WASHINGTON (AP) — A huge new tranche of files on millionaire financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein released Friday revealed details of his communications with the wealthy and powerful, some not long before he died by suicide in 2019.
The Justice Department said it was disclosing more than 3 million pages of documents, as well as thousands of videos and photos, as required by a law passed by Congress. By Friday evening, more than 600,000 documents had been published online. Millions of files that prosecutors had identified as potentially subject to release under the law remain under wraps, however, drawing criticism from Democrats.
Here's what we know so far about the files now being reviewed by a team of Associated Press reporters:
The documents show Epstein exchanged hundreds of friendly texts with Steve Bannon, a top adviser to President Donald Trump, some months before Epstein's death.
They discussed politics, travel and a documentary Bannon was said to be planning that would help salvage Epstein's reputation.
In March 2019, Bannon asked Epstein if he could supply his plane to pick him up in Rome.
A couple of months later, Epstein messaged to Bannon, “Now you can understand why trump wakes up in the middle of the night sweating when he hears you and I are friends.”
The context is unclear from the documents, which were released with many redactions and little clear organization.
Another 2018 exchange focused on Trump’s threats at the time to oust Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, whom he had named to the post just the year prior.
Around the same time, Epstein also communicated with Kathy Ruemmler, a lawyer and former Obama White House official. In a typo-filled email, he warned that Democrats should stop demonizing Trump as a Mafia-type figure even as he derided the president as a “maniac.”
Bannon did not immediately respond to a message from the AP seeking comment. Ruemmler said through a spokesperson she was associated with Epstein professionally during her time as a lawyer in private practice and now “regrets ever knowing him.”
Billionaire Tesla founder Elon Musk e-mailed Epstein in 2012 and 2013 about visiting his infamous island compound, the scene of many allegations of sexual abuse.
Epstein inquired in an email about how many people Musk would like flown by helicopter, and Musk responded that it would likely be just him and his partner at the time. “What day/night will be the wildest party on =our island?” he wrote, according to the Justice Department records.
It’s not immediately clear if the island visits took place. Spokespersons for Musk’s companies, Tesla and X, didn’t immediately respond to emails seeking comment Friday.
Musk has maintained that he repeatedly turned down the disgraced financier’s overtures. “Epstein tried to get me to go to his island and I REFUSED,” he posted on X in 2025
Epstein also invited Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to the island in Dec. 2012. Lutnick's wife enthusiastically accepted the invitation and said they would arrive on a yacht with their children. The two also had drinks on another occasion in 2011, according to a schedule. Six years later, they e-mailed about the construction of a building across the street from both of their homes.
Lutnick has distanced himself from Epstein, calling him “gross” and saying in 2025 that he cut ties decades ago. He didn’t respond to an e-mailed request for comment on Friday afternoon.
Epstein was arrested on federal sex trafficking charges in July 2019, and found dead in his cell just over a month later.
The latest batch of documents includes emails between investigators about Epstein’s death, including an investigator's observation that his final communication doesn't look like a suicide note. Multiple investigations have determined that Epstein's death was a suicide.
The records also detail a trick that jail staffers used to fool the media gathered outside while Epstein’s body was removed: they used boxes and sheets to create what appeared to be a body and loaded it into a white van labeled as belonging to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.
The reporters followed the van when it left the jail, not knowing that Epstein’s actual body was loaded into a black vehicle, which departed “unnoticed,” according to the interview notes.
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Associated Press reporters across the country contributed to this story, including Michael R. Sisak and Philip Marcelo in New York, Cal Woodward in Washington, Safiyah Riddle in Montgomery, Alabama, and Meg Kinnard in South Carolina.
An email that was included in the U.S. Department of Justice release of the Jeffrey Epstein files is photographed Friday, Jan. 30, 2026, and shows the cell where Epstein was found unresponsive. (AP Photo/Jon Elswick)
A document included in the U.S. Department of Justice release of the Jeffrey Epstein files is photographed Friday, Jan. 30, 2026, that illustrates several people who handled Epstein's financial affairs or who were close to him (AP Photo/Jon Elswick)
FILE - Documents that were included in the U.S. Department of Justice release of the Jeffrey Epstein files are photographed Friday, Jan. 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Jon Elswick, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — The Justice Department on Friday released many more records from its investigative files on Jeffrey Epstein, resuming disclosures under a law intended to reveal what the government knew about the millionaire financier's sexual abuse of young girls and his interactions with rich and powerful people such as Donald Trump and Bill Clinton.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the department would be releasing more than 3 million pages of documents along with more than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. The files, posted to the department’s website, include some of the several million pages of records that officials said were withheld from an initial release in December.
