FBI director claims ‘no credible information’ says Epstein trafficked women, blames an ‘original sin’ made justice difficult

FBI Director Kash Patel told U.S. senators on Tuesday morning that there is “no credible information” in case files that Jeffrey Epstein trafficked young women to anyone other than himself. If you’ve been following the Epstein case at all, this news is probably going to surprise you. This all came up during a really heated hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee, where Republican Louisiana Senator John Kennedy asked Patel about the Epstein files he’s seen.

The committee’s questioning of Patel comes amid increased scrutiny of his leadership of the FBI and his handling of the investigation into the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk last week. Kennedy and other senators were really pushing for more transparency from the FBI, especially after the Department of Justice decided not to publish the highly anticipated documents on the case.

It’s been a big deal, with a lot of people wanting to know the truth about what happened and who else might have been involved. “You’ve seen most of the files. Who if anyone did Epstein traffic these young women to, besides himself?” Kennedy asked Patel, per Newsweek. It’s not like we’ll ever see the files from the bigger case, with how often they get blocked from public view.

FBI Director is saying that Epstein was not a trafficker to anyone but himself

Patel’s response was pretty straightforward, saying, “Himself. There is no credible information, none. If there were I would bring the case yesterday that he trafficked to other individuals. And the information we have, again, is limited”. Kennedy followed up, asking if the answer was “no one?” and Patel again responded, “For the information that we have. In the case files”.

Kennedy, on the other hand, was pretty quick to point out that this explanation wasn’t likely to satisfy a lot of people. He was pretty clear about the main issue for the American public. “This issue is not going to go away,” Kennedy said. “The central question for the American people is this: They know Epstein trafficked young women for sex with himself. What they want to know is whether he trafficked them to anyone else”.

To be fair, the available case files are pretty limited. Patel noted that they only contain “limited search warrants” from 2006 and 2007 because federal prosecutors in Florida had previously struck a deal with Epstein that let him avoid prosecution for his earlier crimes. However, this plays into the idea that there is no client list.

It’s a frustrating situation because previous testimonies from Epstein’s victims have already suggested that they were trafficked for other individuals, and a lot of the talk recently has centered on an alleged client list that names people who were said to have been involved. The fact that so many federal files are still hidden from public scrutiny is a really big problem for a lot of people who were promised they’d be released.

In another part of the hearing, Democratic Illinois Senator Dick Durbin asked Patel about reports that any mentions of President Donald Trump had to be flagged by FBI officials. Patel pushed back hard on this, saying that the FBI had worked with the Department of Justice to ensure transparency for the American people.

It all comes down to what Patel called the “original sin in the Epstein case,” which he said was the way it was initially handled back in 2006. Patel said, “The original case involved a very limited search warrant, or set of search warrants, and didn’t take as much investigatory material as it should have seized. If I were FBI director back then, it wouldn’t have happened”.