Women who survived abuse under Jeffrey Epstein have released a powerful video urging House Republicans to vote to release all of the files in relation to the late convicted pedophile.
Staring directly into the camera, the group of women held up photos from when they allegedly first met the sex offender as teenagers and said it was “time to bring the secrets out of the shadows” in a last-minute call to action ahead of Tuesday’s House vote.
The public service announcement was released Sunday evening by World Without Exploitation, a group that campaigns against sexual exploitation.
“I’ve suffered so much pain,” one of the survivors says in the one-minute clip as the women share how old they were when they forst allegedly met Epstein: 14, 16, and 17.
“This was me when I met Jeffrey Epstein,” says another survivor, holding up a photograph of her as a teenager.
“There are about 1,000 of us,” another woman says.
“It’s time to bring the secrets out of the shadows, it’s time to shine a light into the darkness,” another says.
“Five administrations and we’re still in the dark,” the video says, urging viewers to call their members for Congress and “demand” their vote in support of a measure that compels the Department of Justice to release all files in its possession.
“The survivors believe this vote offers an opportunity to stand firmly on the side of protecting minors from abuse,” according to Lauren Hersh, national director of World Without Exploitation.
“They want the public to see how gaps in the system allowed a predator to operate for years and to understand what must change to prevent that from happening again,” she said.
Survivor Annie Farmer, who is featured in the video, said she wanted to remind the public that the issue is not a political one.
Farmer, who testified at Ghislaine Maxwell’s 2021 sex trafficking trial, and her sister, Maria Farmer, have previously spoken publicly about their experiences with Epstein.
“Please remember that these are crimes that were committed against real humans, real individuals. This is not a political issue,” Annie Farmer told NBC News. “This has been going on for decades.”
She told the network that her sister had reported the alleged abuse during the Clinton administration and said that “mistakes were made” under the subsequent Bush administration.
“So many things have happened over the decades that were law enforcement failures in this case,” she said.
Epstein survivors have been calling for action for decades but interest in the case was reignited after the Justice Department and FBI released a memo in July effectively drawing the investigation to a close and claiming that no further public disclosures were warranted, despite pledges from Donald Trump throughout his campaign and pressure from his allies.
That decision sparked outrage, including among Trump’s supporters.
Far-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has become embroiled in a bitter feud with Trump over her refusal to back down in calling for the release of the documents, pledged her loyalty to Epstein survivors over the weekend.
The Georgia congresswoman shared a letter purportedly signed by more than two dozen survivors that thanked her for “standing up against the intimidation, silencing and abuse that Epstein survivors have endured for decades.”
“I want to thank the courageous women who are Epstein survivors that wrote this beautiful letter of support for me,” Greene said Saturday in a post on X. “I’ve got your back!”
Trump, meanwhile, has publicly questioned why anyone is still interested in Epstein while insisting that the push to release the documents is a “hoax” and part of a Democratic-led smear campaign against him.
He once again appeared frustrated with the pressure ahead of the House vote when asked about the matter Sunday night as he made his way back to Washington, D.C.
“Well, I don’t want to talk about it because fake news like you,” Trump snapped at a reporter who asked him about the Epstein controversy. “You’re a terrible reporter ... and fake news like you they keep bringing that up to deflect from the tremendous success of the Trump administration.”
