Kash Patel says White House followed the law in releasing Epstein files - despite blowing deadline by two months

The Department of Justice was ordered to release all documents related to the pedophile financier and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell by December 19, as part of the Epstein Files Transparency Act

Kash Patel says the Trump administration has produced as many of the Epstein files as it “legally and lawfully could” despite missing a court-ordered release deadline by more than two months.

“Three other administrations had the opportunity to do this, and we produced everything we legally and lawfully could,” Patel said, speaking to Fox News’ Bret Baier Tuesday.

“We work with our partners in Congress. We follow the statutes and the court orders, and we produce, what, three million-some pages. So I think we got to the result in the right way.”

The Department of Justice was ordered to release all documents related to the pedophile financier and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, by December 19, as part of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, signed in November.

The deadline was missed by the government, though some of the material handed over to the House Oversight Committee by the Epstein estate was released in late December. Over 3.5 million pages, videos, and images were released by the DOJ last Friday, January 30.

Kash Patel says the Trump administration has produced as much of the Epstein files as it ‘legally and lawfully could’ despite missing a court ordered release deadline by more than two months (REUTERS)

Asked whether he felt the administration could have released the files faster, Patel echoed the sentiment, adding: “I’m not really sure because of numerous court cases, multiple protective orders, multiple court ceilings.

“Now we’ve produced everything we can while protecting victims’ rights and following the law.”

However, as well as missing the legal deadline, critics have pointed to the DOJ’s poor handling of the release, including the brief publication of many un-redacted and explicit photographs on its website, which is available to the public following an easily passable age-verification check.

Some of the images appeared to show young women, and possibly teenagers, with Epstein.

It comes despite the fact that the department previously blamed the missed deadline on the volume of material and the need to redact survivors' identifying information.

As well as missing the legal deadline critics have pointed to the DOJ’s other poor handling of the release, including the brief release of many un-redacted and explicit photographs on its website, which is available to the public following an easily passable age-verification check (Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)

“The Department now has taken down several thousands of documents and media that may have inadvertently included victim-identifying information due to various factors, including technical or human error,” the DOJ wrote in a letter to two U.S. District Court judges with the Southern District of New York on Monday.

In addition, despite the mammoth amount of information that has now released, almost 3 million files still have not been.

Despite this, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who announced the release of the documents on Friday, acknowledged that there were still around three million files missing, but doubled down on the DOJ’s work.

“Today’s release marks the end of a very comprehensive document identification and review process to ensure transparency to the American people and compliance with the act,” Blanche said.

“After submitting the final report to Congress, as required under the Act, and publishing the written justifications for redactions in the Federal Register, the department’s obligations under the Act will be completed.”