This is One Thing, I'm David Rind, and the Jeffrey Epstein story is about a lot of things. But its victims are asking, shouldn't we be at the top of the list?

Even if the DOJ were to take those files down, redact your name, put them back up, I think there's a huge concern that, you know, you can't really put the toothpaste back in the tube.

Stick around. President Donald Trump's first State of the Union of his second term is on Tuesday. And you never know with Trump, but it's a fair bet there are two words you won't hear in the speech, Jeffrey Epstein.

You know, when Epstein was alive, nobody cared about him. When he's dead, they care about him, but it's really a Democrat problem.

It's clear Trump wants to move on from this story. He wouldn't even entertain a question from my colleague Caitlin Collins earlier this month about the survivors of Epstein's abuse.

What would you say to the survivors who feel they have got this? You are the worst reporter, no one to see. CNN has no ratings because of people like you. You know, she's a young woman. I don't think I've ever seen you smile. I've known you for 10 years. I don't think I ever seen a smile on your face.

Critics say that seeming lack of interest in justice or consequences for those associated with the late convicted sex offender seems telling, especially when you look at what's happening across the pond.

We do now know that Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, of course, former Prince Andrew, has been arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office.

British police have been assessing whether he shared confidential government information with Jeffrey Epstein during his time as a UK trade envoy.

'The stunning arrest of former Prince Andrew is just the latest domino to fall in Europe, after the Justice Department released a boatload of Epstein files last month. There have been multiple investigations launched in at least three other European countries besides the UK. Mountbatten-Windsor, for his part, has denied all accusations against him, and insisted he never witnessed or suspected any of the behavior of which Epstein is accused. He has since been released from custody and remains under investigation. He has not commented publicly on these more recent allegations of misconduct in public office. But we have not seen that kind of quick movement in the US. Members of the House Oversight Committee sat with former Victoria's Secret owner Les Wexner last Wednesday and are scheduled to talk with former President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday and Friday. They all strongly deny any wrongdoing related to Epstein and have not been accused of any. But it's not clear whether any new criminal investigations will come from the slew of revelations we've seen from the files. So where does this all go from here? And what do survivors of Epstein's horrific crimes have to say about all this? CNN's senior national enterprise correspondent, MJ Lee, has been following this. Okay, MJ, so it's been a few weeks since the Justice Department released more than three million documents related to Jeffrey Epstein after being compelled by Congress to do so last year. And honestly, since then, the revelations have not stopped one after another. So many headlines, so many famous names. But with a little distance, how do you think we should look at this story right now? Like, where is your head at as we record this on February 19th?

Yeah, you know, I should say I think the through line that I've tried to keep in reporting on the various developments in this massive story has really been the Epstein survivors. I think it's so easy to get caught up in the individual headlines, the people around Epstein who may or not be paying a price right now. But at the end of the day, I mean, these acts and sometimes crimes were committed against young women and young girls. I will say when it comes to the survivors, there's just like this sense of disbelief. Like they can't believe this moment has come, right? They've waited for this moment for so many years for some of them, for even several decades. I've had conversations where they're almost sort of expressing a concern that they think this moment might pass, that they'll, you know, wake up one day and realize, okay, people are no longer interested. So I think that's sort of where we are in the big picture, I think, is the beginning of I think what is going to be a long process where survivors are realizing and the public is realizing, wow, this is a massive story that many people and institutions fail to with the appropriate amount of... Gravity for so long.

It's like if some people are waking up to it now, you have these survivors who are saying, this has been going on for so many years and nobody's done anything. So tell me what their biggest issues are right now and what they're telling you.

Yeah. So, I had been speaking with a number of Epstein survivors and when I was reaching out to some of them, actually to talk before the DOJ started putting out, you know, the first batch of files, they suggested and asked me, would it be okay if we had a conversation with you but as a group? And I said, that's totally fine with me if that's what next to you. Most comfortable. This was Danny, Jess, Liz, and Charlene. And they said, you know, speaking as a group, which we don't often get to do, is really helpful because we feel sort of the power in numbers and we feel safety in each other's company. And honestly, in interview settings, when it's just you and you get asked a question that you don't feel comfortable answering, there's sort of a feeling of there's nowhere to go. So they really like having. Think each other to depend on. So that's how we ended up doing these group interviews. So we spoke before the files came out. And that's when they, you know, every single one of them, all four of them said they had no trust that the DOJ would release the files and be fully transparent by the deadline.

It's good to see you guys.

Good to see you

I know that The weekend was, you know, Friday and the weekend was pretty tough for some of you. Tell me how you're doing for starters. How was the weekend?

Anyone wanna go? I'll start. I can start. I.

Gathered the same group again after the release of the latest batch of files that came out. And I mean, they were really angry.

I could feel the fight in me rise up in more of an empowering way than I thought before rather than a debilitating way.

