The Department of Justice has begun releasing its files on Jeffrey Epstein. The convicted sex offender and wealthy financier was known for his connections to some of the world’s most powerful people, including President Donald Trump, who had long tried to keep the files sealed.

Here’s the latest:

Several photos of former President Clinton are in the documents released by the Justice Department

Some show Clinton on a private plane, including one with a woman whose face was redacted from the photo sitting on his lap. Another photo shows him in a pool with Maxwell and a person whose face also was redacted.

Another photo shows Clinton in a hot tub with a woman whose face was redacted.

The files do not say when the photos were taken.

Clinton has never been accused of wrongdoing in connection with Epstein, and the mere inclusion of someone’s name or images in files from the investigation does not imply otherwise.

Clinton minimized his relationship with Epstein, acknowledging that he traveled on Epstein’s private jet but saying through a spokesperson that he had no knowledge of the late financier’s crimes.

White House responds to DOJ’s release of Epstein files

The White House said the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, which began Friday afternoon, shows how the administration is the “most transparent in history.”

“By releasing thousands of pages of documents, cooperating with the House Oversight Committee’s subpoena request, and President Trump recently calling for further investigations into Epstein’s Democrat friends, the Trump Administration has done more for the victims than Democrats ever have,” said a White House spokeswoman, Abigail Jackson.

Jackson pointed to other Democrats who have had ties to Epstein, such as Delegate Stacey Plaskett, who had received text messages from Epstein during a 2019 House hearing with Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer.

DOJ tells public to flag any identifying information that should’ve been hidden

The Justice Department said “all reasonable efforts have been made to review and redact personal information pertaining to victims, other private individuals, and protect sensitive materials from disclosure.”

However, in a notice posted with the files, the department warned that some may have been missed as it rushed to get records online. Because of the volume of information involved, the release “may nevertheless contain information that inadvertently includes non-public personally identifiable information or other sensitive content, to include matters of a sexual nature,” the notice said.

The department asked members of the public to notify it promptly of any information that should not have been posted “so we can take steps to correct the problem as soon as possible.

”The law mandating the release, the Epstein Files Transparency Act, requires the Justice Department to make such redactions.

What’s inside the released files

Among the thousands of records released by the Justice Department are photos, call logs, grand jury testimony and interview transcripts. Many of the documents have been redacted and at least some have already been in the public domain.

Some of the photos and transcripts feature Epstein and his longtime confidant, British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell.

Maxwell was charged with recruiting underage girls for Epstein to abuse. She was convicted in late 2021 and is serving a 20-year-prison sentence.

The files also included video clips from inside the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City from the day Epstein died by suicide in his jail cell. The video clips had already been released previously by the Justice Department and officials have said for years they showed no one else entering the area around Epstein’s cell before he was found dead.

AP reporters are reviewing the files

Compiling accurate and thorough information takes time. A team of AP reporters is working to confirm information released by the Justice Department regarding Jeffrey Epstein.

These standards guide our reporting process:

We generally do not identify those who say they have been sexually assaulted or subjected to extreme abuse
We must make significant efforts to reach anyone who may be portrayed in a negative way in our content
We will not knowingly introduce rumor or false information into material
We abhor inaccuracies, carelessness, bias or distortions
We always strive to identify all the sources of our information

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Files appear online after a waiting room-like queue

High interest led the Justice Department to regulate access to its Epstein files website for a time.

The webpage went live Friday afternoon with a waiting room-type queue akin to what concertgoers sometimes see when they go online to purchase tickets.

Visitors were greeted with the message: “You are in line for Department of Justice web content. When it is your turn, you will have 10 minutes to enter the website.”

The webpage then refreshed to reveal a landing page with various categories of documents, including court records and other disclosures.

A bill inspired by a fallen St. Paul Fire Department captain has been signed into law, expanding federal support for the families of firefighters and other first responders who die or become permanently disabled from service-related cancers.

St. Paul fire Capt. Mike Paidar died Aug. 26, 2020, at 53. (Courtesy of International Association of Fire Fighters Local 21)

The Honoring Our Fallen Heroes Act, authored by U.S. Sens. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, applies to the federal Public Safety Officers’ Benefits program. In the past, the program covered physical injuries, duty-related heart attacks, strokes, post-traumatic stress disorder and illnesses linked to the Sept. 11 attacks.

The legislation was introduced in honor of Capt. Michael Paidar, who died in August 2020 from acute myeloid leukemia tied to on-the-job exposure.

