Former Attorney General Pamela Bondi appeared for a closed-door interview with a House panel Friday over the handling of files related to deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and Democrats say she told them that acting Attorney General Todd Blanche made many of the decisions.

The interview by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform came amid bipartisan concerns, and occasional internal partisan struggles, around congressional oversight of the initial criminal probes of Epstein and later release of millions of Justice Department files related to him.

Democrats have criticized the Trump administration for its handling of the files and for allowing Bondi to appear behind closed doors rather than a taped deposition or public hearing.

Ranking member Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., told reporters that Bondi was accompanied by Justice Department counsel, an unusual arrangement for a private citizen, and that Bondi deferred on many questions to actions taken by Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel.

The House oversight panel first subpoenaed Bondi in March, when she was attorney general, and five Republicans joined with Democrats to vote on the subpoena. Trump ousted Bondi days before her scheduled deposition in April, and her appearance before the panel was delayed.

Blanche, a former personal attorney for Trump, was elevated to acting attorney general after Bondi was fired.

Garcia said Democrats planned to push committee Chairman James R. Comer, R-Ky., to call Blanche and Patel in for interviews and to attempt to force subpoena votes if he did not.

Rep. Dave Min, D-Calif., called the interview a “sham,” criticizing Bondi for refusing to answer questions and DOJ counsel for stepping in to assert that she didn’t have to answer questions.

Rep. Melanie Stansbury, D-N.M., criticized Republicans for not attending the interview and said Democrats intend to continue to push for answers.

“We are not going to give up. I think Republicans believe that they can just carry out their nonsense transcribed interviews and don’t show up here today and we will forget about this,” Stansbury said. “We are just getting started.”

Comer told reporters that the panel had conducted more than a dozen interviews about the federal government’s handling of the Epstein case, and scheduled another six. Comer also said that he believed the panel had obtained documents that the Justice Department did not have.

“This case hasn’t been thoroughly investigated. I think that is one thing we all can see,” Comer said.

Comer said he believed there were shortcomings in investigations by multiple administrations and that he intended to pursue additional Justice Department documents the agency had not released yet.

“They failed, there is no question that happened,” Comer said. “We are going to try to get justice for the victims.”

During Bondi’s interview, half a dozen of Epstein’s former victims spoke to reporters, saying the government failed them by releasing their private information and not investigating his alleged co-conspirators.

Elizabeth Stein, an anti-trafficking advocate who said she’s a survivor of Epstein’s abuse, told reporters that the Trump administration had not acted on investigative leads from the Epstein case and criticized Blanche for transferring Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell to a low security prison.

“Because the question before us is not whether these crimes occurred, the question is whether we, as a nation, are willing to confront the full truth of them,” Stein said.

At one point one of the Epstein survivors confronted Comer, asking him to bring officials in for sworn depositions and to ask about mistakes in redactions in the files that were released. Comer said that it was a crime to lie to Congress, and that he intends to pursue answers on behalf of the victims.

Harmeet Dhillon, associate attorney general for the Civil Rights Division, who normally supervises hundreds of attorneys, appeared at the interview alongside Bondi. Speaking to reporters afterward, she defended her presence at the hearing as well as Bondi’s numerous deferrals to Blanche.

“The former attorney general has thousands of responsibilities, and it is common for many components of her job to be delegated to other senior officials, myself in some cases, and many others,” Dhillon said.

Epstein was arrested in 2019, in the first Trump term, and charged with several counts of sex trafficking of minors. He later died in prison, and officials ruled his death a suicide.

In the Biden administration, officials charged and successfully secured a conviction against Maxwell, an Epstein accomplice.

During his 2024 campaign for a second term in office, Trump and his allies turned release of investigative materials related to Epstein into a rallying cry. Once Trump won, disputes over release of the files divided the party.

After initially trumpeting planned releases of the files, Bondi and other officials backtracked. Trump himself and White House officials lobbied against, but Trump ultimately signed, a law requiring the release of files related to Epstein.

Millions of files were released after that law’s passage, but Democrats said Bondi confirmed Friday that millions more were yet to be released.

The release of the files has drawn bipartisan criticism, as the files contained private information about victims and redacted the names of numerous unknown affiliates of Epstein. The DOJ Office of the Inspector General announced a probe into the process last month.