President Donald Trump has abandoned his hardball pressure and threats to block legislation requiring the release of investigative material about his former friend and child sex ring operator Jeffrey Epstein — but has not explained why he does not simply release those files, as he has the ability to do.

“They can do whatever they want. I’ll give them everything,” he told reporters in the Oval Office Monday when asked if he would sign the Epstein files bill if it passes both chambers of Congress.

He was not asked in that encounter, though, why he does not just open up all the files on his own, and he did not volunteer an explanation.

“All you have to do is tell [Attorney General] Pam Bondi to release the files,” said Glenn Kirschner, a longtime former federal prosecutor, who added that Trump flipped on the House legislation only after it became clear it is likely to pass with an enormous bipartisan majority. “That is to cover his political ass.”

“Trump’s most recent flip-flop on the Epstein files is his surrender to the fact he was about to be humiliated by an overwhelming vote in Congress and an effort to turn what was going to be a massive repudiation of his extreme efforts to hide the files into a victory,” said Ty........

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