A group of Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse victims made impact statements in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday morning ahead of a House vote to force the Justice Department to release all of its files related to the disgraced sex offender, with whom U.S. President Donald Trump was friends for a time.
Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a mouthpiece of the MAGA movement whose relationship with the president has ruptured in recent weeks, told reporters, “Hell has frozen over,” while introducing the group of female victims. Some of them said they voted for Trump and chose to address him directly, while others encouraged leaders to put politics aside.
While speaking, Greene and the victims stood behind a sign reading “Epstein Files Transparency Act,” a reference to the bill being voted on today in the House that, if passed there, by the Senate and signed by Trump, would require the Attorney General to release all documents related to Jeffrey Epstein publicly.
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“These women have fought the most horrific fight that no woman should have to fight. And they did it by banding together and never giving up. And that’s what we did by fighting so hard against the most powerful people in the world,” Greene said before several victims took their turns to speak.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., speaks during a news conference at the U.S. Capitol, Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2025, in Washington.
AP Photo / Jose Luis Magana
Haley Robson, who says Epstein abused her as a teenager, urged elected officials to address sexual misconduct against underage girls and women, regardless of party lines.
“It’s time that we put the political agendas and party affiliations to the side. This is a human issue. This is about children. There is no place in society for exploitation, sexual crimes, or exploitation of women in society,” she told reporters.
Robson, who said she is a Republican, noted Trump’s absence at the gathering.
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“To the president of the United States of America, who is not here today, I want to send a clear message to you,” she said. “While I do understand that your position has changed on the Epstein files, and I’m grateful that you have pledged to sign this bill. I can’t help to be skeptical of what the agenda is…. I am traumatized. I am not stupid. I am traumatized. I am not stupid.”
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Robson claimed that the delayed swearing-in of Arizona Rep. Adelita Grijalva, who provided the final signature on the petition that triggered the upcoming vote to release the Epstein files, was a tactic to drive the president’s “self-serving” agenda following the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.
The president continues to insist that the push to release the Epstein files stems from a Democrat-orchestrated hoax to distract from the successes of his presidency — despite mounting pressure from within his own party to unseal them and his sudden agreement to support a vote to do so.
“We have nothing to hide, and it’s time to move on from this Democrat Hoax perpetrated by Radical Left Lunatics in order to deflect from the Great Success of the Republican Party,” Trump wrote on social media late Sunday.
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While Trump has never officially been accused of wrongdoing in the Epstein case, he has frequently been associated with the convicted sex offender, who died in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges. Their relationship is well-documented, with the two appearing together at social events in the 1990s and early 2000s.
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Trump’s name, along with those of many other high-profile individuals, is also written multiple times on flight logs for Epstein’s private plane in the 1990s, though he denies ever having been onboard.
American financier Jeffrey Epstein (left) and Donald Trump pose together at the Mar-a-Lago estate, Palm Beach, Fla., 1997.
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Robson closed by urging Congress to side with victims of sexual abuse, suggesting that many of the women in attendance feel betrayed by the promise of their country.
“This is America. This is the land of the free,” she said. “I do not feel free today. I do not know if the women behind me feel free.”
“I am begging every member of Congress, every representative, to step up and choose the chaos. Choose the survivors, choose the children, protect the children. All children. You protect all of us equally.”
Lisa Phillips, another of Epstein’s victims, said, “America is finally united on the immediate release of the entire Epstein files.”
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“In a divided nation, this is one demand we all share,” she continued, adding that survivors of abuse can no longer wait to be taken seriously.
“For too long, survivors have watched others speak for us. And while we are grateful for our allies in Congress on both sides, we’ve realized something. This fight belongs to us. We lived it, and we know the truth. And we will not wait quietly for institutions to decide when we’re allowed to speak.
“The survivors now coming forward have entrusted us with their stories.”
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She added that she and others like her were “laser-focused” on exposing “silencing mechanisms that have protected predators for far too long.”
Jena-Lisa Jones, a woman who Epstein victimized at the age of 14, echoed the bipartisan sentiments put forth by Robson and Phillips.
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“This is not a Democratic issue. It is also not a hoax. We are here as American survivors of a man who used his wealth and power to hurt young girls and women,” she said, before calling attention to a system that “catered to (Epstein)” and failed his victims.
Jones also accused the president of weaponizing the release of the files in an attempt to bring down Democrats who may be named in them.
“I beg you, President Trump, please stop making this political. It is not about you, President Trump,” she said. “You are our president. Please start acting like it. Show some class.
“I voted for you, but your behaviour on this issue has been an international embarrassment.”
The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to vote on Tuesday about releasing the Epstein files in full.
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