Bulwark Takes - BREAKING: House Passes Epstein Files Release 427–1

Episode Date: November 18, 2025

Description: The House just voted 427–1 to release the Epstein files, a shocking turn after months of GOP resistance, including from President Trump. Sam Stein and Joe Perticone break down how Trump’s flip changed everything, why Mike Johnson lost control of his own conference, and what happens now as the Senate takes over.

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slash audio boom to upgrade your selling today. Shopify.com slash audio boom. All right. Hey, everybody. It's me, Sam Stein. Managing out of the bulwark here with Joe Perdico and author of PressPass. Just filed the press pass. Moving at lightning speed.

Breaking news, or at least covering breaking news, I should say. Epstein Files, the vote on the House just concluded to release the Epstein Files. months-long process. And despite all the drama, it passed 427 to one in the house. The one lone no vote was Clay Higgins, an eccentric character to say the least, who said that he believed, according to his tweets, that this was a, you know, break of criminal justice procedures and would injure thousands of innocent people and witnesses, never mind that there's provisions in the bill to protect them, yada, yada, yada. Joe, you were there. You've been covering this. Was any of it a surprise by the end?

So I think the way, the speed at which this snowballed was a surprise to everyone. There were so much opposition. And then there was just a handful of Republicans who triggered the discharge. And then suddenly it gets enough signatures last week. And we think, oh, maybe this is going to get quite a few GOP votes. And I was thinking, oh, it's going to get 50. And that amongst the press corps, I thought that was pretty optimistic. By today, it's snowballed to, where I thought it was going to be unanimous until Clay Higgins decided to defy Trump.

So we'll see. I think that as it goes to the Senate, it's going to be really hard for them to say no to something like this, especially such an overwhelming vote. But as we know, they're going to try and

tinker with it. That's what Mike Johnson wants. We'll get to the Senate in a second because I have some thoughts about that. But look, I think think what happened here, obviously, is that they saw the way the wind was blowing. Certainly Trump did. And then he comes down and he says, well, let's vote for this thing. And then everyone else had cover. And some of them just did absolute 180s. And some occasions, 360s, like Troy Nells, who the congressman who was, as of a couple days ago saying he would absolutely oppose this

because Trump thought it was a hoax. And now he voted for it, I guess because Trump said release it. Did you get a sense from any Republicans that there was like a sense of relief that they were able to do this? You saw a lot of them trying to spin it in the hours leading up to it. You could see that a lot of them, this was becoming personal, if we recall months ago when they were getting yelled at at town halls over it. So it is a little bit of a weight off their shoulders. I could say, though, that in the debate process leading up to this, they were still kind of resisting it in the ways they wanted. They had someone like James Comer, who's leading the oversight investigation speak, where he, you know, called this.

political and partisan, they denied allowing Thomas Massey to speak on the Republican side, which led to Democrats letting him speak on their side, which is very rare. That never happens. So you could tell that, like, they were pushed into this and were pissed about being pushed into this, but I think there's a bit of relief, especially from some of the more right-wing members who maybe don't have an iron grip on their district. So they get to say they did this. they get to do it without being in defiance of Trump at the same time on a technical level. I guess, yeah, the other thing is how Mike Johnson managed this, because obviously he's decided that his entire role in this process, not just the Epstein Files, but this entire term,

is to be subservient to Trump and not independent in the slightest. And so he has to kind of walk this thin line where, you know, he wants to protect his members, but obviously he doesn't want to piss off Trump. And so he's speaking this morning, he's talking about, well, you know, this bill's got some problems. I hope the Senate amends it, but I'm going to vote for it. None of us want to go on record and in any way be accused of not being for maximum transparency. So the only intellectually consistent position to have right now, the only way to ensure that both those things are true at the same time is to allow for everyone to vote their conscience and to go on record to say, of course, of course,

we're for maximum transparency. Now, I'll tell you, there's a handful of Republicans, Judiciary Committee members, and a few others, who are really struggling, as I have been, about whether or not they could even vote yesterday because of this. Because we don't have an absolute guarantee that this will be fixing the Senate. I have a high degree of confidence in that. And that's why I'll be voting yesterday. What is your take on how he handle it? I think this showed that Mike Johnson is not that effective of a speaker when Trump isn't driving the car.

