Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) pushed back against Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) after the latter said that Democrats were trying to stop the release of the “Jeffrey Epstein files,” the list of associates who patronized his sex trafficking ring.
The dispute burst into the open in the confirmation hearing of Kash Patel, who is President Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Blackburn asked Patel whether he would released the files, and he said that he would make the details of the case public.
In the course of her question, she said that Durbin and former FBI director Christopher Wray had stonewalled inquiries.
Durbin pushed back, claiming that he had championed the cause of sex trafficking victims, and that he had been “falsely accused” by Patel of trying to prevent the release of the files. He claimed that Blackburn had “never raised…