Paidar became a St. Paul firefighter in 2011 and also served as a firefighter in Maple Grove, where he lived. His path to the St. Paul fire department came after a successful career as a KSTP-TV photojournalist. He joined the fire department when he was 44.

Paidar was diagnosed in February 2020 with acute myeloid leukemia. He underwent chemotherapy and was determined to be able to get back to work, but he died on Aug. 26, 2020. He and his wife Julie were the parents of two children, who are now 21 and 23.

“He was a good husband, a good father and a good firefighter,” Capt. Larry Goodman said about Paidar shortly after his death. Goodman also remembered Paidar as an excellent cook, especially on the grill.

In 2021, the Minnesota Department of Public Safety awarded line-of-duty benefits to Julie Paidar, which marked the first time the state’s Public Safety Officer Benefits program provided benefits in connection with a cancer linked to job exposure.

The new law extends those types of benefits nationwide.

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“This is a critical victory for our firefighters who put their lives on the line every day to keep us safe, and for their loved ones,” Klobuchar said in a statement. “This bipartisan legislation will ensure that the Public Safety Officers’ Benefits Program covers service-related cancers.”

Julie Paidar said the law honors her late husband’s legacy and acknowledges the occupational cancer risks faced by firefighters and other first responders.

“Losing him to leukemia was devastating not only for our family, but also for his fire family and our communities,” she said in a statement provided by Klobuchar’s office. “This important legislation will recognize the sacrifices of our fallen and allow first responders and their families to receive the benefits they deserve.”

“New Yorkers, and Mayor-Elect Mamdani in particular, have an open window of opportunity to fundamentally shift the city from maintaining the status quo between the haves and have-nots to actively pursuing housing justice.”

Housing advocates at a rally in Manhattan in 2022. (David Brand/City Limits)

With housing affordability as the linchpin of his platform—and half of all New York City renters rent-burdened—Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani has an opportunity to make right what decades of leaders could not.

The Mayor-elect’s ambitious agenda has the potential to provide more than verbal affirmations to freeze rent and foreshadows a political will to enter a trailblazing era of human rights enforcement, with the fights for housing justice and homelessness decriminalization as gateways to other rights-based reforms.     

Widening the view, it is clear as day that our global order is splintered when it comes to human rights and justice issues. The United States’ repressive conduct and enhanced surveillance of its own poor, working class, people of color have made us stand out in a lackluster way on the world stage, while also signaling a dangerous message that our country’s leadership may proceed business-as-usual, with impunity.  

In November, the United States federal government did not appear for its own review before the United Nations Human Rights Council, an opportunity afforded to each nation just once every five years. Despite the federal absence, a strong cross-section of state and local officials, and agency representatives—including our own deputy commissioner of the New York City Human Rights Commission—and a delegation of zealous human rights advocates briefed U.N. representatives both in Geneva and here in New York.

We discussed what an evasion of accountability means in cities like ours, which have become frontline defenders of human rights in combatting the scale of their violations. This builds on public dialogues with high-level U.N. experts on New York City’s affordability and criminalization of homelessness challenges, and a hearing before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. In all these instances, our message was clear: our federal, state, and local leadership’s failures to solve the affordable housing crisis are violations of New Yorkers’ fundamental human rights.  

But as the richest city in the world undergoes a promising political transition, we can and will demand a better road ahead if we truly want it to be a safer and more accessible place for everyone to call home.  

To start, solutions to housing affordability must integrate a perspective about land and its social function. The community land trust model of de-privatizing housing and preserving affordable housing stock is not a foreign concept in our neck of the woods. In fact, over 20 community land trusts exist citywide, offering low-income communities of color the right to reclaim land and be stewards of it for the public good. And just this week, the New York City Council passed the Community Opportunity to Purchase Act.  

Not only should these and other vulnerable communities be afforded collective land rights, but it is imperative for structural, public land displacement practices to be eradicated from the onset. A human right to housing cannot be achieved without repealing criminalization policies, such as the involuntary commitments and sweeps of homeless New Yorkers—actions that universally fail to promote inclusive, humane management of public space. 

Criminalization does not solve homelessness, but in fact, worsens it. The Mamdani administration should prioritize reinvesting the over $6.4 million its predecessor expended in its interagency sweeps task force toward comprehensive, community-based, non-punitive solutions—such as free public bathroom facilities and staffing culturally competent mental health outreach workers, and voluntary supportive housing units, among others. As he has publicly committed to ending sweeps, these solutions are necessary for preserving his homeless constituents’ dignity and diverse needs.   

