Return to Transcripts main page
One World with Zain Asher
Deputy Attorney General Speaks on Release of Epstein Files; Deputy Attorney General: We are Releasing More Than 3 million Pages; Justice Department Releasing 2,000 Videos Files from Epstein Files; DOJ Conducting a Civil Rights Probe into Alex Pretti's Death; Justice Department Releasing 3M Pages from the Epstein Files; Bomb Cyclone to Bring Snow and Winds to Southeastern U.S. Aired 11a-12p ET
Aired January 30, 2026 - 11:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[11:00:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN HOST, ONE WORLD: Hello, everyone. Live from New York. I'm Bianna Golodryga.
ZAIN ASHER, CNN HOST, ONE WORLD: And I'm Zain Asher. You are watching "One World". Any moment now, the Deputy Attorney General will hold a news
conference at the Justice Department.
GOLODRYGA: Yeah, soon as Todd Blanche begins to speak, we will bring that to you live. In what could be however, the most important nomination of his
term President Trump has picked Kevin Warsh to be the next Federal Reserve Chairman.
ASHER: Yeah, Warsh served as a Fed Governor back in 2006. He was 35-years- old at the time, making him the youngest to ever serve on the Fed's powerful board. Warsh was formerly an inflation hawk, favoring higher rates
to keep inflation in check. However, he's apparently reversed that stance favoring lower rates.
GOLODRYGA: Yeah. All this comes after months of Donald Trump's frequent attacks on current Fed Chair, Jerome Powell, slamming him for not lowering
rates at a faster pace. Powell's term ends in May.
ASHER: Matt Egan joins us live now with a closer look at the new Fed Chair. I mean, obviously it's been quite a tumultuous year for Jerome Powell. I
mean, Donald Trump has called him everything under the sun, including a numbskull, a moron, a jerk for not lowering interest rates quickly.
At the last Fed meeting, the Fed actually left interest rates unchanged. Wall Street does seem to be, you know, somewhat soothed by this particular
pick. But just walk us through what the risks are here. I mean, obviously he's had a lot of experience.
He seems to sort of be a safe bet for Wall Street, but at the same time, this idea that he could actually potentially try to appease the president
by at least lowering interest rates in the short term. How much -- how much worry is there about that?
MATT EGAN, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Well, Zain and Bianna, I was a little bit surprised in some ways by this pick, just because Kevin Warsh, he's kind of
a traditional pick for a traditional Republican President, right? And President Trump is anything but a traditional Republican president.
When you look at Warsh's background, you mentioned, he's no stranger to the Fed. He's battle tested, right? He was at the Fed during the financial
crisis. He's a conservative fellow at the Conservative Hoover Institution. He worked under George W. Bush. He's got some connections to President
Trump, because his father-in-law is Ronald Lauder, the GOP MAGA donor.
But the problem is, and you sort of hinted at this, he's not really known as a low rates guy. And President Trump, he's been really consistent about
the fact that he wants not just a little bit lower interest rates, not moderately lower interest rates. He wants dramatically lower interest
rates, the lowest interest rates on the planet.
And Warsh is arguably hawkish, the most hawkish of the Fed finalists here. So that's why it is surprising. Bloomberg Economist Anna Wong said that if
Trump wants someone easy on inflation, he got the wrong guy in Kevin Warsh. RSM's Joe Bruce Wallace told me that Warsh's first instinct is hawkish, and
he rarely saw a potential rate hike he didn't like.
Renaissance Macro Research said Warsh's recent dovishness today stems from convenience and the president's risk getting duped. Now, back in April,
2009 just months after Lehman Brothers had imploded minutes from Fed meetings at the time show that Kevin Warsh sounded pretty concerned about
inflation, right? He said that he was more worried about upside risk inflation than downside risk, right?
GOLODRYGA: All right. Matt, we're going to -- we're going to jump in now, because we are going to go to the U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd
Blanche, who is holding a news conference.
TODD BLANCHE, U.S. DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: I'm here today to talk about the department's compliance with its production obligations under the act
around, I think, right now, and continuing throughout the day to day, as the indexing and uploading completes. We are producing responsive materials
under the Act.
We are also releasing today a letter we are transmitting to Congress and various internal protocols associated with our review. I want to take a
moment to thank the professionals at the Department of Justice who met twice daily, sometimes more, for the last 75 days to get to where we are
today.
The leadership teams from the Office of the Attorney General, from the Deputy Attorney General's Office, the Associate Attorney General's Office,
the Criminal Division, the National Security Division, the FBI, the Southern District of Florida, the Southern District of New York and the
Northern District of New York, all gave up many hours every single day, on top of their other, of course, full time obligations to fulfill the
President Trump's promise of transparency to the American people.
[11:05:00]
I also want to thank the more than 500 lawyers and professionals across all those divisions that I just mentioned, and others who worked long, days,
nights, weekends, Christmas, New Year's Eve, New Year's Day, nights, weekends and holidays to complete this production.