Angry like not in a despondent way, but angry like I am even more determined than I ever was before.

This rage and sorrow and determination. The more this goes on and the more they... Continue to harm us, the more determined I am. To prove them wrong.And just seeing how blatantly careless the DOJ was with redactions, I mean, I don't understand...

They were trying to get their heads around the files that had been released, the redaction problems.

Just seeing people's names unredacted. It's just this isn't transparency. This is absolute retraumatization.

You know, most of them had spent all weekend going through the files, trying to find information about themselves.

It has my full name, my birthday, my address. The thing that is redacted is Danny in that.

Her nickname!

They were coming across information about Jane Doe's that they knew and their names not being redacted. So that conversation was, I mean, it really was fueled by a lot of strong emotions.

'Yeah, tell me more about that, because I think we heard some people saying the files were over-redacted, some were saying they were under-redected. So like, what did that actually look like?

Yeah, so the DOJ was supposed to redact any information that could be identifying of victims, survivors. There were a couple other categories of information that needed to be redacted as well.

I did find a picture of myself black that they were redacted, luckily,

A picture of a couple of pictures of myself blacked and they were adapted luckily, which was what the victims and survivors found was that as the file started coming out, I mean, they were seeing their information all throughout the files. You see an image with just like the

border, but the middle of it's black, sorry. And it's really crazy to like, you know, you know exactly what that image is, you exactly, you, it's just crazy to look at and just, you know it kind of brings you right back to a place that you were in that, you know, I worked really hard to get myself out of that world and, sorry, out of that place. And, it just kind of...

'It brings you right back into it. And then when you hear about potential over-redactions, we are talking about redacting information about people who were around Jeffrey Epstein who may have helped him as he operated this massive sex trafficking ring. So we came across emails exchanged between Jeffrey Epstein and somebody. A person or people where it's clear that they appear to be talking about, for example, the procurement of young women or girls. And we don't know who is on the other side of that message. Now, just one, I think, really important caveat here, as we're talking about sort of the world of sex trafficking is that it can be true that victims of sex trafficking, victims of sexual abuse, can also get into the act of recruiting. So there is a gray, blurry line here where perhaps a person who was discussing with Epstein the procurement of women and girls was also considered a victim by the DOJ.

Oh, so like somebody might be looking at an email and say, hey, this person is obviously helping Epstein with what he's doing, but that person may also have been a victim.

Yeah, so we're going to redact this person's information. But I don't think that was the case for every example of potential overredactions. And I think that is going to continue being just a huge source of outrage for lawmakers, for advocates of the survivors who genuinely feel like this has not resembled in any way full transparency.

Also, what is the DOJ said why they took that route?

Yeah, you know, generally the DOJ's response to the redaction's problems has been to say, look, we had so much information to go through, millions and millions of pages of files of, you know videos and photos, and we've been working around the clock to get this information out there as quickly as possible.

I want to talk for just a moment about the redactions that will be obvious to anyone who reviews the materials that we just produced today.

I mean, we heard Todd Blanch saying it. Mistakes were made.

'We of course want to immediately correct any redaction errors that our team may have made. And so the department has established an email and inbox for victims to reach us directly to correct redactions and any concerns when appropriate. That's been-

And, you know, in the instances of survivors' information being put out in the public when, you know that information really shouldn't have been put out into the public, they've said, essentially, just let us know and we'll try to fix that mistake as quickly as possible. I think the problem in this current internet age is that, I mean, say you're a Jane Doe and You never meant to be a public person. Your name has been published once or twice or however many times in the files. Even if the DOJ were to take those files down, redact your name, put them back up, I think there's a huge concern that, you know, you can't really put the toothpaste back in the tube.

Right, the whole point of being a Jane Doe is so that you didn't have to go ahead and come forward and say this is me. We got to take a quick break. When we come back, does a resignation equal justice? Stick around. On the accountability front, I think a lot of people were saying that the severe consequences against some of these people who were in these files seem to be happening a lot faster overseas than here in the U.S. I mean, we're talking on the day we learned the former Prince Andrew was arrested in the U.K. Over suspicion on misconduct in public office, the first senior British royal in modern history to be arrested. Do we get a sense that the tide might start turning in the US?

'It's such a good question. And I think the contrast between what's happening in the UK now versus the pretty relatively muted response we've seen here has been fascinating and incredibly stark. Here in the US, we have seen some prominent figures maybe being forced to step down from... A role at the company that they're working at or, you know, take like Larry Summers, who I think has been driven out of every sort of public-facing position he held because of all of the messages that came out between him and Epstein.

This morning, fallout from the Jeffrey Epstein files has now reached one of the largest investment banks in the world Goldman Sachs....

Kathy Rumler is going to be leaving her post at Goldman Sach in a couple of months.

