'Release The Files!': Jamie Raskin Skewers Trump Over Epstein Files Controversy

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During a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) spoke about Jeffrey Epstein.

Transcript

00:00Thank you, Dr. Ronder. I now recognize the ranking member of the whole committee, Mr. Raskin.

00:09Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ambassador de Baca, is there anything illegal about not-for-profits

00:15spending money on a priority that a government agency or department also has? And I'll give you

00:21an example. The Gates Foundation has spent $30 billion to advance vaccines, both research and

00:29spreading vaccines around the world. USAID spent $3 billion over the last decade on that. Is that

00:37either illegal or unusual, that you would have a convergence of the not-for-profit philanthropic

00:43sector with a governmental priority? It's not illegal, and in fact, it is a best practice so that

00:48you can extend both the governmental and the philanthropic spending. And presumably, we could

00:54expect the same thing under R.F. Kennedy Jr., who opposes vaccines. He opposes vaccine

00:59research. He wants to stop vaccine programs. And presumably, he's going to, all of the same

01:05people that he just packed the advisory committee with, will be getting grants to go and try to stop

01:12vaccine research. And as our colleagues constantly say, that's elections count. Elections matter,

01:17and R.F.K. Jr. is in there. So there's not much that can be due about it. We can have a hearing

01:22lamenting it and bewailing it. I'd much rather have money going into promoting vaccine research

01:28and distribution than opposing it. But that's the difference between our two parties. Is there

01:33anything illegal about people in not-for-profits going to work in the federal government in a new

01:38administration? No, sir. In fact, a great example of that is this guy, Ed Martin, who was for a while

01:47the acting U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia. They were forced to withdraw his nomination when

01:52it turned out that his close friend is a neo-Nazi who dresses up like Adolf Hitler. And they just

01:59switched over to appointing him to a non-confirmable position in the Department of Justice, believe it or

02:04not, running the task force on weaponization. But in that event, he ran something called the Patriot

02:10Freedom Project, which is a 501c3 not-for-profit organization that supported January 6th

02:16defendants and their families, more than 100 criminal defendants, including people who

02:20violently assaulted our police officers, wounding them, injuring them, disfiguring them, permanently

02:27disabling them. And then he went into the government, and he's got close ties. In fact, he dismissed

02:33some of the prosecutions against these people, and they have fired lots of January 6th prosecutors.

02:39That looks like a really tight little revolving door channel, and it's not just him. In fact,

02:44they hired an actual January 6th insurrectionist who was convicted of crimes to go work for him at

02:53that same entity in the Department of Justice. As much as we might hate it, as much as we might think

02:58the American people should know about it, that the criminals in this soft-on-crime administration

03:03are taking over at the Department of Justice, it's hard to say that there's anything illegal about it,

03:09right? So if somebody goes from working at the Gates Foundation or the Open Society Institute

03:15at the State Department, is there anything illegal or criminal about that? Is there anything that

03:20should cause public alarm in the way these gentlemen are trying to stimulate it?

03:24No, sir. Well, in fact, is there anything illegal about the government, if it's spending funds

03:35appropriately, giving to organizations that other people disagree with? I think some of the witnesses

03:41were saying the vast majority of people disagree with it, which, of course, our colleagues would answer

03:45by saying that's what elections are for. In other words, we've elected a particular government. Now, I'll give you an

03:50example of that. I just looked it up. $434 million has gone in the first Trump administration, and I'm sure more

03:58will flow now, to crisis pregnancy centers, okay, who, from our perspective, lure young people in and give them

04:07distorted or tilted information about abortion. And I'm sure that's what they say about Planned Parenthood, okay? That's

04:13politics. People have different perspectives on things. About hundreds of millions, presumably billions of dollars

04:18are going to go to the crisis pregnancy centers, which a lot of people think are completely

04:22objectionable. Is that illegal because some other people disagree with it?

04:27It is not. It's not illegal. It's not criminal. This hearing is just weird. It's just people getting up

04:33and complaining about things that happen under administration they disagree with when the

04:38administration they agree with is doing the exact same thing on a mirror image basis. But there's

04:43something that everybody here, at least I used to think, agreed with, which is let's release the

04:50Epstein files. That guy is a child sex offender who's convicted of it and then took his life before

04:58the larger trial could take place. His associate, Ms. Maxwell, is in jail for 20 years. The whole country

05:05is saying release the files. That's what Donald Trump said. That's what J.D. Vance said. That's what the

05:10attorney general said. That's what the FBI director said. And now suddenly they want to sweep the whole

05:14thing under the rug. Why don't we have a real hearing with real government officials talking

05:19about the government and talking about a real investigation with the real problem, which is

05:24the nationwide crisis in the sexual abuse of children and human trafficking. Why don't we do that?

05:29I yield back to you, Mr. Chairman.

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