These highly trained reviewers spend their careers putting bad guys in jail and effectuating the mission of the department. And to a person, they work
tirelessly to protect victims and comply with the act since its passage. So, thank you to all of them.
Today, we are producing more than 3 million pages, including more than 2000 videos and 180,000 images. In total, that means that the department
produced approximately 3.5 million pages in compliance with the act.
Just a quick note about the videos and images. The 2000 videos and 180,000 images are not all videos and images taken by Mr. Epstein or someone around
him. They include large quantities of commercial pornography and images that were seized from Epstein's devices but which he did not take, or that
someone around him did not take. Some of the videos, though, and some of the images do appear to be taken by Mr. Epstein or by others around him.
Now I want to talk for a few minutes about the department's document identification and review protocols. It consisted of multiple layers of
review and quality control designed to ensure compliance under the act and protect victims.
On top of the review protocols that the department had in place, the United States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York employed an
additional review protocol to ensure compliance with a court order requiring United States Attorney Jay Clayton to certify that with respect
to certain materials, a large quantity of the materials.
A rigorous process was undertaken to protect victims against any clearly unwarranted invasion of their personal privacy. The department's collection
effort resulted in more than 6 million pages being identified as potentially responsive, including Department and FBI, emails, interview
summaries, images, videos and various other materials collected and generated during the various investigations and prosecutions that the act
covered.
We erred on the side of over collecting of materials from various sources to best ensure maximum transparency and compliance, which necessarily means
that the number of responsive pages is significantly smaller than the total number of pages initially collected. That's why I mentioned a moment ago
we're releasing more than 3 million pages today, and not the 6 million pages that we that we collected.
I want to address what we didn't produce. The categories of documents withheld include those permitted under the act to be withheld, files that
contain personal, personally identifying information of victims or victims' personal and medical files and similar files, the disclosure of which would
constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.
Any depiction of CSAM (ph) or child pornography was obviously excluded. Anything that would jeopardize an active federal investigation. And
finally, anything that depicts or contain images of death, physical abuse or injury also not produced.
Although the Act -- although the act allows for withholding for items necessary to keep secret in the interest of national security or foreign
policy, no files are being withheld or redacted on that basis.
Further, as we previously stated in our December 19th letter of last year, the Department withheld or redacted files contained covered by various
privileges, as we always do, including deliberative process privilege, work product privilege and attorney client privilege.
As you all know, under the Act the department must subsequently submit to the House and Senate Committees on the Judiciary report listing all
categories of records released and withheld a summary of redactions made, including legal basis for such redactions and a list of all government
officials and politically exposed persons named or referenced in the act. We will do so in due course, as required under the Act.
I want to talk for just a moment about the redactions that will be obvious to anyone who reviews the materials that we just produced today.
[11:10:00]
In addition to the documentary redactions, which includes personal identifying information, victim information and other privileges, there is
extensive redactions to images and videos. To protect victims', we redacted every woman depicted in any image or video, with the exception of Ms.
Maxwell. We did not redact images of any men unless it was impossible to redact the woman without also redacting the man.
To this end, though, and to ensure transparency if any member of Congress wishes to review any portions of the response of production in any
unredacted form they're welcome to make arrangements with the department to do so, and we're happy to do that.
I want to talk for a minute about something that is important. Every single day of the year, the Department of Justice investigates and prosecutes
those who abuse and traffic young women and children. Just last year, the FBI located over 2700 victims of child exploitation.
The Department of Justice found and terminated 3.8 million Dark Web pedophile accounts. In August, we charged 11 defendants for extensive sex
trafficking in Los Angeles of illegal immigrants and underage women. Last month, we charged five men who were engaged in a sadistic extort sex
torture network of deranged young men abusing women.
Over the past several months, last summer and into the fall, we executed operation restored justice, rescuing 205 child victims and arresting 293
offenders. I point this out because I take umbrage at the suggestion, which is totally false, that the attorney general or this department does not
take child exploitation or sex trafficking seriously, or that we somehow do not want to protect victims. We do.
There are some select members of Congress and some in the public eye, including those most critical of our efforts at full transparency under the
act, who remain silent as to all the work that we have done and continue to do every day in this space.
While quickly pointing a finger at the attorney general or this department, because we were careful in our review of millions of pages of documents
over the past two months. The Attorney General, the Director of the FBI and our partners throughout this administration work hard every single day to
protect the most vulnerable among us.
With the production of this magnitude, mistakes are inevitable. We of course, want to immediately correct any redaction errors that our team may
have made, and so the department has established an email and inbox for victims to reach us directly to correct redactions and any concerns when
appropriate. That's been in existence since December, and we've been doing that since then.
