The Latest: Huge cache of Epstein documents includes his emails with wealthy and powerful

NEW YORK (AP) — A huge new tranche of files on millionaire financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has 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, and House Democrats called on Attorney General Pam Bondi to share unredacted versions with Congress.

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The disclosures have revived questions about whether Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Prince Andrew, should cooperate with U.S. authorities investigating Epstein and his links to powerful individuals around the world.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Saturday suggested Mountbatten-Windsor should tell American investigators whatever he knows about Epstein’s activities.

“In terms of testifying, I’ve always said anybody who’s got information should be prepared to share that information in whatever form they’re asked to do that, because you can’t be victim-centered if you’re not prepared to do that,” Starmer said as he arrived in Japan to meet with the country’s leaders.

The former prince has so far ignored a request from members of the House Oversight Committee for a “transcribed interview” about his “long-standing friendship” with Epstein.

Robert Fico, Slovakia’s prime minister, said Saturday that he had accepted the resignation of his national security adviser, Miroslav Lajcak.

Lajcak’s resignation comes a day after Lajcak’s past communications with Jeffrey Epstein appeared in newly released U.S. documents.

Lajcak, a former Slovak foreign minister and a onetime president of the U.N. General Assembly, denied any wrongdoing. He said his contacts were part of his diplomatic duties and occurred before U.S. authorities opened their investigation into Epstein.

Pressure mounted for his ouster from opposition parties and a nationalist partner in Fico’s governing coalition.

Epstein was emailing with Matthew I. Menchel, a former federal prosecutor who was involved in a deal that allowed Epstein to avoid federal prosecution in 2007 in exchange for a guilty plea to a state charge.

Menchel replied but didn’t discuss Sandusky. A message seeking comment was left for him.

Epstein told Menchel that he saw nothing in trial transcripts “that proved that Sandusky was innocent” and nothing “that proved to me, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Sandusky is guilty either.”

After his own legal trouble involving a minor, Epstein weighed in on ex-Penn State coach Jerry Sandusky’s conviction, writing in a December 2012 email “I also entertain the possibility that Sandusky is innocent.”

Sandusky was convicted of 45 counts of sexual abuse involving at least 10 victims over two decades. He is serving 30 to 60 years in prison. Like Epstein, he was accused of preying on children from broken homes and downtrodden lives and enticing them with gifts and, in Sandusky’s case, access to the revered Penn State football program, before sexually abusing them.

Epstein said he was disturbed by the “speed and conviction at which Sandusky was tried and found guilty by the media and public” before trial, saying it reminded him of “the community hysteria surrounding the Salem witchcraft trials. Scary.”

Jennie Bond, who reported on the royal family for the BBC, said it would be highly unusual for a royal to meet with someone they knew so little about.

“I mean, what was he thinking?” Bond told the BBC. “What was he thinking when Epstein offered him a 26-year-old Russian very beautiful lady to have dinner with? I mean, was there no red light saying, ’Oh my goodness, you know, is this a security risk? Could she be a spy? Should I do this?’ Nah. He says, ‘That would be absolutely lovely.’’’

The emails released on Friday include an August 2010 exchange between Epstein and an account labeled “The Duke” that occurred soon after the financier was released from home detention following his earlier conviction. Before he was barred from using the title, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was the Duke of York.

“I have a friend who I think you might enjoy having dinner with,” Epstein writes.

“The Duke” replies: “Of course. I am in Geneva until the morning of 22nd but would be delighted to see her. Will she be bringing a message from you? Please give her my contact details to get in touch.”

The email is signed “A.”

In response to a redacted email, “The Duke” then writes, “Great. Any other information you might know about her that might be useful to know? Like what have you told her about me and have you given her my email as well?”

Epstein, whose emails often contain typographical errors, responds: “She 26, russian, clevere beautiful, trustworthy and yes she has your email.”

"That was quick!” The Duke replies. “How are you? Good to be free?”

“Great to be free of many things,” Epstein says.

Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, is pressing the Justice Department to let lawmakers review unredacted versions of the latest Epstein files release as soon as Sunday.

Raskin’s demand is the latest signal Democrats believe the Justice Department has not fully complied with the Epstein Files Transparency Act.

In a letter to Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, Raskin said the review is urgent ahead of Attorney General Pam Bondi’s Feb. 11 testimony before the House Judiciary Committee.

He argues Congress must assess whether DOJ’s redactions, from a universe of more than six million pages tied to Jeffrey Epstein, were lawful or improperly shielded from scrutiny.

