Republicans are stopping votes on legislation over fear Democrats will bring in Epstein amendments

The Jeffrey Epstein case has President Donald Trump and Republican leaders in Congress under pressure from Democrats and the Maga base. Photo / Doug Mills, the New York Times

The House has largely come to a halt as Republican leaders struggle to assuage an irate group of lawmakers who are demanding that the Justice Department release files related to deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The House will adjourn tomorrow, a day earlier than expected, for its month-long recess from Washington after Republicans blocked any legislation from reaching the chamber floor for a vote this week.

Republicans on the House Rules Committee - which is the last stop before legislation hits the House floor - have for the second week in a row refused to meet, in fear of retaliation from constituents and members of the Maga base who want the Trump Administration to release the files.

Democrats on the panel have repeatedly dared Republicans to vote against amendments that, if adopted by the House and Senate, would force the Justice Department to release all documents related to Epstein and jump-start oversight investigations in the GOP-led House.

Representative Ralph Norman (Republican-South Carolina), a member of the House Freedom Caucus who sits on the Rules Committee, said voting on Democratic amendments “is not a good use of our time”.

Rules Committee chairwoman Virginia Foxx (Republican-North Carolina) told reporters today that the panel may not meet again until “possibly” September, meaning the House will not vote on any legislation this week that isn’t overwhelmingly bipartisan.

Moments later, the leadership announced that the House would start its August recess tomorrow.

House Republican leaders’ inability to quell the rebellion from within their own ranks is the latest example of how the controversy related to Epstein continues to haunt the GOP after years of promising their base that a Trump Administration would shed light on the matter.

The outrage from supporters began earlier this month after President Donald Trump’s Justice Department said the matter was effectively closed, forcing congressional Republicans to grapple with the blowback from the base.

Republicans do not appear likely to let the issue go upon their return from their August break, as Representative Thomas Massie (Republican-Kentucky) tees up a vote that would force a vote in the House, rebuking leadership’s wishes, and Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (Republican-Georgia), a key Trump ally, said “the call volume on Epstein” to her congressional and district offices “has almost been 100 percent”.

Other House Republicans are also being asked about the matter back home. Representative Glenn Grothman of Wisconsin said in an interview with a conservative home-state radio host last week that lawmakers have to “keep pushing” the Administration until the files are released, “unless there’s somebody who Trump wants to protect”.

Asked today if he stood by his comments about pushing for the release of records, Grothman said he rarely hears from constituents about Epstein and that he’s “not going to push at all against President Trump”.

The anxiety for congressional action culminated in Representative Tim Burchett (Republican-Tennessee) motioning the House Oversight Committee to subpoena testimony from Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s former girlfriend and a convicted sex offender now serving time in federal prison.

The motion was unanimously adopted, and chairman James Comer (Republican-Kentucky) is expected to seek a subpoena “as expeditiously as possible”, according to his spokesperson.

“I want justice for those thousands of young ladies who were abused, and I want the dirt bags of the world to know that we’re not going to tolerate it,” Burchett said.