Right. Because he quickly lost control of this thing, despite really concerted attempts to block it. So I think it shows that without Trump there, he would not be doing as well as speakers he would have. He still faces the same kind of problems from insurgent members. Now those people are Thomas Massey, Marjorie Taylor Green. They used to be people in the Freedom Caucus. So I think it showed that he doesn't have the grip on the conference that people thought, did. Yeah, and that's, I guess, my, not trying to diminish the legitimate, important stuff that

will be revealed when these files are made public if they're made public. That's obviously a huge, huge issue, the predominant issue. And it also relatedly could be a huge problem for Trump, judging just by the revelations of the files already out there that have been released. So we're potentially hitting a very rough patch for Trump. And it's very evident that he wanted to avoid that. That being said, I think the secondary story here is we now have kind of proof point that if enough Republicans can ban together and resist the pressures of leadership, including Trump, that they can actually get things done or move the ball in directions that Trump doesn't want them to do. And so that's the other story here. Discharge petition worked.

Lauren Bober didn't buckle despite being summoned to the situation room. Marjorie Taylor Green didn't buckle despite Trump coming down hard on her with this stupid Marjor Taylor Brown nickname and unendorsing her. Tom Massey didn't buckle despite Trump attacking him for remarrying after his wife tragically died. I mean, the ridiculous situation. And then on top of that, you have kind of want to notice, but a second discharge petition was got to the 218 signatures that needed to get to yesterday about,

restoring employment rights for federal employees, union rights for federal employees. Are we going to enter this age now where, you know, just a handful of renegade Republicans decide, you know what? We actually don't care what Trump says and we're going to push this stuff. I think in such a slim majority, that's possible for a lot of things. The fact that we saw two in one week's time is very rare. It's a big deal. I spoke to Brian Fitzpatrick. He's a more moderate member on the discharge petition who signed on to the other one, not the Epstein one. And he was saying, look, this kind of stuff is going to increase if leadership's not going to put things that we want on the floor. Because when a discharge petition happens, it's not, oh, they're getting the courage to defy the president.

It's they're getting fed up with a lack of free movement from congressional leadership. And if as long as that continues to happen, you're going to see more of the stuff. And for example, there's things like potential extension of the Affordable Care Act. subsidies, the enhanced subsidies. That's got a ripening committee for a while, but that's something that we could see maybe if just a handful of moderate members or members who are worried about losing their race, Republicans, that they could sign on to. So, I mean, it kind of opens the floodgates, but I think they'd be premature to say that it's the beginning of a new trend. Yeah, and I just think it's important to remind folks, discharge petition, it's just when 218 members are signing something,

They're just saying, we want to get this to the floor for a vote, and you can't bottle it up anymore. But because there's 218 signatures on it, it's very likely that when it gets to the floor, it's going to pass, right? So it is a way to circumvent leadership, and it doesn't happen often precisely because it undercuts leadership. It prevents them from exercising their most important power, which is controlling what gets put on the floor. So that's why this stuff matters. All right. Now, this doesn't mean we're kind of wrestling.

with whether or not we're going to see the Epstein files. And it doesn't necessarily mean it. Now, I think you and I are both more optimistic about it today than more a week ago, right? Because Trump has now said he's fine with a release. But it does go to the Senate. Mike Johnson did encourage the Senate to tinker with it. Do you imagine, lay out the process now in the Senate and do you imagine it passes. And then after that, I want to play this Tom Massey clip. So I think that you're going to see right away, Senator Schumer, probably within a couple hours that they come in at 530, I believe, attempts to pass it via unanimous consent. I could see an objection there because, as Johnson said, they want to amend and pick apart this thing to

fit what they want to do. So that means that, you know, we're going to get to a point where Thune does put this on the floor. I don't think that'll happen later this afternoon the way we expect. Okay. Yeah. I mean, they will vote on it, though, right? They'll vote on a form of it. They might amend it in certain ways. And so when it comes out of the Senate, if it does, it'll look very different than what it did today. Okay. So that's what I want to pick up on because what they do with it in the Senate is now the next saga here. Like there's been a number of different sagas, but it's been primarily confined to the House.

