WASHINGTON — After he voiced adamant disapproval to funding the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and peppered his Republican colleagues with questions about President Donald Trump’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern received a slice of national attention Monday for his address to the House Rules Committee.
“Hell no,” said McGovern, on when asked if he supports more funding for the DHS. McGovern also asked for more answers about Trump’s involvement with Epstein as files continue to trickle out on the deceased financier and sex offender and have grabbed headlines during Trump’s second term of office.
McGovern repeated these stances on the House floor Tuesday.
Addressing the Rules Committee, of which he is a ranking member, McGovern said he refuses to send “another cent” to Stephen Miller, Trump’s homeland security advisor, and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.
“They are undermining our Constitution, and the department they run is murdering American citizens in the streets,” said McGovern. “She ought to be impeached and he ought to be fired. I think their words and actions are disgusting.”
McGovern opened his address to the 13-person committee, which has a minority of four Democrats, asking for a moment of silence for Renee Good and Alex Pretti, both of whom have been shot by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in the past month.
McGovern called out both Noem and Miller for “smearing” the two by providing the public with a rushed narrative. Following the killing of Pretti, Noem suggested that the former Veterans Administration nurse was a “domestic terrorist,” and Miller called him an “assassin.”
“Those were lies — lies that were whipped up and spread by people in positions of authority who immediately sought to exploit the murder of a federal employee for their own partisan politics,” said McGovern. “And I refuse to fund such a lawless, out of control agency.”
After saying he would not vote to fund DHS “for two seconds let alone two weeks,” despite a potential government shutdown that appears to have been averted by a deal in the House on Tuesday, McGovern then turned his attention to the military budget in the government’s upcoming appropriations bills for next fiscal year.
“And by the way, I don’t support the massive glut of unlimited military funding in the rest of this package either,” he said. “Why on earth are we giving to the so-called ‘Department of War’ when the so-called ‘president of peace’ is threatening to use the money we’re appropriating to invade allies, bomb Venezuela, and break the law?”
‘Release the files’
After another tranche of files concerning Epstein was released Friday, McGovern said the administration is “collapsing under the weight of their ever expanding ties to a child-rape ring.”
Within the latest release, Elon Musk, who at this time last year was one of Trump’s most ardent allies and led the Department of Government Efficiency, was mentioned, as was Howard Lutnick, Trump’s commerce secretary.
The newly released records show Musk, the billionaire Tesla founder, reached out to Epstein on at least two occasions to plan visits to the Caribbean island where many of the allegations of sexual abuse were reported to have occurred.
In a 2012 exchange, Epstein asked how many people Musk would like flown by helicopter to the island he owned.
“Probably just Talulah and me,” Musk responded, referencing his then-partner, actress Talulah Riley. “What day/night will be the wildest party on our island?”
Musk messaged Epstein again ahead of a planned Caribbean trip in 2013. “Will be in the BVI/St Bart’s area over the holidays,” he wrote. “Is there a good time to visit?” Epstein then extended an invite for after the New Year holiday.
It is unclear if Musk ever did visit Epstein’s island. He denied doing so in a post made to X, the social media platform he owns.
“No one pushed harder than me to have the Epstein files released and I’m glad that has finally happened,” he wrote. “I had very little correspondence with Epstein and declined repeated invitations to go to his island or fly on his ‘Lolita Express,’ but was well aware that some email correspondence with him could be misinterpreted and used by detractors to smear my name. I don’t care about that, but what I do care about is that we at least attempt to prosecute those who committed serious crimes with Epstein, especially regarding heinous exploitation of underage girls.”
Lutnick has also said he had cut ties with Epstein. But the records show that in December 2012, Epstein invited Lutnick to his private island for lunch. Lutnick’s wife accepted the invitation and noted they would arrive on a yacht with their children. On another occasion in 2011, the two men had drinks, according to a schedule shared with Epstein.
A Commerce Department spokesman said Lutnick had “limited interactions with Mr. Epstein in the presence of his wife and has never been accused of wrongdoing.”
McGovern pressed the committee asking for answers from everyone involved with Epstein, whether they be Democrats or Republicans.
“Democrats want answers from everyone — including and up to the president of the United States,” said McGovern. “And that seems to be the biggest difference between you guys and us. We aren’t afraid of where these files lead. You are, and if you’re afraid of where the files lead, you’re not standing with the survivors — you’re defending pedophiles.”
As for Democrats in the files, former president Bill Clinton is another name that has been repeatedly brought up in connection with Epstein, and McGovern said bringing up Clinton is an attempt by Republicans to “change the subject.”
“Please, please do not insult America’s intelligence by trying to make the conversation about the Clintons,” said McGovern. “First of all, the Clintons have publicly called for the government to release all the Epstein files, unlike Donald Trump who said he would release them all and then backtracked. There’s millions more documents that still have not been released.”
On Monday, the Clintons agreed to testify before Congress, but arrangements have not been finalized.
McGovern went on to say: “They [the Clintons] sent written declarations of what they knew and were negotiating to testify under oath. When will Trump testify? His name appears 5,361 times in the documents released so far.”
It’s long been known that Epstein was friends with Trump before the two had a falling out.
The new trove of documents contain thousands of references to Trump, much of which sheds little additional light on the men’s relationship. They include emails in which Epstein and others shared news articles about Trump, commented on his policies or his politics, or gossiped about him and his family.
The Justice Department also disclosed a spreadsheet created last August that summarized calls made to law enforcement tip lines from people claiming to have some knowledge of wrongdoing by Trump.
Reporting from the Associated Press was used in this article.