The Epstein files are the biggest challenge to face the justice department since Trump’s return.

After public outcry, Congress mandated that the justice department release its trove of millions of files related to the investigation into the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. However, the slow pace of their release and extensive redactions have drawn criticism from lawmakers and survivors.

Blanche faced probing questions from both parties about the justice department’s handling of the files.

About a dozen women, wearing T-shirts that featured images of the redacted files, attended the hearing to protest.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, the top Republican on the panel, asked Blanche about “problematic redactions”, “insufficient effort” on following investigative leads and “refusal to meet with victims”, as well as questions surrounding the Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell’s move to a lower-security prison.

Blanche responded that redacting and releasing six millions pages of files within a short timeframe was a “Herculean task”.

“There were mistakes that were made, and so approximately 1% of the redactions had to be fixed,” Blanche added. “We had dozens of lawyers on call.”

During one exchange, Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal asked if Blanche would apologise to Epstein survivors for “the mishandling and mistakes”.

“I will absolutely say that any mistake that we made should not have been made,” Blanche said. “And I very much. I very much apologise.”