Finally, the human right to housing demands the city challenge abusive, predatory housing schemes that make housing inaccessible for tens of thousands of New Yorkers. Our City Commission on Human Rights monitors one of the most expansive human rights laws in the country, making way for a particularly high volume of housing discrimination inquiries in its docket (over 51,000 from 2019-2024), and it needs more support.

Moreover, as many advocates and City Council leaders have correctly identified, the human right to housing is intersectional and requires administration-wide coordination with agencies dealing with policies from immigration to healthcare, education to public safety. As human rights are truly indivisible and interdependent, mandates around affordable housing and each of these other key areas would benefit from a synergy of advocates and municipal staff that models community-driven, holistic participation and enforcement.  

Having just commemorated Human Rights Day and Homeless Persons Memorial Day, New Yorkers, and Mayor-Elect Mamdani in particular, have an open window of opportunity to fundamentally shift the city from maintaining the status quo between the haves and have-nots to actively pursuing housing justice.

In a city where everyone knows the rent is too damn high, no one deserves criminal punishments for not being able to afford a home, and we all deserve the right to safe, affordable housing. Let us make 2026 the year we bring the human right to housing home to New York and as a model to the rest of the world. 

Siya Hegde is a staff attorney for the National Homelessness Law Center’s “Housing Not Handcuffs Campaign.”

The post Opinion: How Mayor-elect Mamdani Can Achieve a Human Right to Housing appeared first on City Limits.

By ANTHONY IZAGUIRRE, Associated Press

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Rep. Elise Stefanik announced Friday that she is suspending her campaign for New York governor and will not seek reelection to Congress, bowing out of the race in a surprise statement that said “it is not an effective use of our time” to stay in what was expected to be a bruising Republican primary.

Stefanik, a Republican ally of President Donald Trump, said in a post on X that she was confident of her chances in the primary against Bruce Blakeman, a Republican county official in New York City’s suburbs. But she said she wanted to spend more time with her young son and family.

“I have thought deeply about this and I know that as a mother, I will feel profound regret if I don’t further focus on my young son’s safety, growth, and happiness — particularly at his tender age,” she said.

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Stefanik has been an intense critic of incumbent Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul, who is also seeking reelection but faces a primary challenge from her own lieutenant governor, Antonio Delgado.

The announcement marks an abrupt end, at least for now, for a once-promising career for Stefanik. She was the youngest woman ever elected to Congress when she won her first campaign in 2014 at just 30 years old, representing a new generation of Republicans making inroads in Washington. She ultimately rose to her party’s leadership in the House when she became the chair of the House Republican Conference in 2021.

First viewed as a moderate when she came to Washington, Stefanik became far more conservative as Trump began to dominate the party. Once someone who refused to say Trump’s name, she became one of his top defenders during his first impeachment inquiry. She would go on to vote against certifying the 2020 election results, even after a violent mob stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6.

Stefanik was expected to have a bitter Republican primary against Blakeman, who also counts himself as an ally of Trump. The president had so far seemed keen on avoiding picking a side in the race, telling reporters recently: “He’s great, and she’s great. They’re both great people.”

Stefanik’s decision follows a clash with Speaker Mike Johnson, whom she accused of lying before embarking on a series of media interviews criticizing him. In one with The Wall Street Journal, she called Johnson a “political novice” and said he wouldn’t be reelected speaker if the vote were held today.

The tumultuous early December episode appeared to cool when Johnson said he and Stefanik had a “great talk.”

“I called her and I said, ‘Why wouldn’t you just come to me, you know?’” Johnson said. “So we had some intense fellowship about that.”

Still, Stefanik, the chairwoman of the House Republican leadership, has not fully walked back her criticisms. A Dec. 2 social media post remains online in which, after a provision she championed was omitted from a defense authorization bill, Stefanik accused Johnson of falsely claiming he was unaware of it, calling it “more lies from the Speaker.”

State Republican Chairman Ed Cox said the party respected Stefanik’s decision and thanked her for her efforts.

“Bruce Blakeman has my endorsement and I urge our State Committee and party leaders to join me,” Cox said in a prepared statement. “Bruce is a fighter who has proven he knows how to win in difficult political terrain.”

Associated Press writers Steven Sloan and Joey Cappelletti contributed from Washington.