Finally, a very small portion of the documents collected pursuant to the act include materials that a law firm produced to the SDNY in 2019 pursuant
to a grand jury subpoena. This was during the criminal investigation of Ms. Maxwell. We determined it would be prudent to seek an order from the court
in the Southern District of New York seeking production of these materials subject to the protective order in that civil lawsuit.
To that end, the department has filed that motion with the appropriate judge and the SDNY, and if that motion is granted, we'll release those
materials with appropriate redactions immediately.
Today's release marks the end of a very comprehensive documentation, document identification and review process to ensure transparency to the
American people and compliance with the act. The department has engaged in an unprecedented and extensive effort to do so.
After submitting the final report to Congress, as required under the act, and publishing the written justifications for redactions in the Federal
Register, the department's obligations under the under the Act will be completed. I'm happy to take any questions anybody has about that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Todd, I'd like to ask you about this, and I have a Minnesota question for you. On the Epstein release today, it was recently
made public that Ghislaine Maxwell claims more than two dozen men signed secret agreements with the federal government not to be prosecuted. What is
your reaction to that? And what does that mean for her case?
BLANCHE: I read an article that describes -- I wasn't aware that it was actual men that she's claiming. I thought it was accomplices, which I'm not
sure if that's a reference to some of the financial institutions or other individuals.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: 25?
[11:15:00]
BLANCHE: So yes, I don't -- I don't -- I don't have a reaction to her filing. I can tell you that we reviewed, as I just described, every single
piece of paper that we have associated with these investigations, Mr. Epstein and Ms. Maxwell and to the extent that such arrangements exist, I'm
not aware of them.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Move on to Minnesota, if I may ask you really quick, that's in the topic in the headlines right now. There's new video of a man
believed to be Alex Pretti, who's spitting, who's kicking out a tail light of a law enforcement vehicle. Does that change the perception of a
potential DOJ investigation? Is there going to be a civil rights investigation into his death? Where does that land now that that video is
out, that I have a quick follow up on that?
BLANCHE: I don't -- so look, I don't think a single video should change any perception the Department of Justice may or may not have about that tragic
occurrence last Saturday. We said repeatedly over the past week that, of course, this is something that we're investigating, and we are. That's what
we would -- we would always do in circumstances like this.
And so, there's an investigation that's ongoing, which I'm not going to talk about. But just look, the problem is an initial reaction to a
particular video, one or another. You're talking about one that happened apparently some days ahead of last Saturday. It's an investigation.
So, an investigation necessarily means just that. It means talking to witnesses. It means looking at documentary evidence, sending subpoenas if
you have to, and the Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division has the best experts in the world at this. They've been doing it for decades, and
so I expect that investigation will proceed with that -- with those parameters in mind.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you looking at a nexus of left-wing groups this DOJ said that that's something that you guys were concerned about. Are you
following money? Are you looking at a potential that all of this may be related somewhere?
BLANCHE: I mean, yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Attorney General. You said in your remarks that you've withheld some documents because of ongoing
investigations. I've done this long enough to know you can't comment on ongoing investigations.
But can you say a little bit more? Because, as you know, the department has been criticized for not bringing charges against more people. Are there
still open investigations related to Jeffrey Epstein?
BLANCHE: So, what I was laying out in my comments is the statutory, what the statute talks about, about what we can withhold and the reasons we can
withhold it. I wasn't pointing to any particular. I wasn't trying to be coy or otherwise suggest there's some investigation.
As you all know, Jay Clayton in New York is in charge of any potential investigations, and I'm not going to comment beyond that on that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You were referring to Clayton's investigation?
BLANCHE: I wasn't referring to anything. I was just saying that Congress, in their wisdom, allowed us to withhold documents if there were ongoing
criminal investigations. That's one of the four reasons I wanted to make clear, with respect to any national security information that we were not
withholding.
There's not some tranche of super-secret documents about Jeffrey Epstein that we're withholding or actually not withholding anything based upon NDI.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Deputy Attorney General Blanche thank you for your time. Two questions for you. Number one, pushing politics aside and everyone else
aside, some of the victims of Epstein have expressed frustration with the entire process. I want to give you the opportunity to speak directly to
them.
BLANCHE: Well, I don't -- I don't know what you're what you're speaking to. I mean, if there's frustration with quote, the entire process same here. I
mean, you have a situation where for many, many years, nobody even breathed a word about Jeffrey Epstein, and then all of a sudden it was all anybody
would talk about going into the last spring and summer, culminating in the passage of the Transparency Act.
And President Trump has said for years, what I think everybody will find to be exactly true, which is detailing his relationship and lack thereof with
Mr. Epstein, and what he thought about Mr. Epstein and notwithstanding what the department has been saying for a very long time, we're still where we
are today.
Listen, victims of Mr. Epstein have gone through unspeakable pain, and there's nobody that should say anything differently. And I to the extent
that there's frustration, I understand where that comes from, just from what we know about Mr. Epstein. I hope that the work that the men and women
within this department have done over the past two months, hopefully is able to bring closure.
