Wyden urges Treasury to release records showing banks27 role in Epstein finances, calls for new penalties

Sen. Ron Wyden, ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said a multiyear committee investigation has uncovered extensive financial activity tied to Jeffrey Epstein and urged the Treasury Department to provide the committee with documents that Wyden says show banks repeatedly ignored signs of trafficking.

"There is no question in my mind that Jeffrey Epstein took advantage of loopholes in the law to exploit women," Wyden said, asserting that committee staff "saw firsthand names of women and young girls in these documents." He told colleagues the inquiry uses a "follow the money" approach and relies on a paper trail reviewed by bipartisan Senate Finance Committee staff.

Wyden said the committee reviewed Treasury Department records, including suspicious activity reports, and identified what he described as "well over 4,000 wire transfers," with transfers through a single bank that he estimated totaled about "$1,000,000,000 in total." He framed those findings as evidence that some transfers involve trafficking-related activity and argued the scale warrants further oversight and possible enforcement.

The senator criticized the handling of the files across administrations, saying the Trump Justice Department "had no interest in spending a significant amount of time looking at those files at the treasury department," and disputed recent public comments dismissing the need for inquiry. Wyden also cited a settlement involving Leon Black as an example the committee is reviewing for connections between financial support and trafficking.

As an immediate step, Wyden asked the Treasury Department to make the requested records available to the Senate Finance Committee on a bipartisan basis. "My own judgment is if Pam Bondi wanted to get up in the next morning or 2 and make these documents available to the senate finance committee, she could do it," he said. He added he will push to write new, explicit statutes that create civil and criminal sanctions for banks that fail to report or act on trafficking-related financial activity.

Wyden characterized the alleged conduct as "trafficking" and said it "doesn't get any more serious" in terms of harm. He closed by saying Americans want answers about what happened and who is responsible; there was no formal vote or reported enforcement action at the end of his remarks.

The next procedural step, according to Wyden's statement, is for the Treasury Department to provide the committee the documents it has sought; Wyden said lawmakers would use those records to consider legislative and oversight options.