New Mexico AG Rips DOJ for Failing to Assist in Probe of Epstein’s Zorro Ranch

New Mexico’s Attorney General Raúl Torrez is accusing the Department of Justice (DOJ) of having made a “deliberate choice not to cooperate” with an investigation into crimes that may have been committed at Jeffrey Epstein’s Zorro Ranch near Santa Fe. Following repeated requests for assistance in his probe, Torrez is now giving DOJ until the end of the month to comply before he will “pursue all legal remedies.”

In a letter to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, New Mexico’s top lawyer left little doubt what he thinks about the Trump administration’s level of help.

Noting that he has spent the past five months reaching out to DOJ for access to relevant documents, Torrez wrote on Tuesday that this effort “has been met, if it has been met at all, with production so incomplete as to be functionally non-responsive.”

Blanche, Donald Trump’s former lawyer, is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday and will undoubtedly have to answer questions about his role in DOJ’s chaotic compliance (or lack thereof) with a law to release the Epstein files ahead of a possible confirmation to stay at the department’s top job permanently.

While senators from both sides of the aisle will have plenty of things to discuss with him, such as the $1.8 billion slush fund to reward the president’s allies that he helped create, or a meeting he had with Epstein’s confidante Ghislaine Maxwell that resulted in her getting moved to a country club prison, the timing of the letter suggests that Blanche may also be quizzed about DOJ’s apparent lack of cooperation with the Zorro Ranch probe.

Torrez has been investigating the matter since February and has sought access to the unredacted version of an email from 2019 that alleges that two “foreign girls” who died during fetish sex were buried there.

While Epstein’s offenses related to sex trafficking minors have been documented, this would involve a whole different type of crime.

And yet, DOJ has been of little to no help, Torrez says.

“The gap between USDOJ’s public posture and its actual conduct is remarkable,” he wrote.

While the administration had claimed to welcome the investigation, “Those statements stand in sharp and troubling contrast to what the NMDOJ [New Mexico Department of Justice] had actually received: a handful of already-public, still-redacted documents, photocopies of local news coverage, a Touhy response letter that raises objections rather than facilitates production, and referrals to satellite offices that are either unwilling or unauthorized to produce what Main Justice holds.”

A Touhy request seeks official information for litigation purposes when the government is not part of that litigation.

Torrez leaves no doubt that he believes this is intentional.

“USDOJ’s conduct reflects the appearance of cooperation rather than its substance, calibrated precisely to deflect public scrutiny while leaving  NMDOJ’s investigation no further advanced than the day its first request was submitted,” he wrote.

“The USDOJ’s mission, like the NMDOJ’s, is to seek justice, protect the public, and vindicate the rights of those who have been harmed,” Torrez added. “The NMDOJ implores the USDOJ to act in alignment with that mission.”

Of course, therein lies the crux of this problem: The Department of Justice under former Attorney General Pam Bondi and now under Blanche routinely acts not in the best interest of the country but rather that of Donald J. Trump, as evidenced by that slush fund or measures taken to protect the president from the fallout resulting from the Epstein files.

These things and many others make Blanche wholly unfit to permanently hold DOJ’s top job. His conflicts of interest are staggering, and many Republicans know this. Of course, that doesn’t mean that they will do the right thing and reject his confirmation.

If they do not, that’s a choice they will have to live with when Blanche continues to act as Trump’s personal attorney and not the people’s lawyer.