Epstein survivors accuse Blanche of 'gaslighting' in opposition letter

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(NewsNation) — Survivors of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein have continued to voice their opposition to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s confirmation to hold the position permanently after former United States Attorney General Pam Bondi was fired in April.

Survivors wrote a letter to Sens. Thom Tillis and John Cornyn — two Republicans who have not vocalized support for Blanche — urging them to vote against his confirmation to the position. 

“Under Todd Blanche’s leadership, the Justice Department released survivors’ names, identifying information and images while the names of alleged abusers and enablers remained hidden. More than a thousand women and girls were abused, yet no one beyond Epstein and (Ghislaine) Maxwell has been prosecuted,” the letter stated.

Jess Michaels, who alleged she was first abused by Epstein in 1991, met with Blanche on Thursday with five other fellow survivors and Virginia Giuffre’s family.

“Our meeting with Todd Blanche only happened because Sen. Tillis held his ‘vote’ over Todd Blanche’s head. He was forced to meet with crime victims,” Michaels told NewsNation on Tuesday. “In our meeting, he expressed a complete lack of remorse regarding the damage done to survivors who had their private identifying information exposed, would not commit to looking for missing files we told him about, and explained we would need to go back to the FBI, tell our stories again to them and bring them the files we want them to look. He said, ‘I’m just the Attorney General. I can’t subpoena or prosecute.'”

Michaels continued, “When Sen. Tillis urged Blanche to meet, I believe he wanted Blanche to have a meaningful meeting, not a check the box/respond to an ultimatum.  A vote for Blanche is a vote against survivors of the largest sex trafficking scandal in history.”

The letter said the survivors’ meeting with Blanche was “an hour of deflection, interruption and gaslighting. Todd Blanche showed no remorse for the horrific release of materials that exposed survivors’ identities and images.”

“It was unbelievable how uninterested he was in anything we asked of him,” Michaels said. “He was condescending and patronizing.”

Epstein victims say they were retraumatized by DOJ files release

In February, Danielle Bensky, a 2004 Epstein survivor, told NewsNation that seeing her name unredacted in the documents was retraumatizing. 

“It has outed those who never wanted to be public and has exposed all parts of many of our lives,” Bensky said. “Survivors have worked for years to move on from the inexplicable horrors of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. They exploited us as children, and now this DOJ furthers that harm by unsealing our scars.”

Additionally, the letter read that Blanche gave no indication there were “investigative leads worth pursuing, or that he intended to seek accountability beyond Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.”

Under Bondi’s leadership at the Justice Department, Blanche met with Maxwell, who is currently serving a 20-year federal prison sentence on sex trafficking charges.

Shortly after Maxwell’s meeting with Blanche, she was moved to a minimum security prison — Federal Prison Camp Bryan, in Texas.  

The DOJ released 16 audio recordings and four transcripts from Blanche’s meetings with the imprisoned Maxwell on July 24 and 25.

Attorney Arick Fudali, who represents several Epstein survivors, told NewsNation, “Todd Blanche and this DOJ have shown nothing but disregard and even contempt for the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein. The document roll-out has been a disaster at best and the survivors have had enough. Anyone involved in such a gross display of both incompetence and fealty to Trump does not deserve to be Attorney General of the United States. I stand with the survivors.”

Vice President JD Vance told Joe Rogan earlier this month the Trump administration “absolutely screwed up” the communications surrounding the Epstein files. 

“I say this with all candor we absolutely screwed up the comms of the Epstein files, like we just did. But do I think the reason we screwed up the comms is because we were trying to hide something? No,” Vance told Rogan. 

The Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication.

Diana Falzone is the senior national investigations reporter at NewsNation Digital, covering the federal government, warzones and top-level criminal investigations.  

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