[11:20:00]
I think that what we -- what we told our reviewers, is that that was the goal, you know, there was, there's this mantra out there that, oh, you
know, the Department of Justice is supposed to protect Donald J. Trump, and that's what we were telling that's not true. That was never the case.
We are always concerned about the victims. When we said that we were not legally allowed to release documents, that's a fact. That was true. It
remains true today, and then with the act's passage, we are able now and directed to release documents, which is what we are doing, but, but so
hopefully, hopefully, some of those frustrations are now eased.
Listen, we -- any victim that wants to speak with the department has a -- has done so. Hopefully, if not, they should. The prosecutors from this case
in New York have given hundreds, if not thousands of hours to working with victims, and that's what we do every day, and that's what we did in this
case as well.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you assure -- can you assure the American public that President Trump, like every other prominent person whose name came up
in relation to the Epstein files, that all documents, photos and anything relevant to him connected to the case are being released?
BLANCHE: I mean, yes, I can assure that we complied with the statute. We complied with the act. And there is no -- we did not protect President
Trump. We didn't protect or not protect anybody. I mean, I think that we -- that there's a hunger or a thirst for information that I do not think will
be satisfied by the review of these documents.
And there's, it's not, there's nothing I can do about that. But President Trump, of all the people in Washington, DC and around this country that
have said for years the same consistent message about Jeffrey Epstein is President Trump.
And so, there's not been a change of course or anything. And certainly, his direction to the American people in the Department of Justice, sorry, his
direction to the Department of Justice was to be as transparent, release the files, be as transparent as we can. And that's exactly what we did.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Clarify your remarks on the Alex Pretti killing. Are you saying that the Justice Department has opened a civil rights
investigation into a state investigation into his death?
BLANCHE: Yes. Yeah. I mean, look, and I know there's a lot of -- there's been a lot of discussion among the media around that, but just think about
what that means. All that that means is that DHS, as they've -- as the Secretary has said, is conducting an investigation as they should, and as
they do every time there's a tragic event like this.
And the FBI in their role, which is a separate role from DHS, is also take looking into it and conducting the investigation. And that's not -- that
shouldn't be treated as making news. It's just we've said that for a week, and it remains as true today as it was last Sunday when I said it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two questions for you, one on topic and one. Two questions for you, one on topic and one separate on topic. Do you have any
information that you could just share? Because 3 million documents is a lot for people who are watching this at home. Are there any new names or new
people, public people in positions of power, who you're department found in his filings?
BLANCHE: I don't have anything to share about what's new or not new. And there's -- no, I don't have anything to share about that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And to follow up on that. Do you have a reaction to the arrest of Don Lemon overnight?
BLANCHE: Reaction to what?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To Don Lemon's arrest overnight?
BLANCHE: Do I have a reaction to it? I don't know what that means. What are you looking for me to do? Jump up and down. No, I don't have a reaction to
it. I don't know that his -- the charges are unsealed yet. So no, I can't, I'm not going to comment on that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you. You said this is the end of the Epstein of your review of the Epstein files. So just to clarify, are -- is the public
going to learn the identities of the men who abuse the girls with the information that you're releasing. And if not, why not? And then I have a
quick follow up.
BLANCHE: You just baked in an assumption into your question that I have never said and I don't know to be true. Is the public going to learn about
men that abuse these girls? Like, what does that mean? I understand what that means.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I mean, they're the men who abuse the young women through Epstein's --?
BLANCHE: We said in July, and it remains as true today as it was in July. If we had information, we meaning the Department of Justice, about men who
abused women, we would -- we would -- we would prosecute them, right? We talked about the work that we're doing. That's why I said that.
There's -- that I said this earlier. There's this built in assumption that somehow there's this hidden tranche of information of men that we know
about, that we're covering up, or that we're not -- we're choosing not to prosecute. That is not the case. I don't know whether there are men out
there that abuse these women. If we learn about information and evidence that that allows us to prosecute them, you better believe we will.
[11:25:00]
But I don't think that the public or you all are going to uncover men within the Epstein files that abuse women unfortunately.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just to follow up on the investigation into Federal Chairman Jerome Powell is the Justice Department -- what's the status of
that investigation now that President Trump has nominated a new Fed Chair? Are you -- is the Justice Department looking to bring a close to the
investigation into Chairman Powell as soon as possible.
BLANCHE: I don't have a comment on that, on the subpoenas that were issued. I don't think the timing of President Trump's decision to nominate somebody
is a controlling factor in any investigation.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, I just wanted to follow up on Alana's (ph) question. So, you're saying that the shooting investigation of Alex Pretti
is now a civil rights investigation. You're saying, you're implying that that's always been the case. Can you also say has that -- what about the
shooting of Renee Good? I mean, is she -- is that why or why, or why not is that a civil rights investigation?
