Bondi says the FBI withheld information
Bondi responded to the criticism by promising to release more documents, which she said the FBI had withheld from her office.
She said in a statement that after the Justice Department had received approximately 200 pages of documents, she was "informed of thousands of pages of documents related to the investigation and indictment of Epstein that were not previously disclosed."
Bondi tasked FBI Director Kash Patel with investigating why the request was not completed in full, and asked the FBI to deliver the remaining documents by 8 a.m. on Friday. It is not immediately clear whether the FBI has met that deadline; the agency has not returned NPR's request for comment.
Many of the conservative figures who had received binders similarly placed the blame on the FBI and the Southern District of New York, accusing them of defying Bondi's orders.
"These swamp creatures at SDNY deceived Bondi, Kash, and YOU,"
Wheeler tweeted.
Patel posted
on X Thursday that the FBI is entering a new era in which there will be "no cover-ups, no missing documents and no stone left unturned," promising that "anyone from the prior or current Bureau who undermines this will be swiftly pursued."
"If there are gaps, we will find them. If records have been hidden, we will uncover them," he added. "And we will bring everything we find to the DOJ to be fully assessed and transparently disseminated to the American people as it should be."
