Former Attorney General Pam Bondi failed to appear on Tuesday to testify under oath before the House Oversight Committee regarding her handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Lawmakers had warned that if Bondi refused to testify despite being ousted from the Trump administration, they would move to hold her in contempt of Congress.
“Pam Bondi is evading a lawful congressional subpoena by failing to appear before the Oversight Committee for a deposition about the Epstein files and the White House cover-up,” said Ranking Member Robert Garcia in a statement.
He warned, “If she continues to ignore the law, Oversight Democrats will move forward with contempt proceedings immediately.”
The Justice Department told the committee last week that Bondi would not show up for her scheduled deposition on April 14 because she was no longer serving as attorney general.
It remains unclear whether Bondi’s firing in early April was purely coincidental as her testimony loomed, but the Justice Department used it as a convenient excuse to push back on her appearance.
After being fired, Bondi claimed she had a month to wrap up her work at the department, but Todd Blanche assumed the title of acting attorney general almost immediately.
Since last week, the Justice Department quietly removed Bondi as its leader from their website, but Bondi’s social media still listed her as attorney general as of Tuesday.
A spokesperson for Chairman James Comer said last week that the committee would work with her personal attorney to reschedule her appearance. But his office did not respond to inquiries on whether progress had been made.
The subpoena issued in March came after a bipartisan group of lawmakers pushing to hear directly from her about the botched release of files. The Justice Department has still not fully complied with the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
Republican Rep. Nancy Mace’s office on Tuesday said her position remains that Bondi was subpoenaed specifically, not as the attorney general.
The South Carolina lawmaker has demanded Bondi’s deposition be rescheduled in a timely fashion and threatened that if the former attorney general refuses to comply, she should be held in contempt.
Democratic Rep. Summer Lee also blasted Bondi’s failure to comply with the committee’s subpoena.
“I previously moved to hold her in contempt; there’s no reason we cannot try again. Bondi must be held accountable for her handling of the Epstein files, for weaponizing the Department of Justice, and for evading the law,” Lee said.