BLANCHE: I didn't say it was always the case. I said it's the same thing that we said as of last Sunday, as with respect to last weekend. There are
thousands, unfortunately, of law enforcement events every year where somebody is shot.
The Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice does not investigate every one of those shootings. There has to be circumstances or facts, or
maybe unknown facts, but certainly circumstances that warrant an investigation.
So, when we talked about -- when I talked about last weekend, and when others have talked about this week, the fact that President Trump has said
repeatedly, of course, this is something we're going to investigate, that's what I meant about what we're doing.
It doesn't mean that every time that there's a federal officer related shooting that that's something civil rights takes up. It depends on the
circumstances.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Follow up on that. Can you just, I know you can't be specific about details of the investigation, but can you, kind of just
characterize the scope of the Pretti investigation, what kinds of things that they'll be looking for?
BLANCHE: Well, I mean, it's an investigation, so what do we think we're looking at? We're looking at everything that would get shed light on what
happened that day and, in the days, and weeks leading up to what happened. And that's like any investigation that that the Department of Justice and
the FBI does every day.
It means we're looking at videos, talking to witnesses, trying to understand what happened. I mean, you're talking about an incredibly tragic
morning. And then trying to unwind and investigate that is it takes a lot of time. I'm not going to prejudice what they're doing or not doing by
laying any, you know, any markers. But I expect that the folks that are doing this are the most experienced in this space and are doing that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So, to follow up on that, how would a civil rights investigation work with DHS taking the lead, which is what was said over
the weekend? And our prosecutors in Minnesota I mean, who is involved in this?
We know that there's a lot of frustration within the department, both in Minnesota and the Civil Rights Division, that they feel they are not being
brought in, and they are the experts here. So just to follow up, how would this work with DHS taking the lead, and who is from DOJ involved in this
investigation?
BLANCHE: I don't think that. Look, I think anytime there's a every single federal agency, including DHS, as a process that they use when there's
something that happens, an internal review investigation, however you want to -- want to call it, that's what DHS was doing, as they do every single
time something like this happened.
There was nothing unique to these facts. There might have been outsized focus on it because of what happened, but DHS was doing an investigation. I
don't know that that will stop. I don't expect that investigation to stop because we're investigating, and, of course, we're coordinating with them.
We're not -- there's nothing -- we're not working against them or but it's an -- it's -- there's, I suppose, potentially separate goals, or potential
goals in the two investigations. I mean, DHS is conducting an investigation, and then the FBI conducts an investigation. It's not as if
one goes one way and one goes the other, but they are their own, their own investigations.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Very clearly, said on Sunday that HSI is leading the investigation. He did not want to overstep and say anything. Was that not
true anymore, or was that true at the time?
BLANCHE: I don't -- I don't think it's fair to say whether it's true anymore, OK. And I don't think it's also -- I don't want to say who's lead
or not lead. I don't even really know what that means in the course of an investigation. There's the FBI is investigating. They are, for sure,
coordinating with Secretary Noem and her folks as well.
And I expect DHS is also continuing their investigation to some extent, and there's outside folks on this.
[11:30:00]
This happens, like I said, thousands of times a year. And it is tragic every single time it happens. And it's tragic this time like it's tragic
every other time. And so there is a process that has to be allowed to play out internally with these law enforcement organizations, and certainly with
the FBI as well, to allow this investigation to go on.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You talked about the expectations surrounding the Epstein files. Do you agree that the DOJ itself? Senior officials at the
DOJ played up those expectations for the first half of this year? I'm just sort of trying to understand what responsibility does the Justice
Department have for the criticism that has come over the handling of the Epstein files?
BLANCHE: I'm not commenting on criticism. People can criticize all they want. My point was just to make plain that when it comes to what we've been
doing the past two months and why we weren't able to complete the review of 6, over 6 million pages OK.
So, you're talking about two Eiffel Towers, OK? Of pages in 30 days, in a way that made sure we complied with the act, right? So, the act had
multiple requirements, get it done in 30 days, and you better not release any victim information, all right. So, there's a lot of statutory
construction.
There's a lot of case law that exists that says that if those two are in conflict, we obviously are not violating the 30-day requirement by taking
our time to comply with the act. And so, my comments were directed at this idea that because we didn't review the six plus million pages within 30
days.
Somehow the Attorney General doesn't care about victims, or is further doing damage to victims because of that, because exactly the opposite is
true when it comes to the Attorney General.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sir, I have questions on Epstein and Minnesota. First on Minnesota. For transparency would you commit to releasing the body cam
video from federal officers that was involved in that shooting and their names at a point when the investigation can allow that? Would you make that
public? And I did not hear clarity on whether Renee Goods' case is also in civil rights realm?
BLANCHE: I'm not committing to anything with respect that investigation that would be completely unfair to the investigation itself, for me to
stand here and, you know, commit to something for any reason, it just -- it depends, it depends on what happens with the investigation.
