A congressperson investigating the Jeffrey Epstein case accused the former prince, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, of “hiding” from his committee’s request to sit for a deposition, as Congress moves closer to a key vote on forcing release of US government files related to the alleged sex trafficker.
Suhas Subramanyam is among the Democratic members of the oversight committee in the House of Representatives who earlier this month asked Mountbatten-Windsor to sit for a deposition as part of its investigation into how the government handled the case against Epstein, who died while awaiting trial in 2019.
Mountbatten-Windsor, whom King Charles stripped of his royal title amid concern over his friendship with Epstein and an allegation of sexual assault by Virginia Giuffre who said she was trafficked by the late financier, has not responded to the request, Subramanyam told the Guardian on Monday.
Mountbatten-Windsor “has been hiding from us, and I think he will continue to try to hide from people doing meaningful investigations of this matter”, Subramanyam added.
The request from the committee’s Democratic minority came after UK trade minister Chris Bryant said that, “just as with any ordinary member of the public”, Mountbatten-Windsor should honor requests from American lawmakers to testify.
The congressperson spoke days after the oversight committee’s Republican leader released more than 20,000 emails obtained from Epstein’s estate that detail his connections with Donald Trump and other powerful figures worldwide. Among the revelations in the documents was that Mountbatten-Windsor kept in touch with the late financier for longer than was previously known.
“It seems like every time we find more evidence, Prince Andrew seems to be in the documents. And so I think if he is hoping that the story will just go away by ignoring us and being silent, he will be sorely disappointed as we continue to pursue this over the next year and beyond,” said Subramanyam, who has represented a northern Virginia district since the start of this year.
He acknowledged that his options for compelling Mountbatten-Windsor’s testimony were limited. Republicans hold the majority in the House, and none signed the letter asking Mountbatten-Windsor to testify. Even if the Democrats retake control of the chamber after next year’s midterm elections, Mountbatten-Windsor can’t be subpoenaed because he is a foreign national, Subramanyam said.
Mountbatten-Windsor is not the focus of the oversight committee’s investigation, which grew out of the furor that erupted among Trump’s supporters in July, when the justice department announced that the Epstein case was closed. But Subramanyam said that Mountbatten-Windsor’s name keeps coming up, which means the pressure he is under to talk to the investigative panel is not going away.
“Even if Andrew doesn’t voluntarily come forward, there may be others who are close to him who may come forward as well and provide us information,” he said, adding that those parties could be asked “formally” to testify to the oversight committee in the future.
“I think the documents have given us a lot of information over the past six months, and we’re going to continue to press on with finding evidence and let the evidence do the talking. And so far, the evidence keeps talking about Andrew,” he said.
The House is expected to on Tuesday vote on legislation to compel release of US government files related to Epstein. Trump had opposed the legislation, but Democrats along with four dissident Republicans gathered enough signatures on a petition that forced the vote, over the objections of speaker Mike Johnson, an ally of the president.
On Sunday evening, Trump reversed course and called on the lower chamber to approve the bill. Subramanyam predicted it may pass with a “close to unanimous vote”, but its prospects in the Senate are unclear.
The Democrat said he expected the president to “put a lot of pressure on” the Republican majority to scrap the legislation, which would require his signature to take effect.
“The victims have been so strong and outspoken and courageous about this, and the general public is fed up with the Trump administration about this,” Subramanyam said.
“And so I think the more public pressure there is, the more of a chance we could see this happen in the Senate.”
