WASHINGTON — Republican members of Mississippi’s congressional delegation have declined to call on the Justice Department to release the Jeffrey Epstein case files, labeling the push to unveil the information to the public a political distraction propagated by Democrats and opponents of President Donald Trump. 

In interviews with Mississippi Today at the U.S. Capitol last week, Reps. Mike Ezell and Trent Kelly, both former law enforcement officials, said those who committed crimes in relation to the Epstein case should be prosecuted. But they stopped short of calling for the Justice Department to release the tranche of case files from the sex trafficking investigation into Epstein, the late billionaire financier.

Epstein was accused of paying underage girls hundreds of dollars in cash for massages and then molesting them. He was accused of running a sex trafficking cabal serving mega-wealthy power brokers across the globe. In 2019, he committed suicide in prison while facing federal sex trafficking charges. Conspiracy theories and outrage have swirled around Epstein since his death.

The files have become a political headache for Trump, who has downplayed his connections to Epstein.   

Public fascination with the case reignited after Attorney General Pam Bondi suggested she had an Epstein “client list” on her desk, but then didn’t release documents with any new information. Many Trump supporters and Democrats alike want the government to release the Epstein files, but to their chagrin, administration officials have insisted there’s nothing more to disclose.

Ezell, a former Jackson County sheriff, stopped short of calling for the Justice Department to unveil the files, but he said the attention around the issue would lead to their eventual release. 

“I would expect them to be released. But I’ll tell you this, I just don’t think this needs to be some kind of major priority,” Ezell said. “You know, there are just so many bad things going on right now. And what I think this Epstein thing is is a distraction, a political distraction.”

If the files include incriminating information on Trump, those details would likely have already come to light amid scrutiny of Trump, he said. 

“You know what the FBI did during Trump’s first administration, when he was running for office,” Ezell said. “If there had been anything in there negative with Donald Trump’s name on it, it would have been all over the front page. So I feel reasonably sure that these things will be released at some point in time.”

Last week, Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released a sexually suggestive letter to Epstein purportedly signed by Trump. The president has denied signing the letter and has sued The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times for their reporting on it.

Rep. Trent Kelly, a former district attorney in northeast Mississippi, also declined to come out in favor of releasing the files, citing a process he said had become politicized.   

“You know, I wish they had asked four years ago — they had four years.” Kelly said of the recent push from Democrats. “Personally, I think everybody who’s involved in any way should be prosecuted, but I think most of that is just for political purposes and political purposes only, and I don’t think they truly care about the victims of those cases.” 

Kelly added that he was interested in the contents of the files as a private citizen, but also said Epstein paid the price for his crimes. 

“As a regular person, am I interested? Yes. (But) I think we’re spending a whole lot of time on things for political purposes,” Kelly said. “What are we making better? What is made better, whether they’re disclosed or not disclosed? … I mean, (Jeffrey Epstein) is about as accountable as you can get. He’s no longer here. He was sentenced to prison, and he died there.”

Rep. Bennie Thompson, the lone Democratic member of Mississippi’s congressional delegation, did not respond to a request for comment, but he has signed a petition seeking to force a House floor vote on the release of the files. 

Michael Guest, a former district attorney for Madison and Rankin counties, declined an interview with Mississippi Today last week, and his office did not respond to a question about the congressman’s opinion on the release of the files. 

Guest, however, did tell Mississippi Today at the Neshoba County Fair in July that the Justice Department should release all of the files. 

In a narrow vote last week, Senate Republicans defeated a legislative maneuver by Democrats to insert language into Congress’ annual defense authorization bill that would have forced the public release of the Epstein files. 

Mississippi Sens. Roger Wicker and Cindy Hyde-Smith both voted with all but two other Republicans to defeat that effort by Democrats. Neither Wicker nor Hyde-Smith’s offices responded to requests for comment on their votes against the measure.