And that's decision that was made by the folks that are working the investigation as it relates to Ms. Good. I don't -- like I said before,
there's investigations that happen all the time with respect to shootings like what happened last Saturday, and cases are handled differently by this
department depending on the circumstances.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sir, on Epstein, sir, if I may just ask one on that please? You mentioned a letter to Congress. How and to whom did you notify
the White House about the production that you're announcing today, before you came out and spoke to us?
BLANCHE: How did I do it?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Notify the White House? What was your interface with the White House? You said there's a letter to Congress. Who did you update
at the White House about this?
BLANCHE: Well, I don't know. I don't really understand the question you mean, who did I update?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yeah, did you provide them an explanation of what today's release would be?
BLANCHE: Look, we -- my team, has certain communications with the White House. Let me just be clear. They had nothing to do with this review. They
had no oversight over this review. They did not tell this department how to do our review? What to look for? What to redact? What to not redact?
They absolutely knew that we were -- I was doing this press conference today, and that we're releasing the materials today. But there's not,
there's no oversight by the White House into the process that we've undertaken over the past 60 days.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I wanted to ask a question about the evidence in the Alex Pretti investigation. Early on, our reporting showed that the only
type of evidence that the FBI initially had in its possession that it was processing for ballistics and DNA, et cetera, was Pretti's firearm.
It did not have the firearm, the two firearms that were used to shoot Pretti those of -- those were in the hands of HSI. And also, there were
concerns about chain of custody, things not being properly bagged and tagged, et cetera. Where are the guns now?
Are they in the FBI's possession and being reviewed at one of their labs? And where -- who has the phone that Pretti was using and filming, and is
that going to be reviewed by the FBI?
BLANCHE: I don't know. I don't have an answer to those questions. Look, I think that there's Secretary Noem is been clear with the American people,
but also with the Department of Justice that we're doing this together. We're coordinating, and so I'm not -- I am not following the in the weeds
about who actually has possession of the firearms that were -- that were discharged.
[11:35:00]
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And the FBI would need in order to conduct a thorough investigation into a color -- this is obviously a color --?
BLANCHE: When I said I didn't know, I wasn't being critical of the question. I was just simply saying I don't know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On the Fulton County seizure of ballots. Local officials there, election officials say those materials were set to become public by
February 9th, and that the Justice Department could have simply asked for them.
Why was it necessary to conduct a search warrant? And do you expect the affidavit in that search warrant matter to become public anytime soon? Or
do you have any comment or explanation as to why that was necessary?
BLANCHE: Listen, I'm not going to comment on it's a criminal investigation. I'm not -- I will not comment on it. I will say that that it should be no
surprise to many of this room that or anybody watching that election integrity is extraordinarily important to this administration. Always has
been and always will be.
And so, the fact that President Trump and this administration are investigating to make sure that well, are investigating issues around
elections to make sure that we do have completely fair and appropriate elections should not be surprising. But I can't comment on any criminal
investigations here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To follow up on that regarding Fulton County. Can you explain Tulsi Gabbard's role? Could you please explain Tulsi Gabbard's role
in DOJ activity regarding the Fulton County search?
BLANCHE: What do you mean her role?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was reported that she was --
BLANCHE: She happened to be present in Atlanta. I mean, yes, I saw the same photos you did. I mean, she's not -- she doesn't work for the Department of
Justice or the FBI. She's an extraordinarily important part of this administration. This administration coordinates everything we do as a
group.
And so, I think her presence shouldn't be there -- shouldn't be questioned, of course, and that's a big part of her, of her job. And so, the fact that
she was present in Atlanta that day, you know, is something that shouldn't surprise anybody. All right, just two more go ahead.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just following up on that. So are you saying that Gabbard's appearance in that area had nothing to do with Justice Department
action.
BLANCHE: Most certainly did not say that. No, I did not say that. I said that exactly the opposite. I said this administration works closely
together in all kinds of different areas. And so, the -- I'm not sure if they're surprised at the -- that the administration is working together on
things like election integrity.
But if there is surprise, let me unequivocally state we are working together as an administration on election integrity type issues. And so
that's all I can say about that. All right, one more.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you clarify who at the Justice Department is involved in the Pretti investigation? Is that the Civil Rights Division? Is
it the U.S. Attorney's Office in Minnesota?
BLANCHE: So, I want to be careful about, I want to choose words carefully about involved. Investigations like this are led by law enforcement. So
that's the FBI. There's coordination with the civil rights with Harmeet Dhillon's group, and there's trial attorneys there that have this is their
lives. They've done this for decades.
And so, to the extent there's questions during an investigation that require a trial attorney to weigh in, or if you need a civil rights
attorney to draft a search warrant or help with an investigative process. I expect the Civil Rights Division here at main justice will be part of that
effort.
