The Senate late Tuesday afternoon agreed to unanimously pass the House bill requiring the Justice Department to release its bill on Jeffrey Epstein files.
When the bill arrives from the House, it will be considered immediately approved by the Senate and sent to President Donald Trump’s desk.
Minority Leader Chuck Schumer arrived on the floor at 5:18 p.m., just hours after the House resoundingly approved the bill, and asked that the Senate consider it passed as soon as it was processed by the House.
Nobody objected.
The Senate’s unanimous action means there will be no amendments or changes to the bill, as House Speaker Mike Johnson and other members of his Republican leadership team had been urging.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune speaks to reporters at the Capitol in Washington, Nov. 7, 2025.
J. Scott Applewhite/AP
Trump said Monday that he will sign the bill if it reaches his desk.
“I’m all for it,” Trump said.
But in a post on his social media platform Tuesday afternoon, the president said he doesn’t “care when the Senate passes the House bill, whether tonight or some other time in the near future,” and that he wants Republicans to stay focused on their agenda.
“I just don’t want Republicans to take their eyes off all the victories we’ve had, including THE BIG BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL, Closed Borders, No Men in Women’s Sports or Transgender for All, ending DEI, stopping Biden’s record inflation, the biggest tax cuts and regulations in history, stopping EIGHT wars, rebuilding our Military, being RESPECTED by every country in the world, having trillions of dollars INVESTED in the “America, having created “hottest” country in the world, and even dealing a HUGE DEFEAT to the Democrats during the shutdown,” Trump said in his post.
A senior White House official later told ABC News that the bill “will be signed whenever it gets to the White House.”
Trump did not need to wait for Congress to act: he could order the release immediately.
At a vigil at the Capitol, a group of House Democrats and Epstein survivors erupted in loud cheers upon learning that the Senate had unanimously passed the bill.
After New Mexico Democratic Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez made the announcement from the podium, the group erupted in loud cheers, applause and smiles, some of whom broke down in tears.
Democrats were seen hugging survivors.
Earlier, Senate Majority Leader John Thune dismissed the idea of the Senate amending the bill despite Johnson urging the Senate to do so.
“I think when a bill comes out of the House 427-1 and the president says he was going to sign it, I’m not sure amending it is in the cards,” Thune said.
Johnson was not enthusiastic about the prospect of the Senate fast-tracking the Epstein files bill through the upper chamber without making changes.
“I just texted him: We’re getting together,” Johnson said of Thune. “We’ll talk about it.”
“There is an easy way to change the legislation to ensure that we do not cause permanent damage to the justice system, and I am going to insist on that,” Johnson added. “We will talk to our colleagues in the Senate.”
Speaking on the Senate floor, Schumer said he would personally ask the Senate to act unanimously on the Epstein bill later Tuesday.
The move requires Attorney General Pam Bondi to make available all “unclassified records, documents, communications and investigative materials” in the Justice Department’s possession related to Epstein.
If the legislation becomes law, it could force the disclosure of federal records about Epstein and his convicted accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, as well as other individuals, including government officials, named or mentioned in connection with Epstein’s “criminal activities, civil settlements, immunity, plea agreements or investigative proceedings,” according to the text of the legislation. Victims’ names and other identifying information would be excluded from disclosure, as would any items that may depict or contain child sexual abuse material, according to the text of the bill passed by the House.
ABC News has not received a response from the Justice Department to questions about whether and how it plans to comply with the bill once it has been signed by Trump.
On Friday, Bondi announced that the Justice Department was launching a new investigation into the files and possible ties between high-profile Democrats and Epstein just hours after Trump ordered it to do so on his Truth Social account.
It is unclear whether he will seek to cite that announcement as exempting much of the files from public disclosure because of their relevance to the new investigation, even though the DOJ and FBI stated unequivocally in a July statement that they discovered no evidence in a review of the files that would support an investigation predicated on unindicted individuals.
The Justice Department is unlikely to release the entire Epstein file, according to sources. Any materials related to ongoing investigations or claims of White House executive privilege will likely remain out of public view.
ABC News’ John Parkinson, Lauren Peller, Rebecca Gelpi and Michelle Stoddart contributed to this report.
