By Matt Spetalnick
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday urged his fellow Republicans in Congress to vote for the release of files related to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, reversing his earlier resistance to such a move.
Trump's post on his Truth Social came after House Speaker Mike Johnson said earlier that he believed a vote on releasing Justice Department documents in the Epstein case should help put to rest allegations that Trump had any connection to Epstein's
abuse and trafficking of underage girls.
"House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide," Trump wrote on Sunday night. "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, including our recent Victory on the Democrat 'Shutdown'."
Although Trump and Epstein were photographed together decades ago, the president has said the two men fell out before Epstein's convictions. Emails released last week by a House committee showed the disgraced financier believed Trump "knew about the girls," though it was not clear what that phrase meant.
Trump, who has recently dismissed the Epstein files as a Democratic smear campaign, has since instructed the Department of Justice to investigate prominent Democrats' ties to Epstein.
The battle over disclosure of more Epstein-related documents, a subject Trump himself campaigned on, has opened a rift with some of his allies in Congress.
Many of Trump's most loyal supporters believe the government is withholding sensitive documents about Epstein, a convicted sex offender who died by suicide in jail in 2019, that would reveal the late financier's ties to powerful public figures.
Trump late on Friday withdrew his support for U.S. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, long one of his staunchest supporters in Congress, following her criticism of Republicans on certain issues, including the handling of the Epstein files.
U.S. Representative Ro Khanna, a California Democrat and an original sponsor of the petition calling for a vote on the files' release, said on Sunday that he expected more than 40 Republicans to vote in favor.
Republicans hold the majority in the House, with 219 seats, versus 214 for Democrats.
(Reporting By Matt Spetalnick; Editing by Christian Schmollinger, Sergio Non and Saad Sayeed)
