House Democrats chased Jeffrey Epstein’s ghost for more than a year hoping to hang a sex scandal around Donald Trump’s neck.
Their incoming committee bosses already want a televised sequel.
And the final report put one very different politician’s name in front of the Justice Department.
Fifteen Months of Digging Turned Up Nothing on Trump
The House Oversight Committee wrapped up its Epstein investigation with a 137-page majority staff report, and the Democrats who treated the whole probe as a fishing trip for Donald Trump reeled in an empty hook.
Chairman James Comer (R-KY) and his staff ran 19 transcribed interviews and depositions over 15 months. They subpoenaed the Justice Department, the Epstein estate, and two major banks, then pored over financial records from the Treasury Department.
And plenty of the people they questioned came straight out of the Democrat Party’s inner circle. Bill and Hillary Clinton both sat for depositions. Kathryn Ruemmler, who served as White House counsel under Barack Obama, answered questions too, and so did Doug Band, the longtime Clinton right-hand man.
But not one of them put Trump anywhere near Epstein’s crimes.
According to the report, every witness the committee examined agreed that Trump, to their knowledge, had no involvement in any crimes Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell committed. The documents told the same story. Investigators combed through files from the estate, the US Virgin Islands, JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank, and the Justice Department and found nothing implicating the President in criminal activity tied to the pair.
But the report went further than a clean bill of health. Committee Republicans wrote that their Democrat colleagues were “obsessed with trying to implicate President Trump” and called the effort an “unfounded witch hunt” that rolled on without regard for the survivors.
That last part should sting. Democrats wrapped every Epstein press release in the language of justice for victims, then burned month after month trying to turn a sex-trafficking case into a campaign ad.
A Former Democrat Candidate for Governor Lands in the Crosshairs
The committee did send two names to the Justice Department for a closer look. But neither belongs to Donald Trump.
Sarah Kellen worked as Epstein’s assistant for more than a decade and says he abused her throughout. In a closed-door interview with the committee in May 2026, she accused two powerful men of sexually assaulting her: celebrity hairstylist Frédéric Fekkai and Philip Levine, who served as mayor of Miami Beach from 2013 to 2017.
Levine isn’t some anonymous socialite. He ran for governor of Florida as a Democrat in 2018 and lost the party’s primary.
Kellen told lawmakers the alleged assault took place in 2002 or 2003 at a house Epstein and Maxwell rented in Saint-Tropez, where Levine stayed as a guest. She described him as one of Maxwell’s good friends.
Levine denies her account. Through a spokesperson, he told ABC News the two shared a brief, consensual encounter more than two decades ago, and that “Any allegation suggesting otherwise is not true.” Fekkai’s spokesman, Mark Herr, pushed back just as hard on behalf of his client: “Mr. Fekkai never assaulted anyone.” Prosecutors have charged neither man with any crime.
Still, Levine’s ties to the Epstein crowd run deeper than his public statements let on. His name turns up more than 1,000 times in the files the Justice Department released, mostly in mass campaign emails, along with flirtatious exchanges with Maxwell, NBC News reported. In 2010, after Epstein finished his sentence on state charges, Levine sent him warm wishes.
And Maxwell told Todd Blanche, then the deputy attorney general, that Levine was the man who introduced her to Bill Clinton, according to CNN.
Levine insists he met Epstein only a handful of times and regrets ever crossing paths with him. The Justice Department can sort out the rest, which is how due process ought to work. Kellen herself remains a polarizing figure whose own name appeared in Epstein’s 2007 non-prosecution agreement.
The Plea Deal That Let a Predator Keep Hunting
Comer’s report saves its harshest words for the federal government. The committee concluded that Epstein’s crimes after 2005 never had to happen, if only federal investigators and prosecutors in South Florida and Washington, DC had done their jobs.
In 2007, the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida handed Epstein a non-prosecution agreement instead of a federal indictment. He pleaded guilty to lesser state charges and drew 18 months. According to the report, he kept abusing women during generous work-release privileges, then walked out early. Prosecutors never even told his victims about the deal.
The committee found that some of those failures may trace back to Epstein’s reach inside the office itself, possibly including two attorneys who worked there.
“Had the government done its job, much of this abuse could have been prevented,” Comer said in a video unveiling the findings.
And the failures didn’t stop at the courthouse door. Understaffing at the federal jail in New York left guards missing at least 12 rounds and three inmate counts the night Epstein died in custody in 2019, leaving him and other inmates without adequate supervision for nearly eight hours. The Justice Department brushed off Comer’s recommendations, telling NPR that “the Chairman’s recommendations have already been addressed.”
Robert Garcia Gets the Gavel and Keeps the Grudge
Democrats take control of the House in January, and Representative Robert Garcia (D-CA), the committee’s top Democrat, sits in line for Comer’s chair.
His record on Epstein says plenty about what comes next. Oversight Democrats under his leadership have described Epstein as “Trump’s longtime friend” in official releases. In June 2026, Garcia demanded that Comer haul in JD Vance for questioning over a New York Times report about meetings on how to release the Epstein files. Two months later, he wanted Attorney General Todd Blanche in the hot seat too.
But after 15 months, two Clinton depositions, and a mountain of bank records, Democrats came up dry on Trump. A new House majority won’t change the evidence. It only changes who controls the cameras.
Expect the investigation to morph into something else entirely. With subpoena power in hand, Democrats can drag Trump officials before the committee week after week, park the word “Epstein” next to the word “Trump” in every headline, and call it accountability. The survivors become props in a road show that runs straight through 2028.
It’s possible Garcia will surprise everyone and pursue the allegations against a former Democrat officeholder with the same zeal he brought to chasing the Vice President. But nothing in his record so far points that direction.
And the double standard writes itself. Democrats demanded transparency right up until transparency produced a Democrat’s name instead of Trump’s.
In June 2026, Oversight Democrats demanded that the Vice President of the United States answer questions about the Epstein files.
Five months later, the committee’s final report sent the Justice Department the name of a man who once asked Florida Democrats to make him their nominee for governor.
Sources:
Mediaite, “House Republicans Unleash Massive Report on Government’s Epstein Failures While Clearing Trump of Wrongdoing”
Office of Representative James Comer, “Comer Releases Report on the Federal Government’s Mishandling of Epstein and Maxwell Criminal Investigations”
ABC News, “Lawmakers ask DOJ to probe additional alleged abusers named by ex-Epstein assistant”
CNN, “Here is who Epstein’s longtime assistant accused of sexual abuse”
NBC News, “House committee calls on DOJ to investigate 2 men with ties to Jeffrey Epstein”
NPR, “Federal government failed to hold Epstein accountable, Republican committee says”
Al Jazeera, “GOP-led House report slams systemic failures in handling of Epstein case”
House Oversight Committee Democrats, press releases (July 2025, June 2026, August 2026)