the first lady to make the statement.

In the summer and fall of 2026, Epstein and the Epstein files increasingly became an issue in the 2026 midterm elections. A CNN analysis found that candidates and political groups had spent some $35 million on more than 160 different ads for candidates across the country. By comparison, during the 2024 campaign, just three ads mentioned Epstein, and they all aired in Florida. The ads target members of Congress who initially voted against releasing the Epstein Transparency Act. (Ultimately, all but one member of Congress voted for the law, after Trump dropped his opposition to it.) Many of the ads attempt to tie Republicans to Trump and Epstein as Democrats argue they would hold the administration accountable if they took control of Congress.

Careers affected by ties to Epstein

Of course, having your picture taken with Epstein or having your name mentioned in released documents does not constitute wrongdoing. But for much of the decades-long scandal, the most significant consequence anyone faced for their association with Epstein was embarrassment.

In early 2026 that started to change. The release of millions of pages of documents in late 2025 and 2026 has increasingly led to lost careers and potentially much more, from European capitals to Wall Street to the halls of academia.

• Peter Attia, longevity influencer at CBS: A medical doctor, Attia joined CBS News as a contributor in January 2026. A month later he announced he was stepping away from the role. He had already resigned as chief science officer at the protein bar company David a few weeks earlier. Attia’s name appeared some 1,700 times in the January 2026 release of Epstein documents. He exchanged crude emails with Epstein, expressed fondness for him, and arranged medical testing for the financier. Attia says he was unaware of any of Epstein’s wrongdoing.

• Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, Emirati business leader The Dubai-based businessman and the brother of the head of Formula One racing’s governing body exchanged emails with Epstein that referenced a “torture video” that bin Sulayem had apparently shared with Epstein. His was one of the names revealed as part of the move by U.S. members of Congress Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie to unredact names within the files. He was replaced as chair and CEO of DP World, a logistics firm based in Dubai and owned by the royal family, in February 2026 after the emails were released by the Justice Department.

• Thorbjørn Jagland, former prime minister of Norway: The prominent Norwegian politician, who led Norway for a year in the late 1990s, was charged with “gross corruption” and his properties searched in February 2026 on suspicion that he may have received gifts and loans from Epstein. According to released documents, Jagland, who at the time of their relationship was the head of the Council of Europe, and Epstein exchanged emails frequently, including in 2018 when Epstein suggested that Jagland should connect him with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

• Mona Juul, Norwegian ambassador The ambassador resigned her post as her country’s ambassador to Jordan and Iraq in February 2026 amid reporting that members of her family had been left $10 million in Epstein’s will. She and her husband, Terje Rød-Larsen, are the subject of a criminal investigation in Norway. Rod-Larsen resigned his position as president and chief executive of the International Peace Institute in 2020, when it was revealed that he had had inappropriate financial dealings with Epstein.

• Brad Karp, prominent attorney: The longtime chair of the Wall Street power firm Paul Weiss abruptly resigned the role he had held for 18 years in February 2026 after released documents indicated a close relationship with Epstein, including Karp asking Epstein to get his son a job on a Woody Allen movie and thanking him for “an evening I’ll never forget.” Karp remains a lawyer at Paul Weiss.

• Miroslav Lajčák, Slovakia’s national security adviser::The key adviser to Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico resigned after the release of emails between Lajčák and Epstein. In one exchange about young women, Lajčák wrote to Epstein, “Sharing is caring.” For his part, Fico decried Lajčák’s resignation, saying that he was “an incredible source of experience in diplomacy.”

• Jack Lang, France’s former minister of culture: The head of the Arab World Institute announced his resignation from one of Paris’s leading cultural institutions in February 2026. Lang had been France’s minister of culture under Pres. François Mitterrand. Among the Justice Department’s documents is a video of Epstein and Lang outside the Louvre in Paris.

• Peter Mandelson, former British ambassador to the United States: The longtime British politician was fired from his ambassadorship by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in September 2025. Mandelson appears multiple times in the files, including calling Epstein “my best pal.” The released documents indicate that Mandelson may have leaked internal government information to Epstein, allowing Epstein to benefit. In February 2026 he resigned from the Labour Party and the House of Lords. Later that month he was arrested on suspicion of passing documents to Epstein.

• Morgan McSweeney, Starmer’s chief of staff: Although McSweeney has no known ties to Epstein, he resigned under pressure because he recommended Mandelson for the ambassadorship even though Mandelson’s relationship with Epstein was known.

