Inside his cavernous office on Monday afternoon, Speaker Mike Johnson was facing a growing crisis. The House GOP conference, which included some of the Louisiana Republican’s key allies, was in full rebellion over the spiraling Jeffrey Epstein situation.
Rules Committee Chair Virginia Foxx of North Carolina and panel member Erin Houchin of Indiana informed House leaders that Republicans on the panel would not advance any rule for the week — the prerequisite for the chamber to fully function — without a better solution to the Epstein problem, according to two people with direct knowledge of the conversation.
The lawmakers knew that bucking their own leadership was an extreme response. But panel Republicans were incensed that a week earlier, they were all but forced to vote against a Democratic effort calling for the release of Epstein-related information. Many, including Houchin, were under intense pressure from constituents to support the unsealing, and they wanted leaders to provide more political cover.
Hours later, Johnson and senior Republicans decided to shut down the Rules Committee altogether, which meant forgoing votes on two key immigration bills before lawmakers left for the month-long August recess. After some back and forth, leaders also scrapped votes scheduled for Thursday and sent members home a day early. The speaker later defended his strategy, saying House Republicans were refusing to play Democrats’ “political games” over the deceased financier and convicted sex offender.
One Rules Committee Republican, Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, suggested Johnson had bought himself some time — for now.
“I think the administration will put more stuff out in August. … If they don’t, then I promise you, there’s going to be some more looking at this in the first week of September,” he warned.
This account of the House breakdown is based on interviews this week with more than a dozen lawmakers and aides who described a level of anger within the conference that went beyond even what was on display publicly. Behind closed doors, standoffs played out between GOP leaders and rank-and-file members who found themselves divided over being forced to take more Epstein-related votes.
The revolt of House Republicans who favored releasing Epstein case documents surprised White House officials and multiple members of GOP leadership. Trump officials in particular, who are used to House Republicans rolling over to the president’s every whim, were especially stunned at the increasingly public and blunt pushback.
But some senior GOP aides privately acknowledged they could see Epstein-fueled pressure brewing into a bigger and bigger problem. They could tell how sensitive the issue was for the White House after Johnson appeared to break with President Donald Trump over the matter by calling for full transparency from the DOJ on a conservative podcast, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter.
The White House fumed over the perceived off-script moment, with Johnson going on to say days later there was “no daylight” between House Republicans and Trump.
The speaker kept in close touch with the president as the crisis unfolded, according to the people, and has since worked diligently to keep Epstein-related votes at bay. But Johnson’s efforts to preach party unity and presidential deference on the matter ran up against an outcry from within his conference.
Dozens of House Republicans had spent years clamoring for this information to be made public, and feared they would be called hypocrites if they backed down now, following Attorney General Pam Bondi’s announcement there would be no more documents released.
House Republican leaders received a series of warnings from members in closed-door meetings and in conversations on the House floor, including from committee chairs, that the problem wasn’t going away. Some of these lawmakers begged leadership for action, according to the people with knowledge of the private exchanges.
House Oversight Chair James Comer said he told leadership last week that if certain Epstein-related votes came up in his committee, his GOP majority would vote for it — and they did. First, on Tuesday, Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) forced a vote on a motion to subpoena Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell; then, on Wednesday, three Republicans joined onto a Democratic motion to subpoena the entire Epstein dossier from the Justice Department.