Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) is accusing the Department of Justice of “muddying the waters” in its latest disclosure of the Epstein files by naming the late singer Janis Joplin in a new letter to Congress.
Joplin was among more than 300 high-profile figures mentioned in a six-page letter on Saturday. The DOJ said these figures were either government officials or “politically exposed persons” who were named or referenced in the documents. The department noted the Epstein Files Transparency Act does not define what a politically exposed person is, but released all relevant names.
The inclusion of Joplin’s name in the letter stands out because she died in 1970, long before convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was in the public spotlight.
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“The DOJ is once again purposefully muddying the waters on who was a predator and who was mentioned in an email,” Khanna posted on X late Saturday.
“To have Janis Joplin, who died when Epstein was 17, in the same list as Larry Nassar, who went to prison for the sexual abuse of hundreds of young women and child pornography, with no clarification of how either was mentioned in the files is absurd,” he continued.
Khanna, who has been particularly critical of the DOJ’s handling of the Epstein files, called on the DOJ to release all documents and to “stop protecting predators.” The department has faced scrutiny for redacting the names of certain individuals, including nonvictims. Khanna argued that only the names of victims should be redacted.
In the letter to top leaders of the Senate Judiciary and House Judiciary committees, the DOJ maintained it has released “all” records related to Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell. The department added that it did not withhold or redact records “on the basis of embarrassment, reputational harm, or political sensitivity, including to any government official, public figure, or foreign dignitary,” as defined in the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
The bill was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Donald Trump late last year.
The new letter lists Trump, Melania Trump, and Ivanka Trump among the long list of public figures. Some of the other names include Govs. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) and Gavin Newsom (D-CA), Tesla CEO Elon Musk, former Vice President Mike Pence, and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Notably, Khanna and other members of Congress who have pushed for the full release of the Epstein files are also listed in the document.
Former Georgia GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who was among the federal lawmakers included in the new letter, questioned why her name and Joplin’s name were included.
“Names that don’t make sense like Janice Joplin who died in 1970, and all kinds of politicians including those of us who fought the hardest to release the files like me, Thomas Massie, Ro Khanna, and Nancy Mace,” she wrote on X.
Greene went on to explain that the federal government kept records on her that were “unrelated to Epstein like me criticizing Covid masks rules and covid vaccine passports.” She wondered why that was the case.
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In the DOJ’s Epstein Library database, “Janis Joplin” appears in the publicly available documents on 11 different occasions. The documents merely contain biographical details about the late rock singer’s career during the 1960s, along with other musicians of that era, such as Otis Redding.
Another pop culture icon who rose to fame during the mid-20th century, Marilyn Monroe, is also mentioned in the DOJ’s letter to Congress and the Epstein Library. In one document, Epstein’s longtime assistant Lesley Groff asks her boss, “How high you would like the Marilyn Monroe picture hung above the statue here in the Oval Office.” Monroe died in 1962.