GOP senators push federal prison chief for answers on Epstein's death

The following is an excerpt from Blaze Media’s Capitol Hill Brief email newsletter:

While another day of the House’s impeachment drama unfolded on the other side of Capitol Hill, Republican senators demanded some answers on what happened to Jeffrey Epstein while he was in federal custody.

“Christmas ornaments, drywall and [Jeffrey] Epstein — name three things that don’t hang themselves,” GOP Senator John Kennedy said to Federal Bureau of Prisons director Kathleen Hawk Sawyer at a Senate Judiciary Committee oversight hearing on Tuesday. “That’s what the American people think … and they deserve some answers."

During the hearing, Ben Sasse asked the director if she could think of any other events in the history of the bureau “that have caused as much crisis for public trust” as Epstein’s highly suspicious death. She responded that “it’s probably gotten the most public attention.”

Sasse also voiced his frustration with the fact that Sawyer wasn’t allowed to testify about the ongoing investigation into the Epstein matter. “This death happened in the middle of August, early August. It's Thanksgiving, and you're here to testify today, and you say you're not allowed to speak about this incident,” Sasse said. “I think that's crazy.”

During the hearing, Sawyer testified that she didn’t have any evidence to suggest that the alleged sex trafficker’s death was anything other than a suicide as ruled by the coroner. She did, however, say that federal investigators are looking into the possibility that “criminal enterprise” played a role in the incident.

On the same day as Sawyer’s testimony, two of the guards at the jail where Epstein died were arrested for reportedly failing to check on the prisoner.

#mc_embed_signup{background:#fff; clear:left; font:14px}

/* Add your own MailChimp form style overrides in your site stylesheet or in this style block.

We recommend moving this block and the preceding CSS link to the HEAD of your HTML file. */