The latest release of documents includes emails between the convicted sex offender and a correspondent who appears to be the man formerly known as Prince Andrew.

They include an invitation for Epstein to dine at Buckingham Palace, Epstein’s offer to introduce his correspondent to a 26-year-old Russian woman, and photos that appear to show Andrew kneeling over an unidentified woman who is lying on the floor.

The revelations come three months after King Charles III stripped Andrew of his royal titles, including the right to be called a prince, as he tried to insulate the monarchy from a steady stream of stories about his younger brother’s relationship with Epstein that has tarnished the royal family for more than a decade. The former prince is now known simply as Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor.

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A group representing Epstein survivors is pressing for the full release of Justice Department files with Attorney General Pam Bondi scheduled to appear before the House Judiciary Committee next month.

In a statement released Friday by the publicist for the late Virginia Giuffre, one of Jeffrey Epstein’s most prominent accusers, the group said the Justice Department “cannot claim it is finished releasing files until every legally required document is released and every abuser and enabler is fully exposed.”

“We need to hear directly from Attorney General Pam Bondi when she appears before the House Judiciary Committee,” the statement said, adding that the matter “is not over.”

The group said it would continue pressing for accountability and urged lawmakers from both parties to support the full release of the Epstein files, emphasizing that their demands are “not about politics,” but about transparency and justice for survivors.

Harvard University’s review determined that the convicted sex offender visited campus more than 40 times and had unfettered access to the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, a research center Nowak created in 2003 with $6.5 million from Epstein.

The review also found in 2020 that Harvard accepted more than $9 million from Epstein during the decade leading up to his conviction but barred him from making further donations after that point.

The review done at the request of the university’s president also found that about $200,000 of Epstein’s money had not been spent, and would be given to groups that support victims of sexual violence.

Nowak gave Epstein an office at the program’s building in Harvard Square, the review found, and circumvented campus security rules to grant the financier a key card and “unlimited” access to the facility. Epstein frequently visited Office 610, which was known as “Jeffrey’s Office,” and met with scholars to hear about their work, the review found.

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Epstein gave millions of dollars to research projects associated with Martin Nowak, a Harvard University math professor. In a 2018 email, Epstein assistant Lesley Groff asked someone about a missing key card for Nowak’s office.

“We can’t find it. ... it is kept in my office drawer and it is not there...do you happen to know where it is?” Groff asked. The email recipient is redacted.

In 2021, Harvard barred Nowak from starting new research or advising students for at least two years because of his ties to Epstein after the financier’s 2008 sex crimes conviction. An investigation determined that Nowak gave Epstein an office in his campus research center, along with a building key card.

At the time, Nowak said he regretted the connection between Harvard and Epstein “and the hurt that it has caused.”

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.

Billionaire Tesla founder Elon Musk emailed 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.

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.”

Compiling accurate and thorough information takes time. A team of AP reporters is working to confirm information regarding Jeffrey Epstein that the Justice Department is continuing to release in batches.

These standards guide our reporting process:

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The AP also is reviewing the documents in collaboration with journalists from Versant, CBS and NBC. Journalists from each newsroom are working together to examine the files and share information about what is in them. Each outlet is responsible for its own independent news coverage of the documents.

FILE - New York Giants co-owner Steve Tisch arrives for NFL owners meetings, in New York, Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - Images from an undated and redacted document released by the U.S. Department of Justice, photographed Saturday, Jan. 31, 2026, show Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Prince Andrew, leaning over an unidentified person. (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 answers a question during a news conference after the Justice Department announced 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)

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)

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)

BETHLEHEM, West Bank (AP) — Mohamad Al-Assi ran beneath the concrete wall as the sun rose over Bethlehem. His Nikes pounded the gravel, his breath fogging the air as graffiti and paint splatter blurred past with each stride.

The road along the barrier separating Israel from the occupied West Bank makes up a stretch of a marathon route that Al-Assi and thousands of others ran on Friday. The event is open to people in other parts of the world running in solidarity with the Palestinians and another, shorter race was happening in Gaza.

The race, known as the Palestine Marathon, was held for the first time in three years and was among the first big international events in the West Bank since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. Festivals, conferences and holiday festivities that once drew thousands have been scaled back or canceled because of the war in Gaza and heightened Israeli restrictions.

It marked a turning point for Al-Assi, 27, who was released from Israeli detention six months ago. Video from that day shows him gaunt-faced and hollow-eyed, his once muscular legs weakened after more than two and a half years of prison.