A spokesperson for Rumler said that Rumler has done nothing wrong, has nothing to hide. Nothing in the record suggests otherwise, adding that Rumlar has been clear and consistent from the outset. She knew him through her work as a criminal defense attorney, shared a client with him, received referrals from him. And was friendly in that professional context. But we've not seen the...

Total sort of, you know, earthquake levels of, I mean, the former prince being arrested. Like, I don't think we can point to anything sort of equivalent to that here in the U.S.

No, it feels a lot more like reputational, right? Like this person was associated in some way with Epstein. That's just not a good look. We don't want to have that association, but it doesn't seem to be going beyond that.

Right. And so go take a time out for a little bit, right? Because who knows how long lasting even the resignations will be just in terms of their long term sort of reputational damage, as you said. Just one example that I think we could dig into a little bit is Howard Lutnick, who is the president's commerce secretary. The quick recap is that he said in an interview a couple of months ago that he and his wife had such a disturbing interaction with Jeffrey Epstein in 2005 that they said to themselves.

My wife and I decided that I will never be in the room with that disgusting person.

Lo and behold.

I did have lunch with him as I was on a boat going across on a family vacation.

Turns out, his entire family, children and nannies included, ended up visiting Jeffrey Epstein at his infamous private island in the Caribbean. I mean, that.

Vacation to the Epstein Island, yeah, that doesn't seem like you're cutting things off.

And importantly, on the timeline of that too, Epstein was convicted in 2008 in Florida for procuring prostitution from a minor. This trip to the island that the Lutnick family took happened after that.

I literally met him three times over 14 years with widespread in between. That's all I can remember. That's there is in the documents.

I think that is a great example of somebody who doesn't appear to have faced any consequences, I mean at all, for either his associations with Epstein or the fact that he completely misrepresented his dealings with him.

Right. And important to say, Ludnick has not been accused of any wrongdoing related to Epstein and, you know, he's basically reaffirmed that he regrets, you know, kind of this association, but the White House, the Commerce Department, they've all stood by him. So I guess what would true accountability look like according to these survivors that you've spoken to?

It's such a good question. I think that they would like more acknowledgement that they were trying to tell the truth all these years.

We have been trying to get meetings with the DOJ. Practically begging, practically begging.

We have been ignored and I think they would like acknowledgement that law enforcement and the various institutions that were supposed to be there to protect them when they were young women, young girls, failed them and failed to sort of do their jobs.

A document dump doesn't equal accountability at all and they would also

all of the files to be released, you know. Millions of files have come out, but we also know from the DOJ that millions of files has not been released. And you know, when you think about these survivors, just keep in mind that they are, some of them, pouring through these files looking for a sense of validation. They are looking for information about their own stories. Maybe they're looking for a 302. This is the FBI form that basically is like the intake form that would transcribe what a potential victim tells the FBI. I mean they're looking for information like that that can help sort of prove to the world, but also for themselves, that they at one point try to do the right thing by telling the truth about Epstein.

I mean, that's really stark that all these years lay due. They just wanna know even for themselves that I'm not crazy. I tried to raise the alarm and yet nothing happened.

That's exactly right. And it's so heartbreaking, you know, the little tidbits you can pick up on when you're speaking with these survivors. I mean, there was one woman I was talking to who was abused by Epstein. And I'll never forget this. Like she said, you know, when I see photos from Epstein's house in New York City, there's like a specific object that I look for because it's an object that I sort of trained my attention on when I was being abused and in that specific room. Like that's completely unimaginable and it just kind of kills you to hear, right? But yeah, those are the kinds of things that some of these women are looking for.

Like the Department of Injustice. You know, we're victims of a crime. There are, you know, depending on who you're listening to, between 1,000 and 1,200 of us. It feels so intentional and so enormously invalidating that the rage in us is really boiling up. The rage and the determination for us to see justice for these crimes that were committed against us. They can keep saying there's nothing to see here, but we're the victims of these crimes and we know what there is to see. We're not gonna stop fighting until we see it.

I think we can for sure say that this feels like only the beginning and that's for a lot of reasons. It's because of the sheer, you know, breadth of what it is Epstein was doing, the number of people involved, the number of years that he did this for. Frankly just the sheer size of the Epstein files and the fact that there's so much more information that could come out. So I think for sure this is just the beginning and I don't know at what point we could possibly look at each other and say, okay, that's the end of the epstein saga. It's really, really hard to imagine.

Well, it's great reporting, MJ. Thanks so much for talking to us about it. Appreciate it.

Thanks for having me.

We should say Larry Summers, the former Treasury Secretary who MJ mentioned earlier, said he was deeply ashamed of his relationship with Epstein after years' worth of emails between the two emerged last year and said he recognized the pain it caused. Summers has since stepped aside from teaching at Harvard University. That's all for us today. We'll have another episode coming your way on Wednesday. Make sure you're following the show so it'll pop in your feed right away. I'll talk to you then.