Now the ball's in the Senate's court, to borrow a bad metaphor. And the question is, are they going to tinker with this in any way that would maybe get ahead of a full transparent release of the files? This is what Tom Massey had to say when he was asked about that possibility when pressed by Monorajua at CNN. What's the impact if the Senate does in fact change this bill? They're part of the cover up. And these bozos here, they pretend like, okay, now we're ready to pull the Band-Aid off. After five months of shooting themselves in the foot politically and morally, they're ready to pull

the Band-Aid off. But the reality is Speaker Johnson's press conference shows that he is unrepentant. They have a backup plan. And I think it's going to work poorly for them, by the way. By the time they get done with trying to cover up by having these other investigations or having amendments in the Senate, they're just going to make more people complicit. Like it takes somebody to offer those amendments and then they're going to have votes on those amendments. And I would encourage them to pass this bill as is put it on the president.

residence desk. It's got protections to prevent the release of child pornography. That's a lot. The speaker, go read the bills, guys. So that's my theory of the case is that no matter what, I mean, this is the thing. The house could have avoided a lot of this heartache and damage to the reputation if they just moved on this quickly and gotten it done with. It's always the efforts to stop the process or cover it up that ends up making you look horrific. And I, I don't know if the Senate Republicans understand that. I'm not sure they do. I mean, I'm sure they're going to try to, you know, tinker with it in the guise of protecting

people. But it's going to look like a cover up. I think Tom Massey's absolutely right there. Yeah, they don't like feeling out of control. And if this goes the way that Massey and Kana intended, they're the ones who controlled the process and they hate that. Massey made another point on the floor right before the vote where he said, Trump has already said he would sign this thing.

so like this thing as is so why do we need to why do we need to alter it if he said he would sign it and that's beyond the point that you know he doesn't even need this bill he could just release them on his own right now if he wanted but he's not going yeah i mean that's the other thing is like trump is not a like helpless actor here he could just do what he want he could release it any second but yeah it would be it's going to be interesting to see which of the senate republicans decides to play the role of mucking this up on behalf of trump assuming that he actually, because I don't actually think he wants it released, I'm very curious to see which senator gets in there and says, you know what, I don't like this. We need to change

it in this way, this way, this way. And it's just going to invite more coverage, more criticism, more questions about motivations. And I don't think they quite realize that. And Trump likes to reframe things, especially his own failures as his own ideas. And so you're seeing him say, oh, like, well, I'll sign it. I support it. Go for it. Like, that's him attempting to control it in his way. The way the Senate and House leadership will attempt to control it is by altering it and amending it. What that does is

it just advances what Massey said, which is the narrative that it's a, that's the sanitization that it's a cover-up. Yeah, and it's also sort of ridiculous. I mean, Trump's out here saying it's both a hoax. Then it's also incredibly damaging to Democrats, and yet he is like semi-resistant to releasing

it. There's a contradiction there. All right, let me leave you this. Prediction time. Is this thing going to ultimately, get through the Senate? Yes. Okay. Unanimous? Are we going to have like one of these situations where there's one person who says no or what are we looking at? There's less wackos in the Senate who like bend, but there are a lot of people who bend themselves to make an excuse that seems infathomable. So I could see somebody maybe being against

it or maybe saying these amendments are insufficient. These amendments aren't what Trump wants or something like that. So we'll see. Ron John. My money's on that guy. Yeah. It's good bet. It's a good bet. He's got the betting odds right now. Or Mark Wayne Mullen, one of those two. All right, Joe, thank you so much for covering this buddy. Really appreciate you. You've been on top of the story from the get-go. Time to switch your focus to the other chamber as this story progresses. For those who've been following us and subscribing to us, thank you so much. Please do subscribe if you're not a subscriber, both to our YouTube feed and to Joe Perticoin's press pass. We'll talk to you soon. When you think about businesses that are selling through the roof,

Allbirds or skims. Sure, you think about a great product, a cool brand, and brilliant marketing. But an often overlooked secret is actually the businesses behind the business, making selling, and for the shoppers buying, simple. For millions of businesses, that business is Shopify. Nobody does selling better than Shopify, home of the number one checkout on the planet. And the not-so-secret secret, with shop pay, that boosts conversions up to 50%, meaning way less carts going a abandon, and way more sales going So if you're into growing your business, your commerce platform better be ready to sell wherever your customers are scrolling or strolling on the web, in your store, in their

feed, and everywhere in between. Businesses that sell more sell on Shopify. Upgrade your business and get the same checkout skim's uses. Sign up for your $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com slash audio boom, all lowercase. Go to Shopify.com slash audio boom to upgrade your selling today. Shopify.com slash audio boom.