The Senate voted 51-49 on Wednesday to kill a Democratic motion that would have forced the Senate to vote in the coming days on requiring the Trump administration to make public its files on Jeffrey Epstein, the late financier and sex offender. All Democrats voted against the motion to table the Epstein cloture motion, and all Republicans voted to table save for two: Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Rand Paul of Kentucky. Earlier on Wednesday, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., had filed the cloture motion on his Epstein amendment to the fiscal 2026 NDAA. The Senate will resume its consideration of the NDAA on Thursday, but no agreement on amendments has been announced. Democrats in both chambers have looked to force votes relating to the Epstein files, hoping to focus public attention on President Donald Trump's connection with him. Trump and Epstein had a social relationship before a falling out, with Trump barring Epstein from his club at Mar-a-Lago in 2007, according to media reports. Schumer’s failed gambit could worsen acrimony between the parties in the Senate. Its effects — on the NDAA debate and beyond — remain to be seen. Asked about Schumer’s move hours before the vote to table it, Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said: “It’s a political stunt and we’ll dispose of it.” Schumer told reporters after he had filed cloture that the Trump administration has badly mishandled the Epstein records. “There's been so much lying, obfuscation and cover-ups,” Schumer said. “The American people need to see everything that's in the Epstein files, and my amendment will make that happen.” Rare gambit Filing cloture — a procedure to seek a supermajority's consent to vote to limit debate on an amendment or bill — is the right every senator has, with the majority leader, followed by the minority leader, getting preference to do so. At least 16 senators are required to sign a cloture petition for it to move forward. Still, it is rare, though not unprecedented, for a minority leader to file cloture, a function normally performed by the majority leader. A minority leader rarely files cloture at least partly because the majority leader normally fills the amendment tree to block unwanted amendments to legislation, experts said. Yet after Republicans had frequently criticized Democrats in the last Congress for regularly filling the tree, Thune has tried not to do so this year. That has left open the possibility — not exercised until now — of senators trying to force colleagues to cast cloture votes on politically charged minority amendments such as Schumer’s Epstein proposal. “Honestly, it's quite rare that the amendment tree hasn't been filled” in past years, said Jeremy Dalrymple, a former counsel for Republicans on the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who was majority leader from 2015 until 2021, “would never have done this when he was majority leader,” said Dalrymple, now associate director of governance at the R Street Institute think tank. McConnell “was an expert on parliamentary procedure, and he always filled the tree, and we've seen with Sen. Thune that hasn't been the case," Dalrymple said. After the vote to table Schumer’s amendment succeeded, Thune promptly proceeded to fill the amendment tree. Five years ago, during Trump's first term, Schumer filed cloture as minority leader in an effort to force a Senate vote on a measure to block the Justice Department from intervening in support of lawsuits involving the 2010 health care law known as the Affordable Care Act. In 2011, the late former Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., forced a cloture vote on an amendment to eliminate ethanol tax subsidies. Victor Feldman, David Lerman, Niels Lesniewski and Daniel Hillburn contributed to this report.