But I don't -- I don't want to overstate what's happening. There's -- I don't want the takeaway to be that there's some massive civil rights
investigation that's happening. This is a -- what I would describe as a standard investigation by the FBI, when their circumstances, like what we
saw last Saturday.
And that investigation to the extent it needs to involve lawyers at the Civil Rights Division that will involve those. All right, thanks a lot
everybody, I appreciate --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- the same kind of investigation.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you have comment on the career prosecutors that are resigning in Minneapolis?
GOLODRYGA: All right, you've been listening to a press conference there by the Deputy U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche announcing what he says marks
the end of the review process with regards to the Epstein files.
The DOJ releasing 3 million additional pages of documentation, as they have collected over the years, related to Jeffrey Epstein. They released 2000
videos, 180,000 images. Notable that the Deputy AG said that they were not working to protect President Trump and the release of these files and the
White House had nothing to do with this process.
[11:40:00]
CNN is currently combing through the 3 million documents as we noted, the 2000 videos, 180,000 images, and we will bring you more information as we
learn about that. But he also laid out some of the guidelines in terms of what's not included here, and that includes some of the redacted
information.
And he said, what is redacted and what they did not produce were personally identified information with regards to the victims, women. No women's
photos were released. They redacted every woman except for Ghislaine Maxwell. They did not redact photos of men. And then they also said, and
this was interesting, our Paula Reid actually asked him about this. They redacted anything that would jeopardize an active federal investigation.
So, with that, I want to bring in Former Miami Dade Court Judge Jeff Swartz, who's been listening to this press conference with us. Jeff, he
went through a lot of topics, a lot of information as it relates to Jeffrey Epstein and the investigation.
Now we know an open civil rights investigation into the shooting death of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. Want to cover all of this with you, but first
your reaction to this news with regards to the 3 million documents released in the Jeffrey Epstein investigation. Jeff, we can't hear you. Can you hear
us better? No -- can we hear you? No, we do not.
ASHER: -- to get --
GOLODRYGA: All right, we're going to go to commercial break right now and come back and try to reconnect with Jeff Swartz.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ASHER: All right. Just before the commercial break, we were indeed listening to a press conference from U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd
Blanche, where he, for roughly about 40 minutes or so, explained that we would be getting essentially 3 million pages of documents pertaining to
Jeffrey Epstein.
This is part of the act that Congress passed back in December. The Epstein Files Transparency Act. There has been so much pressure placed on the Trump
Administration to get some transparency about these documents. That act was passed in December and Tom Blanche, you see on your screen there, really
spent about 40 minutes or so explaining that what was in these documents and the strategy behind.
Some of the redactions we would be seeing. I want to go back to Jeff Swartz, hopefully we do have better audio this time. Jeff, can you hear us?
[11:45:00]
JEFF SWARTZ, FORMER MIAMI-DADE COUNTY COURT JUDGE: I can hear you, and hopefully you can hear me.
ASHER: Yes.
SWARTZ: -- they can't hear me.
ASHER: I was going to say that you know, public trust has been quite low. I mean, we had a lot of pressure on the Trump Administration, including among
a lot of Republicans and including members of Donald Trump's base, who put pressure on him for months.
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Representative Tom Massie, putting pressure on Trump for months to release these documents. Todd Blanche talked about the
strategy behind some of the redactions. He talked about the fact that women, or women, obviously, all victims would be redacted.
The men would not. One reporter did ask, I thought, an important question, whether or not we would be learning the names or the identities of some of
the men who might have been involved here? I mean, obviously there has been so much controversy around Prince Andrew, for example, some of the
associates that Jeffrey Epstein had, other men who may have interacted, may have had sex with, some of these underage girls.
Todd Blanche sort of seemed to sort of shrink away from that question. But walk us through what you anticipate to be the level of transparency that
we're going to be getting here.
SWARTZ: I don't think it's going to be as great as Mr. Blanche tried to create it to be. I think that there's 3 million other documents out there,
and I'd love to know what's in them, but we're not going to find out at this point. They're hiding behind the idea of ongoing investigations.
Everything involving Epstein took place in the early 2000s. I don't know where there would be anything that is not violative of the statute of
limitations in charging anybody new. The fact that they are redacting if they did redact the names of men, and he seems to indicate that they have.
He says, you know, you're not going to see all these men's name -- the names of people that have been disclosed publicly as being involved. So,
it's going to be interesting to see if people whose names have been disclosed publicly are somehow missing out of the FBI 302s, or the other
reports that have been issued out of these 3 million documents.
It's going to take a lot of searching to find what you're looking for. And I think there's the other documents are really more telling than the ones
you see.
GOLODRYGA: Jeff, if we can go back to the question I initially asked you before we lost connection with you. And that is that what has been redacted
and not released is anything that would jeopardize an active federal investigation. We don't know what is currently under active federal
investigation. How much cover does that give the DOJ?
