WASHINGTON: Thousands of new documents linked to the case of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein were made available on Tuesday by the US Department of Justice (DOJ), amid mounting criticism over the pace of the publication and heavy redactions.

The latest release includes around 11,000 files containing 30,000 pages of documents, with many redactions, including an email from a prosecutor indicating President Trump had travelled aboard his private jet “many more times than previously has been reported”.

The tranche of materials released on Friday included photographs of former Democratic president Bill Clinton and other famous names.

According to BBC News, these include the likes of pop stars Diana Ross, Mick Jagger and Michael Jackson, actor Kevin Spacey, British politician Peter Mandelson and former prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, broadcaster Walter Cronkite, French modelling agent Jean Luc Brunel and Virgin founder Richard Branson.

An initial review of the released materials by BBC News and The Guardian yielded three particularly damning pieces of correspondence.

The first was a letter from Epstein to Larry Nassar – the US gymnastics team doctor convicted of sexually abusing scores of young gymnasts – ostensibly written while the former was in prison.

“Dear LN as you know by now, I have taken the ‘short route’ home. Good Luck! We share one thing … our love & caring for young ladies at the hope they’d reach their full potential. Our president also shares our love of young, nubile girls. When a young beauty walked by he loved to ‘grab snatch’, whereas we ended up snatching grub in the mess halls of the system. Life is unfair. Yours, J Epstein.”

The second is a series of emails between an individual identified as ‘The Invisible Man’ – believed to be an alias of former prince Andrew – and Epstein’s associate Ghislaine Maxwell.

In 2022, Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years in prison for crimes including conspiracy to entice minors to travel to engage in illegal sex acts and sex trafficking of a minor.

Sent on August 16, 2001, the email begins: “I am up here at Balmoral Summer Camp for the Royal Family.“Lower down, the sender asks: “Have you found me some new inappropriate friends?” The sign-off reads: “See ya A xxx.”

The BBC maintained that the email did not indicate any wrongdoing, but said it had contacted Andrew’s team for a response.

In October 2025, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor lost use of his Duke of York title following scrutiny over his links with Epstein.

A third email, concerned with Donald Trump, which had both the sender and recipient redacted, is part of an email chain, which includes the subject heading: ‘Epstein flight records’.

The email states: “He is listed as a passenger on at least eight flights between 1993 and 1996, including at least four flights on which Maxwell was also present. He is listed as having travelled with, among others and at various times, Marla Maples, his daughter Tiffany, and his son Eric.”

“On one flight in 1993, he and Epstein are the only two listed passengers; on another, the only three passengers are Epstein, Trump, and then-20-year-old” - with the person’s name redacted.

It goes on: “On two other flights, two of the passengers, respectively, were women who would be possible witnesses in a Maxwell case.

Trump defends ‘innocent people’

For his part, President Trump – who was the one pushing for the release of the files – said on Monday that people who “innocently met” Jeffrey Epstein in the past risked having their reputations ruined by the release.

In his first comments since the Justice Department began releasing the files on Friday, the president also dismissed the furore over Epstein as a distraction from his party’s achievements.

“This whole thing with Epstein is a way of trying to deflect from the tremendous success that the Republican Party has,” he told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago home.

Former president Bill Clinton featured prominently in the first batch of photos from the Epstein files released by the Justice Department and Trump was asked for his reaction.

“I like Bill Clinton. I’ve always gotten along with Bill Clinton. I hate to see photos come out of him,” he said. “There’s photos of me too. Everybody was friendly with this guy (Epstein).”

Trump said he did not like the release of pictures of Clinton and others, calling it a “terrible thing”.

“Bill Clinton’s a big boy, he can handle it,” he said.

In a statement released by his spokesman, Clinton urged the Justice Department to release any materials in the files related to the former president, saying he had nothing to hide.

The Epstein Files Transparency Act (EFTA), passed nearly unanimously by Congress and signed by President Donald Trump, mandated the complete release of the Epstein files by Friday of last week.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has blamed the delay on the need to redact the identities of Epstein’s more than 1,000 victims from the hundreds of thousands of documents and photos in the government’s possession.

EFTA co-sponsors Ro Khanna, a Democrat, and Thomas Massie, a Republican, threatened over the weekend to bring contempt of Congress charges against Attorney General Pam Bondi for failing to comply with the law.

Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer introduced a resolution on Monday calling for legal action against the Trump administration for failing to release the complete Epstein files.