Included were documents concerning some of Epstein's famous associates, including Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Britain’s Prince Andrew, and email correspondence between Epstein and Elon Musk and other prominent contacts from across the political spectrum.
The documents were disclosed under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the law enacted after months of public and political pressure that requires the government to open its files on the late financier and his confidant and onetime girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell. Lawmakers complained when the Justice Department made only a limited release last month, but officials said more time was needed to review additional documents that were discovered and to ensure no sensitive information about victims was released.
Friday's disclosure represents the largest document dump to date about a saga the Trump administration has struggled to shake because of the president's previous association with Epstein. Criminal investigations into the financier have long animated online sleuths, conspiracy theorists and others who have suspected government cover-ups and clamored for a full accounting, demands that Blanche acknowledged might not be satisfied by the latest release.
“There’s a hunger, or a thirst, for information that I don’t think will be satisfied by the review of these documents," he said.
After missing a Dec. 19 deadline set by Congress to release all the files, the Justice Department said it tasked hundreds of lawyers with reviewing the records to determine what needed to be redacted, or blacked out. It denied any effort to shield Trump, who says he cut ties with Epstein years ago after an earlier friendship, from potential embarrassment.
The latest batch includes correspondence either with or about some of Epstein's friends.
The records have thousands of references to Trump, including emails in which Epstein and others shared news articles about him, commented on his policies or politics, or gossiped about him and his family. Also included was a spreadsheet created last August summarizing calls to the FBI’s National Threat Operation Center or to a hotline established by prosecutors from people claiming without corroboration to have some knowledge of wrongdoing by Trump.
Mountbatten-Windsor's name appears at least several hundred times in the documents, sometimes in news clippings, sometimes in Epstein’s private email correspondence and in guest lists for dinners organized by Epstein. Some records document an attempt by prosecutors in New York to get the former prince to agree to be interviewed as part of their Epstein sex trafficking probe.
The records also show Musk, the billionaire Tesla founder, reached out to Epstein on at least two occasions to plan visits to the Caribbean island where many of the allegations of sexual abuse purportedly occurred.
In a 2012 exchange, Epstein asked how many people Musk would like flown by helicopter to the island he owned.
“Probably just Talulah and me,” Musk responded, referencing his then-partner, actress Talulah Riley. “What day/night will be the wildest party on our island?”
Musk messaged Epstein again ahead of a planned Caribbean trip in 2013. “Will be in the BVI/St Bart’s area over the holidays,” he wrote. “Is there a good time to visit?” Epstein extended an invite for after the New Year holiday.
It’s not immediately clear if the island visits took place. Spokespeople for Musk’s companies, Tesla and X, didn’t respond to emails seeking comment.
Musk has said he repeatedly rebuffed Epstein's overtures.
“Epstein tried to get me to go to his island and I REFUSED,” he posted on X in 2025 when House Democrats released an Epstein calendar with an entry mentioning a potential Musk visit.
Epstein also appears to have tried to connect New York Giants co-owner Steve Tisch with women, according to emails. In one exchange, Tisch told Epstein he had had lunch with one of Epstein’s assistant’s friends. He described her as a “very sweet girl,” and asked if Epstein knew anything about her.
“no, but i will ask,” said Epstein, before inquiring if Tisch had contacted another woman, crudely describing her physical features.
Tisch said in a statement that he had a “brief association” with Epstein where they emailed about adult women and other topics. He said he “never went to his island” and that he “deeply regrets” the association.
The documents show that Epstein and Steve Bannon, a conservative activist who served as Trump’s White House strategist earlier in the president’s first term, bantered over politics with the financier, discussed get-togethers with him over breakfast, lunch or dinner and, on March 29, 2019, asked Epstein if he could supply his plane to pick him up in Rome:
Epstein told him his pilot and crew “are doing their best” to arrange that flight but if Bannon could find a charter flight instead, “I’m happy to pay.” Apparently in France at the time, Epstein sent a text message saying: “My guys can pick you up. Come for dinner.” The exchange did not show how that played out.