• George Mitchell, former Senate majority leader and diplomat: In February 2026 Mitchell, a longtime Maine Democrat who played a pivotal role in the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that brought an end to the Troubles in Northern Ireland, resigned from a scholarship organization that bears his name. Additionally Queen’s University Belfast removed a bust of Mitchell, and a prestigious scholarship that bore his name is being renamed. Mitchell’s relationship with Epstein, which went on for decades and had long been known, is being reassessed in the wake of the January 2026 document release in which Mitchell’s name appears some 300 times. Mitchell also wrote a note in the now-infamous Epstein birthday book, in which he said, “The beginning of a new year is an appropriate time to count our blessings. Among mine is your friendship.”

• Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, disgraced former prince: Mountbatten-Windsor’s sordid relationship with Epstein has played out more publicly than most, and his fall has seemed both inevitable and astounding. In 2001, when she was 17, Virginia Roberts Giuffre was photographed with Mountbatten-Windsor and Epstein coconspirator Ghislaine Maxwell. The now-infamous image shows the prince with his arm draped around the teenager’s waist. Giuffre later said that she was forced to have sex with him, after being trafficked by Epstein and Maxwell. In 2019 Mountbatten-Windsor gave a disastrous television interview in which he denied all wrongdoing and described Epstein’s conduct as “unbecoming.” Shortly thereafter, he stepped down from being a working royal. In October 2025 Charles III stripped Mountbatten-Windsor of his titles. The former prince was arrested in February 2026 on suspicion of misusing his public office by supplying Epstein with confidential documents that Mountbatten-Windsor had access to in his role as British trade envoy.

• Thomas Pritzker, Hyatt Hotels executive chair: Saying that he failed to “provide good stewardship” for his company, the cousin of Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced his resignation in February 2026. Released documents show that Thomas Pritzker and Epstein continued to exchange emails and have meals together long after Epstein was convicted of soliciting a teenage girl for prostitution.

•Kathryn Ruemmler, former Obama White House counsel: The files include emails in which Ruemmler referred to Epstein as “Uncle Jeffrey.” Over the years Epstein showered her with gifts, including a $9,000 purse, while she provided him with advice on how to answer difficult questions about his sex life. Less than two weeks after the January release of documents in which Ruemmler appears some 10,000 times, she resigned from her position as chief legal officer at Goldman Sachs, effective in June.

• Lawrence Summers, former U.S. treasury secretary: Although Lawrence Summers’s relationship with Epstein first became known in 2023, in November 2025 new emails dating from 2017 to 2019 were released. In one, Summers asked Epstein for dating advice regarding a young woman Summers described as a mentee. The revelation led Summers to step down from teaching at Harvard University and from the board of OpenAI, among other roles. In February 2026 Harvard announced that Summers would resign from all academic and faculty roles at the university by the end of the school year as a result of his relationship with Epstein. The poet Elisa New, Summers’s wife, had her PBS show Poetry in America canceled when it became known that Epstein helped fund the program.

• Casey Wasserman, talent and sports agent:The marketing mogul, who is also the chair of the organizing committee for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, announced he would sell his stake in the firm that bears his name after flirtatious emails between him and Epstein coconspirator Maxwell came to light. The emails date from the early 2000s, long before Maxwell was convicted of sex trafficking. Key clients of his agency, including soccer star Abby Wambach, left the firm in light of the revelations. Wasserman has said he intends to continue to serve on the Olympic committee, despite some calls for him to resign.

Leon Black, billionaire co-founder of Apollo Private Management: Black was one of the first to lose a job over ties to Epstein. Black stepped down from Apollo in 2021 because of his relationship with Epstein. He paid Epstein some $170 million for financial and estate planning advice, an exorbitant amount even for someone of Black’s wealth. He has repeatedly knowing about Epstein’s alleged abuse or engaging in any wrongdoing himself, although he has been accused by women who had ties to Epstein. Before the House Oversight Committee in June 2026, he said that he “was not involved with, and had no knowledge of, any of Epstein’s heinous conduct.”

Learn more

The rise and fall of Jeffrey Epstein

Ghislaine Maxwell, partner in crime

Who was Virginia Giuffre?

Where did Epstein get his money?

The Epstein files in photographs

Julie K. Brown: The reporter who gave the victims a voice