Reading Epstein: Justice, Power, and Accountability

The past month, whenever I had a spare moment between readings, before I went to sleep, or when I woke up, I found my mind wandering back to the Epstein Files. And I remain consumed by morbid shock and confused outrage. The reality is inescapable: Many of the most powerful people in the world have been implicated in some of the most vile acts humanly possible. I think it’s due time that the files are discussed, in a constitutive capacity, so that we can develop some communal method for processing both their content and the social, political, and cultural consequences of this ongoing affair.

Confronting them is inescapable; the implications for daily life are ubiquitous. Just think about how Patriots owner, Robert Kraft, took his legal counsel during his 2019 prostitution scandal from a lawyer that Epstein himself used and explicitly recommended, Jack Goldberger. Or how, with midterms coming up, Democrats may try to use the files as political currency against MAGA’s substantial war chest of US dollars.  In a political science class I’m taking this semester, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is analyzed as a major nongovernmental organization (NGO) that can have immense influence on policy — but now all I can think of is that Bill Gates is in the files, along with enough “charitable” billionaires to make one question exactly how philanthropy has been functioning for the past three or more decades. Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell themselves were involved in philanthropy, and the role of the latter’s TerraMar Project in Epstein’s trafficking ring is still open to speculation. American higher education isn't spared, either: Students at Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Yale, and more have realized that they’ve attended and maybe continue to attend classes taught by Epstein’s associates, or perhaps even co-conspirators. One man, millions of documents, thousands of victims — how many perpetrators?

While it has been steadily increasing, the relative lack of media coverage is frustrating — and unsurprising. Either for fear of retaliation from the presidential administration, which has shown its willingness to use governmental pressure to police news networks, or a lack of capacity to process the literal millions of documents released by the U.S. Department of Justice, there has been a slow evolution in reporting beyond confirmation that Epstein was indeed a “disgraced financier.” The deliberate lack of cooperation and ignorance of the law by the federal government, which is unprecedented, as William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science Austin Sarat writes, does not help. 

The Department of  Justice (DOJ) is also currently wholly removing files from their release because of subpar or ineffective redactions that have exposed almost 100 survivors. This highlights another necessary component of processing the files: ensuring the safety and privacy of non-perpetrators. Nevertheless, several third-party community projects have developed interfaces to browse the files. One way to look through them in an organized manner is through Jmail.world, a website that allows the user to access released material by emulating the perspective of being logged-in to Epstein’s personal accounts. Another is EpsteinExposed.com, but the site is currently struggling with securing steady funding as private payment processors allegedly loath to be associated with the files, even transactionally. 

Private institutions have responded inconsistently. There have been some disciplinary actions taken, which could be described as performative, or pre-emptive, in anticipation of a heavier hammer falling. Faculty at Columbia’s dental school have received slaps on the wrists for essentially cultivating a relationship of bribery with Epstein for 6 years, which began nearly 14 years ago. Perhaps some solace can be taken in the fact that they were disciplined? On the other hand, Wall Street has decided to take a lighter touch: Big-shot lawyer Kathryn Ruemmler, whom Epstein called “one of the most powerful women in washington [sic]” — and who was White House counsel under President Obama — was allowed to resign from Goldman Sachs, effective June 30. In addition to her alleged stint as ‘informal’ legal counsel to Epstein, which she has denied, she also helped to kill the airing of an 2015 ABC interview with Virginia Guiffre, a survivor of Epstein who was found dead in April of 2025, though she has denied drafting any such letter. Goldman Sachs also denied rumours of her resignation until, well, she announced it. This doesn’t seem like justice to me. It is a culture of denial, a behaviour probably learned and perfected after decades of it working. These two case studies, of which there are countless more, demonstrate how autonomous elite institutions attract and enable bad actors. I believe we need to learn how, why, and what we can do to change this.

From what has been released so far, Amherst College appears to be mostly innocent of any wrongdoing. It seems to me that a liberal arts approach is suited for tackling and unpacking a case such as this, given its varied and multifaceted character, which can be broken down into disciplines. In terms of economics, Jeffrey Epstein’s occupation was as a financier. Bill Gates and Elon Musk, two men who have each held the title of “richest in the world,” have indelible connections to Epstein, not to mention all the millionaires and billionaires in between. 

Politically, the vastly differing public and political reactions to rumors of election fraud that sparked an insurrection on January 6 compared to clear evidence proving the abuse of children are of interest. We must also question how it is possible, or even conceivable, that high-profile politicians and even Presidents — namely Donald Trump and Bill Clinton, associated with Epstein for years — remain politically salient today, although hopefully this changes. In terms of social theories and daily life, these revelations show what classes or demographics American society and the world writ large abuses and victimizes versus who it protects. In essence, who do the people our tax dollars hire work for? Who does the West work for?

America does not care for women and children. It protects rich white men. This has mostly been known, but the knowledge was shrouded, always mediated. Now, millions of documents are available to the public, with concrete examples of this abuse beyond imagination and miscarriages of justice of such scale and severity that they make us seriously question if ideas of reform are appropriate or relevant. 

The people implicated as perpetrators and co-conspirators have committed crimes for which there is truly no law. The plain language of statutes does not approach the essence of them — even if there were, America’s two-tiered justice system would not deliver justice. What psychological theories could explain this? Marx writes of bourgeois (im)morality as a consequence of capitalism; but I don’t think that’s the entirety of the problem, although there is certainly an immoral character to this whole business. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s testimony before Congress on Feb. 11 left the familiar tinge of grift in my mouth, especially when she attempted to take a self-righteous stance, demand apologies for Donald Trump, a convicted sexual abuser and felon, and cite the day’s top performers on the stock market as a more appropriate topic than seeking justice for those victimized by Epstein and others. We are trapped in this amoral territory: On one hand we, the public, are at a loss on how to cope and respond; on the other hand are those who do not want to respond, or who are actively protecting the perpetrators. The lack of transparency, both by the federal government and private entities, makes us suspicious of any actions they claim they take to further justice. This has given rise to paranoia and conspiracy, which I struggle to claim are misplaced; but speculation and conspiracy theories detract from the real, documented abuse which should always be prioritized in discussion. Flooding the intellectual field with conspiracies disarms and disorientates serious work. 

I believe that the Epstein Files tragically represent part of the soul of America. We should be talking about them, at Amherst and at home. This task must not be undertaken alone. Even with redactions, there is enough stomach-churning content in there to make us sick, mentally and physically. Yet I believe that it would be an egregious mistake and an act of civil negligence not to educate ourselves, to endeavor to separate the true from the false and to uncover the sordid character of the sexual predators this country and the West has elevated. But, after that, what does justice look like? We must ask these questions.