Epstein files fight leads US House to start break early
The move averts a push by Democrats and some Republicans for a vote on a bipartisan resolution to require the Justice Department and FBI to release all government documents on Epstein, who died by suicide in prison in 2019.
"What we refuse to do is participate in another one of the Democrats' political games. This is a serious matter. We are not going to let them use this as a political battering ram," House Speaker Mike Johnson, of Louisiana, told reporters.
Many of President Donald Trump's supporters who embraced a slew of conspiracy theories surrounding Epstein saw their hopes raised when the administration vowed to release a slew of new documents on the case, only to backtrack and say it had concluded that there was no evidence to support the theories.
That opened a rare breach between Mr Trump and parts of his Make America Great Again base of support.
Majorities of Americans and Republicans say they believed the government is hiding details on the case, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling.
On Monday, Democrats sought to use a House Rules Committee meeting to force a vote on the Epstein resolution introduced by Republican Representative Thomas Massie and Democratic Representative Ro Khanna.
The panel serves as gatekeeper for floor-bound legislation.
Republicans instead suspended the hearing, preventing the panel from approving bills for floor consideration this week.
The House had been expected to hold the week's final votes tomorrow.
But House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, the chamber's number two Republican, told reporters there would be votes on yesterday and today for less important legislation considered under suspension of the rules.
A subcommittee of the House Oversight Committee voted to subpoena Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite and Epstein's longtime girlfriend, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence after being convicted of sex trafficking in 2021.
Under mounting pressure from Trump supporters for the release of material, Attorney General Pam Bondi has asked a federal judge to unseal grand jury transcripts in the cases of both Epstein and Maxwell, who was convicted in 2021 of five federal charges related to her role in Epstein's alleged sexual abuse of underage girls.
Trump accuses Obama of treason
The early recess of Congress comes as Donald Trump accused former President Barack Obama of "treason", accusing him, without providing evidence, of leading an effort to falsely tie him to Russia and undermine his 2016 presidential campaign.
A spokesperson for Mr Obama denounced Mr Trump's claims, saying "these bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction."
While Mr Trump has frequently attacked Mr Obama by name, the Republican president has not, since returning to office in January, gone this far in pointing the finger at his Democratic predecessor with allegations of criminal action.
During remarks in the Oval Office, Mr Trump leaped on comments from his intelligence chief, Tulsi Gabbard, on Friday in which she threatened to refer Obama administration officials to the Justice Department for prosecution over an intelligence assessment of Russian interference in the 2016 election.
She declassified documents and said the information she was releasing showed a "treasonous conspiracy" in 2016 by top Obama administration officials to undermine Mr Trump, claims that Democrats called false and politically motivated.
"It's there, he's guilty. This was treason," Mr Trump said, though he offered no proof of his claims.
"They tried to steal the election, they tried to obfuscate the election. They did things that nobody's ever imagined, even in other countries."
An assessment by the US intelligence community published in January 2017 concluded that Russia, using social media disinformation, hacking and Russian bot farms, sought to damage Democrat Hillary Clinton's campaign and bolster Mr Trump.
The assessment determined that the actual impact was likely limited and showed no evidence that Russia's efforts actually changed voting outcomes.
A 2020 bipartisan report by the Senate intelligence committee had found that Russia used Republican political operative Paul Manafort, the WikiLeaks website and others to try to influence the 2016 election to help Mr Trump's campaign.
"Nothing in the document issued last week (by Gabbard) undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes," Obama spokesperson Patrick Rodenbush said in a statement.
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