In December 2012, Epstein invited Howard Lutnick, now Trump's commerce secretary, to his private island for lunch, the records show. Lutnick’s wife accepted the invitation and said they would arrive on a yacht with their children. On another occasion in 2011, the two men had drinks, according to a schedule shared with Epstein.
Lutnick has said he cut ties with Epstein long ago. A Commerce Department spokesman said Lutnick had “limited interactions with Mr. Epstein in the presence of his wife and has never been accused of wrongdoing.”
Another Epstein contact surfacing in the records is former Obama White House general counsel Kathy Ruemmler. In one of several exchanges, Epstein emailed Ruemmler to advise that Democrats should stop demonizing Trump as a Mafia-type figure even as he derided the president as a “maniac.”
A spokesperson for Goldman Sachs, where Ruemmler is general counsel and chief legal officer, said in a statement that Ruemmler “had a professional association with Jeffrey Epstein when she was a lawyer in private practice” and "regrets ever knowing him.”
The tens of thousands of pages released last month included previously released flight logs showing Trump flew on Epstein’s private jet in the 1990s, before their falling-out, and several photographs of Clinton. None of Epstein’s victims who have gone public with their stories have publicly accused Trump, a Republican, nor Clinton, a Democrat, of wrongdoing. Both have said they had no knowledge he was abusing underage girls.
Epstein killed himself in a New York jail cell in August 2019, a month after being indicted on federal sex trafficking charges.
In 2008 and 2009, Epstein served jail time in Florida after pleading guilty to soliciting prostitution from someone under the age of 18. At the time, investigators had gathered evidence that Epstein had sexually abused underage girls at his Palm Beach home. The U.S. attorney's office agreed not to prosecute him in exchange for his guilty plea to lesser state charges.
A draft indictment from that period released Friday shows prosecutors contemplated federal charges against not just Epstein but three others who were his personal assistants and wee suspected of participating in a conspiracy to recruit underage girls to perform lewd acts with Epstein.
In 2021, a federal jury in New York convicted Maxwell, a British socialite, of sex trafficking for helping recruit some of his underage victims. She is serving a 20-year prison sentence.
U.S. prosecutors never charged anyone else in connection with Epstein's abuse of girls. One victim, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, accused him in lawsuits of having arranged for her to have sexual encounters at age 17 and 18 with numerous politicians, business titans, academics and others. They all denied her allegations.
Among those accused was Britain's Prince Andrew, who was stripped of his royal titles amid the scandal. Andrew denied having sex with Giuffre but settled her lawsuit for an undisclosed sum.
Giuffre died by suicide last year at age 41.
Tucker and Richer reported from Washington. Associated Press journalists from around the country contributed to this report.
Follow the AP's coverage of Jeffrey Epstein at https://apnews.com/hub/jeffrey-epstein.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche meets with reporters as the Justice Department announces the release of three million pages of documents in the latest Jeffrey Epstein disclosure in Washington, Friday, Jan. 30, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche meets with reporters as the Justice Department says it's releasing 3 million pages of documents in the latest Jeffrey Epstein disclosure, along with 2,000 videos and 180,000 images, in Washington, Friday, Jan. 30, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
An email that was included in the U.S. Department of Justice release of the Jeffrey Epstein files is photographed Friday, Jan. 30, 2026, and shows a 2009 order of no contact in Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Jon Elswick)
An email that was included in the U.S. Department of Justice release of the Jeffrey Epstein files is photographed Friday, Jan. 30, 2026, and shows the cell where Epstein was found unresponsive. (AP Photo/Jon Elswick)
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche meets with reporters as the Justice Department says it's releasing 3 million pages of documents in the latest Jeffrey Epstein disclosure, along with 2,000 videos and 180,000 images, in Washington, Friday, Jan. 30, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
FILE - Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche listens to President Donald Trump speak in the State Dining Room at the White House, Oct. 8, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
FILE - Documents that were included in the U.S. Department of Justice release of the Jeffrey Epstein files are photographed Friday, Jan. 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Jon Elswick, File)
