TLDR
Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA), a Marine Corps veteran who served four tours in Iraq, took direct action to preserve Epstein documents that the DOJ removed from public access — hosting them on his campaign website — after CNN reported the Department was "clearly trying to protect the president."
A Veteran's Approach to Accountability
Rep. Seth Moulton represents Massachusetts' 6th Congressional District, encompassing the North Shore communities from Salem to Gloucester and inland communities across Essex and Middlesex counties. He serves on the Armed Services Committee, the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, and the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (U.S. House of Representatives, 2026). Before entering Congress in 2015, Moulton served as a Marine Corps infantry officer, completing four combat tours in Iraq — an experience that shaped his orientation toward institutional accountability and his low tolerance for government agencies that withhold information from the public.
Moulton holds a B.S. in physics from Harvard University along with an MBA and a Master of Public Administration from the same institution (PAPER TRAIL Project, 2026). His academic training in both hard science and public administration informs an approach to the Epstein files that is analytical and action-oriented: when documents disappeared, he did not merely issue a press release — he preserved and republished them.
Preserving What the DOJ Took Down
On February 2, 2026, the DOJ removed "several thousand documents and media items" from its public Epstein file release, citing redaction failures that had exposed sensitive information (PAPER TRAIL Project, 2026). The removal meant that documents the public had already accessed, downloaded, and analyzed were no longer available through official government channels. The DOJ framed the action as a correction of inadvertent disclosure errors.
Moulton responded by preserving the removed documents and hosting them on his campaign website, making them available to the public through an unofficial but accessible channel (PAPER TRAIL Project, 2026). The action was legally notable: a sitting member of Congress used his personal campaign infrastructure to maintain public access to government records that a federal agency had retracted. It was also politically pointed — by hosting the documents himself, Moulton implicitly challenged the DOJ's authority to unilaterally restrict access to records that were released pursuant to a law passed 427-1.
The CNN Report and Partisan Implications
CNN reported that the DOJ was "clearly trying to protect the president" through its handling of the Epstein file releases (CNN, 2026). On February 24, 2026, NPR provided additional specificity, reporting that the DOJ had withheld FBI interview summaries related to Donald Trump from the congressional review process (NPR, 2026). These reports created a factual backdrop for Moulton's document preservation effort: if the DOJ was selectively withholding materials related to the president while simultaneously removing already-published documents, the pattern suggested something beyond routine compliance management.
Moulton also called for accountability for Bill Clinton, whose name appears extensively in the Epstein document universe (PAPER TRAIL Project, 2026). By naming Clinton alongside the Trump-related withholding, Moulton positioned himself as favoring nonpartisan disclosure — a stance that distinguishes him from members on both sides who have focused scrutiny primarily on the opposing party's connections to Epstein.
What North Shore Massachusetts Constituents Should Know
Residents of Massachusetts' 6th District — from the fishing communities of Gloucester to the historic towns of Salem, Marblehead, and Peabody — are represented by a combat veteran who took concrete action to preserve public access to Epstein documents the DOJ tried to retract. Moulton's decision to host removed files on his campaign website went beyond rhetoric: it created an alternative public archive when the government closed its own. North Shore constituents should understand that Moulton's committees — Armed Services, Transportation and Infrastructure, and the Select Committee on China — do not give him direct jurisdiction over DOJ, but his document preservation action demonstrated that individual members can exercise meaningful oversight through unconventional channels. His willingness to call for accountability for both Trump and Clinton signals a nonpartisan approach to disclosure that his constituents can measure against his future actions.
Moulton's document preservation efforts are significant because DOJ has already removed "several thousand" items post-release. The 419-video surveillance corpus that survived shows guard absence escalation and a phase-driven failure — evidence that might have been lost without the Transparency Act Moulton cosponsored.
References
CNN. (2026). DOJ Epstein file handling report [News report].
Epstein Files Transparency Act, Pub. L. No. 119-38 (2025). https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/4405
NPR. (2026, February 24). DOJ withheld Trump-related FBI interview summaries from Epstein file review [News report].
PAPER TRAIL Project. (2026). Congressional oversight recipient profiles [Data set]. Script 34 output.
U.S. Congress. (2025). Epstein Files Transparency Act, P.L. 119-38.
U.S. Department of Justice. (2025-2026). Epstein document releases [Government records].
U.S. House of Representatives. (2026). Member directory [Data set].
This investigation is part of the SubThesis accountability journalism network.