Woke Squad member grilled by CNN about why she only became interested in Epstein files after Trump was re-elected
'If you see such a need to investigate this, why didn't you raise it during the Biden administration?' the persistent anchor asked. 'We couldn't find that you made any public comments about [Jeffrey] Epstein in previous administrations.'
Jayapal, a member of the House Judiciary Committee, offered a bumbling answer in response. She claimed to have consistently sought to hold all presidential administrations accountable without mentioning Jeffrey Epstein.
Brown, also CNN's chief investigative correspondent, wasn't buying it.
She asked again why Jayapal 'didn't... call for more transparency earlier, during the Biden administration?'
'I'm just trying to better understand why you're so intent on calling for this.
Jayapal again did not respond with a direct answer.
Instead, visibly annoyed, the rep said: 'Well, I think I gave it the same focus that I'm giving it now,' as Democrats continue to weaponize the Epstein case against Donald Trump.
'We haven't - you know, I think I've released one tweet on this, and you wanted to talk about it,' Jayapal stammered. 'So I'm happy to talk about it here, but it certainly hasn't been the focus.
'I'm just responding to what I think is a massive switch from the Trump administration around this issue.
'But yes, I think that this information should have been released under the Biden administration,' the Washington Democrat admitted.
'It should be released under the Trump administration.'
Earlier on, Brown had asked Jayapal if she supported the idea of having Maxwell come and publicly testify before Congress as calls of a cover-up - now coming from both sides of the aisle - continue to reverberate.
'Absolutely, Pamela,' replied Jayapal, who would likely be one of the members questioning Maxwell if she were to talk.
'We think that the files should be released. We should have testimonies from Maxwell. This is something that Trump supporters, for years, called for.'
Jayapal then turned to the topic of the administration's abrupt about-face, which had spawned descension amongst conservative for its insistence that there was no Epstein client list and that the financier did in fact kill himself in August 2019.
The determination deviated starkly from Trump's repeated promises for transparency during his 2024 campaign - an inconsistency Jayapal and fellow 'Squad' members such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have sought to seize on.
'And now all of a sudden, the Trump DOJ, Trump himself is refusing to provide the kind of transparency that he was calling for before he knew what was in the files,' she said, before suggesting Trump may have links to Epstein.
'And so that leads to the question of what are they trying to hide?
'And I think there should be transparency, regardless of who is implicated,' she maintained.
That's when Brown, the anchor of the Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer, pointed out that this was the first she's heard from the rep on the matter. Jayapal has been in office since 2017.
On July 7, the DOJ announced that the long-awaited 'client list' linking figures to Epstein did not exist, after AG Pam Bondi just months bragged on Fox News that the list of alleged, potential accomplices was 'sitting on [her] desk right now to review.'
That same month, in February, the White House released a compilation of Epstein documents that turned out to contain no new information.
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