SWARTZ: It gives it a great deal of coverage, as long as there really is an active investigation somewhere in here. I don't know where this active
investigation is, since the statute of limitations is run on these kinds of charges.
So, I'm trying to figure out unless they're going to charge some sort of long-term conspiracy that's been ongoing, but remember that sort of died
with Ghislaine Maxwell when she was convicted. So, I have no idea what active and he won't even disclose whether there is one or not which he's
not supposed to do. But he's intimated it by the things that he said for non-disclosure.
ASHER: Jeff, he talked about the importance, and I think we can all agree on this, on protecting the victims and protecting their privacy, and that
is why, obviously, a lot of the names are going to be heavily redacted. But I think one of the things that, I think is really important to note is that
victims' interests are not monolithic.
I mean, obviously, some victims, of course, want privacy. Some victims want to make sure that they're not re traumatized by ongoing media coverage.
Some victims want finality. Some victims want transparency. How do -- when you have a situation where there are so many diversifying interests among
the victims themselves, then how do you determine, from a legal perspective, what is in the interests, best interests of the victims?
SWARTZ: Well, the first thing you have to do is contact the victims and find out what they do or do not want disclosed. And they -- because they
know they're in these reports. They know that they're disclosed somewhere in -- they've been interviewed. They've chosen, many of them not to want to
be part of prosecutions going all the way back to the Southern District of Florida's investigation that we won't talk about today was a nothing
burger.
But the fact of the matter is that they know who they are, making a phone call to them and saying, what do you want to do? Are you represented by
counsel? Will call your lawyer. What do you want? Do you want to be disclosed or not disclosed?
The ones that have made it clear that they don't mind being disclosed are the ones who are named in indictments and or charges because they've
already made that point that they don't mind being disclosed. It's not hard for them to do so. I think that's really all it's involved. They can't
disclose names if the victims say, I don't want anything to do with this.
[11:50:00]
GOLODRYGA: Jeff, can I ask you two quick questions? One, as it relates to what we just heard from the Deputy Attorney General, how much should we
read into that actually coming from him, as opposed to the Attorney General herself, Pam Bondi, given all of the scrutiny and criticism she's received
with how she's handled this case?
Right before her deputy came out to speak, she posted on X about the arrest of our former colleague Don Lemon, saying that came at her direction. So,
she's clearly very active right now. Just seems interesting that she's passed this issue on to her deputy.
And second, if you can pick up on his response when asked about the role of DNI Director Tulsi Gabbard in the FBI raid yesterday in Georgia, the Fulton
County Election Office?
SWARTZ: OK. Let's do the last one first. And I'll talk about Tulsi Gabbard. I think that someone brought out earlier in the program, before yours,
something that I had pointed out, and that was that she had no business being there. She's the DNI. She's in charge of, basically, intelligence,
foreign intelligence, not domestic intelligence.
She shouldn't be involved in that investigation at all. What she was doing there was that this was done at her behest, as best we've been able to
determine so far, and she wanted to be involved in the search. There she had no business being there this. This is basically classic Tulsi Gabbard.
And she wants to get back in good with Donald. And so, as a result of which, she wants to be involved in that investigation and make it something
about her. There's no foreign intelligence role that we are aware of at this point. Now, as to your first concern, if I can remember what the
question was, I think that we're talking about a situation. Well, I kind of lost my train of thought -- what was the other thing, Bianna?
GOLODRYGA: -- that it wasn't Pam Bondi who was speaking today at this press conference announcing the release of what they said, 3 million pages the
end of the review process. This is something that she'd been spearheading until obviously, she's not.
SWARTZ: Right. She's not because I think she's kind of in the same position as Kristi Noem. I think that the situation is that they don't want her to
be the face of this release. She doesn't do well with the press. She's far more confrontational than Blanche is.
And I think the idea that the Deputy Attorney General who was heading up this so-called screening of the information probably was the best face they
could put on it. If I had to grade his performance versus her performance is in the past. He's the right guy to be out there right now.
He deals with the press far better. He's less confrontational. I thought that that's the reason why they just don't want her to be the face of this
release. She's made too many mistakes up to this point.
ASHER: All right Jeff Swartz, live for us. Thank you for your perspective. Appreciate it. We'll be right back with more after the short break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[11:55:00]
ASHER: All right, a powerful mix of snow winds and flooding are expected to pound parts of the Southeastern United States this weekend.
GOLODRYGA: The system is called a bomb cyclone. We've used that phrase before. It's a low-pressure system that sucks in very cold air and
strengthens as it moves like a snowy hurricane. More than 28 million people are under winter storm watches and warnings from Georgia to Virginia.
ASHER: Yeah, our producers in Atlanta are going to be in for this weekend.
GOLODRYGA: No one's having fun. All right, stay with us. Hopefully you're warm inside watching. We'll have more "One World" after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
END
