Latest / DEEP INSIGHT / Epstein survivor criticizes Blanche, calls meeting 'a performative move'

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Epstein survivor criticizes Blanche, calls meeting 'a performative move' · DEEP INSIGHT

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The US Senate is weighing President Trump's nomination of Acting
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Attorney General Todd Blanche to lead the Justice Department as
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: questions continue over the administration's handling of legal investigations and
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. It comes days after Blanche
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: met privately with several survivors of Epstein's abuse. Our Justice
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: correspondent Ali Rogan spoke with a survivor who attended that meeting.
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  Speaker 2: Jeff The meeting came as Blanche works to win Senate
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  Speaker 2: confirmation while facing continued questions about the Justice Department's handling
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  Speaker 2: of the Epstein case. Politico is reporting today the White
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: House is now actively lobbying two Republican senators seen as
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  Speaker 2: potential holdouts, Tom Tillis and John Cornyan, to support the nomination.
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  Speaker 2: A group of survivors who met with Blanche Thursday wrote
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  Speaker 2: an open letter to those senators today urging them to
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  Speaker 2: vote against Blanche, calling their meeting with him quote an
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  Speaker 2: hour of deflection, interruption, and gaslighting. Joining me now is
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  Speaker 2: Liz Stein, one of the survivors who met with Blanche
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  Speaker 2: on Thursday. Liz, thank you so much for being here.
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  Speaker 2: Welcome back to the News Hour.
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  Speaker 3: Thanks for having me.
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  Speaker 2: This meeting came on the urging of Senator Tillis, who
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  Speaker 2: said it was a condition of his yes vote. What
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  Speaker 2: was the takeaway for yourself and your fellow survivors.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I think that when Senator Tillis asked Todd Blanche
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  Speaker 3: to meet with us, I think that he wanted it
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  Speaker 3: to be a substantive meeting, and that's not what it
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  Speaker 3: was at all. I don't know if we had extremely
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  Speaker 3: high hopes going into the meeting, but we really met
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  Speaker 3: Todd Blanche in hopes to work with him. We have
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  Speaker 3: been more than willing to work with the Department of Justice.
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  Speaker 3: We've been requesting meetings for months with Todd Blanche and
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  Speaker 3: the Department of Justice and we've gotten nowhere until last week.
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  Speaker 3: And it feels to us that it was a bit
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  Speaker 3: of a performative move so he could check a box
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  Speaker 3: for his promotion.
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  Speaker 2: Can you expand on that a little bit? What about
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  Speaker 2: it made you come away with that impression?
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  Speaker 3: Well, like I said, we went into the meeting really
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  Speaker 3: in earnest looking to work with Todd Blanche in the
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  Speaker 3: Department of Justice. We went into the meeting with an
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  Speaker 3: agenda questions that we had that we wanted answered, and
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  Speaker 3: when we got into the meeting, we didn't receive any
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  Speaker 3: answers to any of the questions that we were asking.
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  Speaker 3: He talked around the subjects that we were trying to
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  Speaker 3: press him on, and we couldn't really get him to
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  Speaker 3: commit to anything. I think that if Todd Blanch even
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  Speaker 3: offered us the slightest bit of an olive branch, we
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  Speaker 3: would have been satisfied with that. But it just felt
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  Speaker 3: like more of the same over and over again. You know,
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  Speaker 3: earlier this year, when Pambondi testified and refused to acknowledge
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  Speaker 3: that we were in the room, that sent a really
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  Speaker 3: strong message to us about what the DOJ thinks of
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  Speaker 3: us as victims of crime, and our meeting with Blanche
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  Speaker 3: only reiterated those feelings.
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  Speaker 2: For me, what were some of the questions or the
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  Speaker 2: action items that you came in with that you felt
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  Speaker 2: went unanswered or unacknowledged.
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  Speaker 3: We couldn't get a real clear answer on the redaction process,
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  Speaker 3: how it was handled, why we saw over and over
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  Speaker 3: survivors' needs and information being released while we simultaneously were
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  Speaker 3: seeing perpetrators information redacted. We did find out from Todd
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  Speaker 3: Blanche that there were over eight hundred individuals who were
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  Speaker 3: reviewing these files, but they were reviewing them for redactions only.
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  Speaker 3: They were not looking for additional investigative leads. They weren't
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  Speaker 3: looking to put pieces of the puzzle together. They were
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  Speaker 3: merely just looking at needs. That's concerning to us. There
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  Speaker 3: were eight hundred eyes on these files and they were
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  Speaker 3: doing nothing but just looking for redactions instead of information.
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  Speaker 3: Feels like a waste of time.
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  Speaker 2: You and your fellow survivors have called for the Department
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  Speaker 2: of Justice to follow up on the investigative leads revealed
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  Speaker 2: in these documents. Did Acting Attorney General Blanche acknowledge that
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  Speaker 2: at all was there any movement on That.
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  Speaker 3: There wasn't, And that I think was really concerning to
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  Speaker 3: us because when we look at the Epstein files, we
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  Speaker 3: can see investigative leads on almost every page, but the
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  Speaker 3: DOJ isn't interested. And I need people to remember that
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  Speaker 3: there's been so much political emotion infused into what is
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  Speaker 3: a case about sex trafficking. This is a crime, and
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  Speaker 3: it's beyond concerning that a Department of Justice doesn't want
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  Speaker 3: to follow investigative leads in what is quite possibly the
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  Speaker 3: largest international sex trafficking ring we've ever seen.
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  Speaker 2: Given how badly this meeting when according to the recounting
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  Speaker 2: of yourself and your fellow survivors, do you think Senator
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  Speaker 2: Tillis's vote should be conditioned on more than the fact
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  Speaker 2: that the me took place.
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  Speaker 3: I think that Tillis wanted us to have a substantive
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  Speaker 3: meeting with Todd Blanche, and that's not what happened. And
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  Speaker 3: you know, Senator Tillis is a businessman, right and if
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  Speaker 3: he was looking at the Department of Justice the way
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  Speaker 3: that he would look at any other business enterprise, Todd
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  Speaker 3: Blanche has not shown the leadership to be the head
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  Speaker 3: of the Department of Justice. And I think that Senator
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  Speaker 3: Tillis and Cornyn really need to consider what Todd Blanche's
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  Speaker 3: record has been in regards to the Epstein case and
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  Speaker 3: how we were treated by the Department of Justice just
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  Speaker 3: last week.
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  Speaker 2: If Todd Blanche is confirmed as Attorney General, how do
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  Speaker 2: you hope the DOJ proceeds when it comes to Epstein.
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  Speaker 3: We've heard Todd Blanche say over and over and over
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  Speaker 3: again that there are no investigative leads that for as
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  Speaker 3: much as the Epstein saga has been a part of culture,
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  Speaker 3: in the past year. It shouldn't be part of anything
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  Speaker 3: going forward. In the release of these files, there were
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  Speaker 3: survivors who were Jane Does and had never ever thought
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  Speaker 3: that they would ever have to be public. Yet they
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  Speaker 3: were thrown into the spotlight. People that they work with, friends,
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  Speaker 3: family are now reading the most intimate details of these
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  Speaker 3: women's lives. There's one survivor named Rosa who came out
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  Speaker 3: and testified publicly in Palm Beach and said that she
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  Speaker 3: had been exposed more than five hundred times. I don't
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  Speaker 3: know how anyone could look at that as a mistake.
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  Speaker 3: The Department of Justice is really not treating us with
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  Speaker 3: the respect that crime victims should be treated, and it
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  Speaker 3: begs the.
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  Speaker 2: Question why listein Survivor and Advocate. Thank you so much
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  Speaker 2: for joining us.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks