Last November, Congress passed a law ordering the Justice Department to release its files on Jeffrey Epstein. It passed the House 427 to 1.
Ten months later, the department says it has put out only about half of the roughly 6 million pages. Epstein's victims have accused Attorney General Todd Blanche of dragging his feet, and a federal judge has threatened him with contempt if the department misses court deadlines, the Kansas Reflector reported on Monday.
So Reps. Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna wrote a second bill — the Epstein Files Transparency Act II — that would let victims, lawmakers and states sue the Justice Department for illegally hiding Epstein records. It stalled in committee. The only way around House leadership is a discharge petition: once 218 members sign, the House has to vote.
Derek Schmidt, the Kansas Republican who represents the 2nd District, won't sign it.
"I prefer to work with the leadership"
Schmidt explained why at a recent town hall, the Reflector reported:
"I have not yet signed a discharge petition on any subject since I've been in Congress. I prefer to work with the leadership to get items scheduled on the floor."
He went further. Members join these petitions, he said, "not only because they care about an issue, but because they want to render the place nonfunctional. They want to basically hijack the ability of the (House) speaker and the leadership to control the floor schedule and to do that, usually, for political reasons."
That's how a congressman describes the petition that gave the country the first Epstein law — the same law he now says the Justice Department should obey. When that petition was open in 2025, the only member of Kansas's House delegation to sign it was Democrat Sharice Davids. No Kansas Republican did.
It got to 218 anyway
On Thursday, September 17, Massie and Khanna announced they had commitments for 218 signatures, enough to force the vote. Two Democrats who were out sick, Khanna said, will sign the day the House comes back. Every Democrat is on board. So are four Republicans who agreed to sign: Massie, Ralph Norman and Nancy Mace of South Carolina, and Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania.
Schmidt was not one of them.
There's a catch. House leaders had already cut the week short, and the House isn't back until after the November 3 election. So Kansans will vote on Schmidt before the House votes on the Epstein files.
"I'd probably vote for it"
Schmidt's defense is that he cares about the result, just not the method. At the town hall, he said he'd "probably vote for" the new bill if it reached the floor. And he said the Justice Department should simply follow the law it already has:
"I'm not sure we have to have another law. What we have to have is DOJ follow the one we've got. Don't make us pass another law. Just release what you've got."
But the Justice Department has had ten months to "just release what you've got," and it hasn't. New Mexico had to sue the department to get records for its own investigation of alleged sex crimes at Epstein's ranch. The new bill exists precisely because asking nicely didn't work — and the only thing that gets it to the floor is the petition Schmidt won't sign.
"Probably" voting yes on a bill he refused to help bring to a vote costs him nothing. That vote won't come before Election Day.
Schmidt is a former Kansas attorney general — the state's top law enforcement officer. His office didn't respond to the Reflector's calls and emails about the Epstein files.
His Democratic opponent, Don Coover, called on him to sign. "Once again, Derek Schmidt decided to stand behind D.C. insiders covering up the Epstein files instead of standing with survivors of sexual abuse," said Coover spokesperson Lily Johnson.
What we know
The Justice Department has released about half the Epstein files a 2025 law ordered out. Every House Democrat and four Republicans backed a petition to force a vote on a second bill giving victims the power to sue for the rest. Derek Schmidt refused, telling constituents he has never signed a discharge petition and prefers to "work with the leadership" — the same leadership that has kept the bill off the floor until after the election.
Source
Kansas Democrat Don Coover objects to U.S. Rep. Derek Schmidt's approach to unreleased Epstein files — Tim Carpenter, Kansas Reflector, September 21, 2026. Photo: Tim Carpenter/Kansas Reflector.
