Maxwell is currently seeking a pardon from the administration, recently telling Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, “I never, ever saw any man doing something inappropriate with a woman of any age.” She was subsequently transferred to a more comfortable prison.
Johnson was asked on Friday on CNN how much weight he put on Maxwell’s comments.
“Not much at all,” he told “News Central” host John Berman. “She has no credibility. She’s been convicted for sex trafficking, OK? But we’re for maximum — maximum transparency. With the Epstein files, I’ve been saying this for years.”
Johnson argued that the Trump administration has “been intellectually consistent” on the matter all along, citing full compliance with subpoenas from Congress, and said the Justice Department has already submitted “over 34,000 Epstein documents.”
Johnson didn’t elaborate Friday on the details of what the 34,000 documents include.
“Our House Oversight Committee is doing their due diligence so that we can release it all,” he told Berman. “But they’re going through carefully to make sure that the victims of these horrific sex crimes, let’s be frank about it, are not exposed.”
Johnson said the Trump administration is “going to put it all out there and let the American people decide,” prompting Berman to ask if this is due to a petition from Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) that was designed to force the release of more files.
Johnson said the measure is “not even necessary” because the Trump administration itself “is already doing this” by turning relevant documents over. Berman argued Massie and Khanna must be skeptical, as they’re still seeking signatures to introduce their petition.
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Asked if he would “allow” the petition to come to a vote, Johnson vowed transparency.
“We might not even wait for that,” he said. “We have our own resolutions to affect this same thing, but the process is playing out as it should, and very soon the American people will have that information, and they should have had it all along. That’s my view.”