From WNYC Studios.

I'm Brian Lehrer.

This is my daily politics podcast.

It's Thursday, September 4th.

So Jeffrey Epstein is dead, though believe it or not, there are still some people who claim he isn't.

But his shadow still

looms over questions of power, accountability, and abuse, as you know. Nearly six years after

his apparent suicide in a Manhattan jail cell, and of course that's something else that people

ask about, did he take his own life or was it something else? But survivors of his trafficking are still pressing

for the truth. They want Congress to pass the Epstein-Files Transparency Act, a bill that would

force the Justice Department and other agencies to release thousands of pages of sealed records.

Now, at a news conference yesterday in Washington, one survivor,

a nurse good georgio, made a direct plea to President Trump. President Trump, you have so much

influence and power in this situation. Please use that influence and power to help us

because we need it now and this country needs it now.

President Trump's response was to call the whole thing a democratic hoax.

Epstein's accusers are also, however, considering compiling their own list of the people

they say were in Epstein's orbit after years of government in action,

and releasing that list to the public. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is dismissing the entire

saga as a hoax, despite the alleged victims insisting it's not. After the news conference,

under intense political pressure, just enough Republicans voted yes on a resolution

relating to releasing more documents, but it's not binding. So where to things stand now with the

...