November 17, 2025

Good Monday evening. In today's edition: Trump changes course on Epstein files, encourages GOP to vote for release.

• Plus, Garcia, FAA, Ossé, Mexico, Bangladesh and FEMA.

Epstein Files

President Trump has reversed course on the Jeffrey Epstein files, encouraging Republicans to support a bill to compel their release and telling reporters he would sign it into law if it passed both chambers of Congress.

• "Sure, I would," he told reporters in the Oval Office when asked whether he would sign the bill that he had long opposed.

For months, the president had dismissed the issue as a "hoax" and lobbied Republicans to oppose the legislation from Reps. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Ro Khanna (D-CA), who led a successful discharge petition to force a House vote on the bill.

• The House is expected to vote on the bill Tuesday afternoon after the petition drew the 218 signatures needed to bypass House leadership and bring the measure directly to the floor.

Once it became clear that most Republicans would support the bill, President Trump shifted course over the weekend and encouraged GOP lawmakers to back it.

• "House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide, and it's time to move on from this Democrat Hoax," he wrote on Truth Social.
  
  
• "I DON'T CARE! All I do care about is that Republicans get BACK ON POINT."

Although the president continued to call the matter a "hoax," he said he did not want it to "detract" from his administration’s accomplishments.

• "Let the Senate look at it. Let anybody look at it, but don't talk about it too much, because, honestly, I don't want to take it away from us," he told reporters.
  
  
• "It's really a Democrat problem. The Democrats were Epstein's friends, all of them, and it's a hoax."

Responding to the news, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said the president had "caved" on the issue.

• "Donald Trump appears to have chickened out on the Epstein scandal. He's caved. It's a complete and total surrender," he told reporters.
  
  
• "The House will act decisively, the Senate needs to act, and Donald Trump just needs to step out of the way and let the chips fall where they may."

On Friday, President Trump also directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to launch an investigation into alleged ties between several prominent Democrats and Mr. Epstein, specifically naming former President Bill Clinton and former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, among others.

• Hours later, AG Bondi assigned Jay Clayton, the acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, to lead the probe.

The Epstein issue has created deep fractures within the MAGA movement, especially after the Justice Department announced in July that an Epstein "client list" did not exist and that no additional files would be released.

• The announcement went back on a campaign promise to fully release the files, something the MAGA base had long sought.

It has also provoked a significant rift between President Trump and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), one of his closest allies, who was among the four Republicans to sign the discharge petition.

• "Wacky Marjorie 'Traitor' Brown (Remember, Green turns to Brown where there is ROT involved!) is working overtime to try and portray herself as a victim when, in actuality, she is the cause of all of her own problems. The fact is, nobody cares about this Traitor to our Country!" the president wrote on Truth Social.

Rep. Greene told CNN on Sunday that the president’s comments had been "hurtful" and said she was committed to avoiding "toxic" rhetoric going forward.

• "I would like to say, humbly, I’m sorry for taking part in the toxic politics; it’s very bad for our country," she told CNN's Dana Bash. "It's been something I’ve thought about a lot, especially since Charlie Kirk was assassinated."

Watch remarks from President Trump and Rep. Jeffries.

In other news…

• The House plans to vote this evening on a motion to table — or kill — a resolution offered by Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-WA) to disapprove of Rep. Chuy Garcia's (D-IL) decision to announce his retirement just after the primary ballot nominating deadline, effectively ensuring his chief of staff would succeed him in his deep blue district. Democratic leaders are encouraging their members to kill the resolution. If the vote to table fails, which is expected, the resolution will receive a roll call vote on Tuesday.
  
  

• The FAA announced Sunday that it is fully lifting the flight-reduction order that had restricted commercial traffic at 40 major airports during the record 43-day government shutdown, allowing airlines to resume normal schedules. Officials said the unprecedented limits, which cut flights by as much as 6% at major hubs, were no longer necessary thanks to improving air-traffic-controller staffing and a safety review showing a sharp decline in shutdown-related risks. Airlines expect operations to stabilize ahead of the Thanksgiving travel period as the system returns to full capacity.
  
  

• Chi Ossé, a New York City Council member and ally of Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, filed paperwork to run against House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) in the 2026 Democratic primary. "The Democratic Party's leadership is not only failing to effectively fight back against Donald Trump, they have also failed to deliver a vision that we can all believe in," he told Axios, which first reported the news. Rep. Jeffries responded by saying: "Come on in, the water is warm."
  
  

• Thousands of people took to the streets across Mexico City over the weekend to protest crime and President Claudia Sheinbaum's government, sparked by the assassination of Uruapan Mayor Carlos Manzo. The protests were initially nonviolent but ended with some young people clashing with police, resulting in more than 100 officers and around 20 civilians becoming injured. The rally was organized by Gen Z youth groups.
  
  

• Sheikh Hasina, the former prime minister of Bangladesh, was sentenced to death for crimes against humanity for her crackdown on last year's student uprising that killed up to 1,400 people, according to the United Nations. Ms. Hasina, who fled to India in August 2024 at the height of the uprising against her government, dismissed the court as a "rigged tribunal." The verdict has led to both celebrations and unrest as the country prepares for elections in February.
  
  

• David Richardson, the acting administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), resigned after roughly six months of leading the agency that President Trump has called for the dismantling of. Mr. Richardson had been heavily criticized for his slow response to the deadly Texas flooding in July. The Homeland Security Department said Karen Evans, FEMA's current chief of staff, will step into the acting administrator position beginning Dec. 1.

For your radar…

• Phillip Swagel, the director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), testifies Tuesday at an oversight hearing before the House Budget Committee. Watch LIVE on C-SPAN2 at 10:15am ET.
  
  

• The House votes Tuesday on a bill to compel the Justice Department to release the Epstein files. Watch the House LIVE on C-SPAN starting at 10am ET, with the Epstein vote expected around midafternoon.

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