At Todd Blanche's confirmation hearing for Attorney General, Sen. Richard Blumenthal asked him to apologize to Epstein survivors in the room. Blanche said his heart breaks for victims and offered sympathy that "this happened to them." Pressed on the Justice Department's mishandling, the furthest he went was: "any mistake that we made should not have been made."
The receipt
- Who
- Sen. Richard Blumenthal
- Where
- hearing - Senate questioning of acting Attorney General Todd Blanche
- Original footage
- MS NOW · watch the full video from this moment
- Length
- 51 seconds, unedited within the cut
- Plays
- 574 on Instagram
Read the transcript
I'm asking you today with Epstein survivors in this room to apologize to them. Well, so my heart breaks for every victim of any sexual crime, whether it's involving Mr. Epstein or somebody else. And so if you're asking me to apologize that this happened to them, of course, absolutely. This is a horrible thing, which is why this Department of Justice, this administration is focused very heavily on going after these predators. And so, yes, of course, that's part of my job as being empathetic to the victims of crime. Will you apologize to them for the mishandling and mistakes that were made by the United States Department of Justice? I will absolutely say that any mistake that we made should not have been made.
Machine transcript of the clip's audio; names are checked, small words may differ.