When Maria Farmer discovered that her younger sister Annie had been subjected to a topless massage at Jeffrey Epstein’s ranch in New Mexico almost 30 years ago, she went to the FBI.
Nearly a decade before investigations first began into the wealthy financier’s predatory behaviour towards underage girls, Farmer filed a complaint in 1996 reporting Epstein’s fondness for “child pornography”.
Nothing happened. In the years that followed, as evidence of Epstein’s abuse began to tumble out, Farmer has complained that the FBI never even acknowledged the existence of her original report.
That changed on Friday night, as Donald Trump’s justice department released a trove of files from criminal investigations into the late paedophile financier. Among more than 300,000 documents was Farmer’s complaint, dated 3 September 1996, alleging that Epstein had stolen photos of her sisters, aged 16 and 12.
The handwritten report includes the blunt warning: “Epstein is now threatening [Farmer] that if she tells anyone about the photos he will burn her house down.”
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When a New York Times reporter contacted Farmer after the release on Friday, she wept. “I’ve waited 30 years,” she said. “I can’t believe it. They can’t call me a liar any more.”
Farmer said she felt vindicated but distraught that the government had not acted to stop Epstein in the 1990s, saving hundreds of young women from abuse.
“They should be ashamed… They harmed all of these little girls. That part devastates me,” she said.
For other victims, there was only disappointment and frustration at the cache of heavily redacted documents that revealed little new about Epstein’s crimes or the powerful men who moved in his orbit.
For Trump and his administration, there were renewed allegations of a cover-up as the president vainly tries to quash speculation about his friendship with the notorious US sex offender that has dogged his first year back in the White House.
Instead, the release appears certain to sustain the clamour for full publication of the unredacted files and ensures that the scandal will pursue the president into 2026 and the midterm election campaign.
Trump had fought to block the release of the files altogether before a rebellion within his own Republican party saw Congress pass legislation last month that forced the justice department to release the Epstein files within 30 days.
On the campaign trail last year, Trump promised to release the files, fuelling the conspiracy wing of his Maga base. His U-turn since taking office has enraged many supporters who believed he would expose a “deep state” cabal of paedophiles at the heart of the ruling US elite.
Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, a former loyalist who fell out with Trump after leading the Grand Old party revolt in Congress, accused the president of betraying his supporters. At a rally on Friday night, Trump again denounced Greene as a “traitor”.
“The whole point was NOT to protect the ‘politically exposed individuals and government officials’. That’s exactly what Maga has always wanted, that’s what drain the swamp actually means,” Greene fired back on X. “It means expose them all, the rich powerful elites who are corrupt and commit crimes, NOT redact their names and protect them.”
Trump’s name was scarcely mentioned in the files, which included photos of politicians, pop stars and former British royalty. One troubling allegation did slip through, however, with court documents claiming that Epstein introduced Trump to a 14-year-old girl at his Mar-a-Lago club during the 1990s.
“This is a good one, right?” Epstein allegedly said to Trump, gesturing to the girl, referred to as “Jane Doe”. She would later allege that Epstein groomed and raped her at his New York townhouse.
“Trump smiled and nodded in agreement,” the court documents allege of the meeting. “They both chuckled and Doe felt uncomfortable, but, at the time, was too young to understand why.”
Trump has denied any wrongdoing or knowledge of Epstein’s crimes. He and the deceased financier were close friends for many years before a falling out in the early 00s.
The first batch of documents appeared calculated to embarrass Democrats. White House officials gleefully took to social media, posting photos of Bill Clinton in a hot tub and seated with a young woman whose face was blacked out.
There was further humiliation for Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, with a string of photos revealing how the former prince had ushered Epstein and his girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell into British high society.
The trio were pictured in a box at Royal Ascot and enjoying hunting trips to Balmoral. One photo showed Andrew wearing a tuxedo and lying across the laps of several women whose faces were redacted.
Democrats and Republican rebels are considering articles of impeachment against Pam Bondi, the attorney general, for failing to comply with the law and release all the files by Friday’s deadline.
Ro Khanna, the California Democrat who co-wrote the legislation requiring full disclosure of all the Epstein files by Friday and forced Trump into an embarrassing climbdown, said he was exploring legal avenues to find the justice department in contempt of Congress, “or referring for prosecution those who are obstructing justice”.
Inevitably, however, the focus will now fall back on Trump himself. The president ignored the Epstein release during his speech in North Carolina on Friday night as he tries to push past the scandal amid mounting public criticism of his handling of the economy.
The president’s approval rating has slumped as prices and unemployment continue to rise, threatening disaster for Republicans at next year’s midterms.
“If those names aren’t coming out, then the whole exercise is just a cover-up,” said Sky Roberts, the brother of Virginia Roberts Giuffre, one of Epstein’s most prominent victims, who killed herself earlier this year.
“I feel like we’re still getting the same runaround we were getting before,” Roberts said in the Atlantic. “They’re kind of slow-rolling it and keeping what they want to keep from us.”
Photograph by Heather Diehl/Getty Images