He began training in December, gradually upping his mileage every month since. He ran 62 miles (100 kilometers) that first month, and in April reached 135 miles (217 kilometers), according to his account on the tracking app Strava.

He jogs in the morning after his mother wakes him up in their home in Dheisheh, a Palestinian refugee camp made up of graffiti-covered cinderblock homes in tangled alleyways.

“The main difficulties we face are the cars on the roads and the presence of Israeli security forces along the route where I train,” Al-Assi said.

He had to suspend his training several times because of military operations in the camp.

“I would return home feeling hopeless because I couldn't do what I had intended to do,” Al-Assi said.

In the West Bank, runners cannot complete a 26.2-mile (42.2-kilometer) course without hitting a checkpoint or military gate, which is why Friday's marathon route looped around the same circuit twice.

They ran up through the narrow streets of two Palestinian refugee camps and down to a farming town next to Bethlehem where fields are divided by the concrete wall, barbed wire and cameras. The course hooked back to finish at Bethlehem’s Manger Square.

Organizers say the race highlights restrictions facing Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, where checkpoints can disrupt even routine commutes and where open land for hiking, biking and running is increasingly taken by Israeli settlements and outposts.

“Marathon runners anywhere may ‘hit a wall’ under the physical and emotional strain of completing the 42-kilometer race course," they said on the marathon's website.

But in the West Bank, they added, "runners literally hit the Wall.”

At a time when the West Bank’s economy is struggling and in the shadow of Gaza's fragile ceasefire and stalled rebuilding efforts, the atmosphere in Bethlehem was celebratory. Crowds gathered near the Church of the Nativity to cheer runners at the race's early morning start and finish. Bagpipes blared and drummers pounded out traditional rhythms through streets along the route.

On a beachside road in Nuseirat in central Gaza — which is roughly the length of a marathon — 15 disabled people, including amputees, ran a 2K, and a couple thousand of people ran a 5K. Thirteen years after the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, canceled a 2013 marathon because Hamas forbade women from participating, the women were back.

Haya Alnaji, a 22-year-old woman who ran in the 5K, said the number of people taking part reflected that Palestinians in Gaza were determined to live and persevere despite the devastation wrought by more than two years of war.

“All of Gaza loves sports,” she said.

Al-Assi was arrested in April 2023, and imprisoned under administrative detention, which allows Israel to hold detainees for months without charge. Between 3,000 and 4,000 Palestinians are being held under that system, according to Israeli rights groups and the Palestinian Prisoners Society.

In October 2023, Al-Assi was sentenced for transferring money to suspicious entities, a charge he denies. Israel closely monitors money transfers — particularly to Gaza — for fear that funds could end up in the hands of militants. Palestinians, however, say donations and charitable contributions are often swept up in the dragnet. Israel’s military, Shin Bet and Prison Service did not answer questions about Al-Assi's charges.

In Israeli prisons — where detainees routinely complain of inadequate diets — Al-Assi said nearly everyone goes hungry. The weight he lost eroded the endurance built through 10 years of training.

“I have more muscle mass than fat, so when I lost weight, the loss came from my muscles rather than fat,” he said. “This had a major impact on my physical fitness.”

He also had to regain the mental fortitude to run a marathon.

“I was emotionally shattered after spending such a long period in prison,” he said.

On Friday, he collapsed to his knees, bowing and thanking God after finishing second overall, as supporters and journalists encircled him. He dedicated his run to Palestinians still in Israeli detention.

“After 32 months in prison, Mohamad Al-Assi is first in his class!” he shouted through tears, raising his hands and looking up to the sky.

__ Imad Isseid contributed from Bethlehem, West Bank and Abdel Kareem Hana from Nuseirat, Gaza Strip.

A Palestinian amputee runner takes part in the 2-kilometer Palestine Marathon along the coastal road near Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip, Friday, May 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)

Palestinian runners take part in the 5-kilometer Palestine Marathon along the coastal road near Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip, Friday, May 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)

Runners participate in the Palestine Marathon in the West Bank city of Bethlehem, Friday, May 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)

Runners pass by Israel's separation wall as they compete in the Palestine Marathon in the West Bank city of Bethlehem, Friday, May 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)

Palestinian Mohamad Al-Assi, who was released from Israeli detention six months ago, runs past Israel's separation wall as he trains ahead of the Palestine Marathon in the West Bank city of Bethlehem, Thursday, May 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Sam Metz)