What is in the new Epstein photos released ahead of US Justice Department transparency deadline

Committee Democrats said the release was meant to increase public transparency around Epstein’s network and activities.

What is in the release

The latest batch includes 68 photographs. Among them are images showing sentences from the novel Lolita written in black ink across different parts of a woman’s body, including her chest, foot, neck and back.

Other images show redacted identification cards and passports of women from countries including Russia, Morocco, Italy, the Czech Republic, South Africa, Ukraine and Lithuania.

One photograph shows a screenshot of a late-night text conversation discussing the sending of “girls” for someone identified as “j”, with a price of $1,000 per person.

The release also includes photographs of Epstein with several high-profile figures, including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, academic and political activist Noam Chomsky, former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, and former Alphabet executive Sergey Brin.

Representatives for Gates, Chomsky and Bannon did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Earlier releases by the committee included images featuring US President Donald Trump. Trump previously dismissed those images as “no big deal”.

Democrats say aim is transparency

Democrats on the House Oversight Committee said the photos were chosen to give the public a representative look at the material provided by Epstein’s estate.

In a statement, they said the images were released “to provide the public with transparency into a representative sample of the photos” and “to provide insights into Epstein’s network and his extremely disturbing activities”.

They added that they still hold thousands more images, which they described as both “graphic and mundane”, and said these are continuing to be reviewed.

California Representative Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the committee, said the latest release raised fresh questions about what material remains undisclosed.

“As we approach the deadline for the Epstein Files Transparency Act, these new images raise more questions about what exactly the Department of Justice has in its possession,” Garcia said. “The DOJ must release the Epstein files now.”

Photos released ahead of DOJ deadline

The photo release comes just before a legal deadline requiring the Justice Department to publish unclassified files from its own investigation into Epstein.

Under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the department must release those records by Friday. The scope of what the files contain is not publicly known, and significant redactions are expected.

The White House said the latest release by Democrats did not change the administration’s position.

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said President Trump had “been consistently calling for transparency related to the Epstein files” and said his administration had already delivered on that promise.

Epstein died in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges.