Baumgartner highlights violent crime decrease as attorney general ducks questions on Epstein files

WASHINGTON – Near the end of a four-hour hearing on Wednesday that focused largely on the Justice Department’s handling of its investigation of the deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, Rep. Michael Baumgartner credited the agency with a sharp decrease in violent crime over the past year.

After noting that more senior members of the House Judiciary Committee had already spent hours grilling Attorney General Pam Bondi about her handling of documents related to Epstein, the freshman Republican from Spokane highlighted reporting by Axios that showed violent crime has fallen in cities across the United States.

“I want to talk about the big things the Department of Justice is doing,” Baumgartner said, after calling the Epstein issue important but suggesting the Democrats have used it for political gain. “So my first question would be, when it comes to the big stuff, how are you guys getting this stuff so right?”

Bondi responded by recalling how the head of an agency within the Justice Department had told her, “President Trump has taken the handcuffs off us, so we can keep the people of America safe.”

Before his allotted five minutes of question time expired, Baumgartner turned to “sanctuary” policies that limit the cooperation of state and local law enforcement with federal immigration enforcement agents, asking Bondi how such policies hamper her department’s work.

“I see it every day, Congressman, how well – despite, despite what these liberals are trying to do – Donald Trump’s administration is working tirelessly, tirelessly to protect all of Americans,” Bondi said.

“Well, you guys are getting the big stuff right,” Baumgartner replied. “You look at that decrease in crime across the country. You ought to take a victory lap. Well done.”

Baumgartner told Bondi he thought she had “performed well today and answered the questions well,” adding that her conduct in the hearing was “a credit to you and appreciated by the American people.” The attorney general took an aggressive approach to fielding questions from Democrats – and GOP Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky – about the Epstein files. At one point, she called the panel’s top Democrat, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, “a washed-up loser” while dodging his questions.

In one particularly tense moment, Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Seattle asked Bondi to apologize to Epstein’s victims for the Justice Department releasing documents that identified some of them and included sexually explicit photos of underage girls. Bondi didn’t apologize, but later turned the question around on the lawmakers

“What a massive coverup this has been and continues to be,” Jayapal told Bondi. “Donald Trump made the release of the Epstein files the center of his political campaign because he thought it would benefit him. Then you got into office, attorney general, claimed to have a client list, only to then say that there was no list.”

Addressing Democrats who impeached Trump twice in his first term, the attorney general shot back, “Have you apologized to President Trump?”