For months now, a thorny subject has tormented supporters of the Republican majority in Congress: the hush around the Jeffrey Epstein documents. People across the country keep calling for transparency, but the House has seemly ducked every opportunity to release these records. Rather than quell the public’s interest by pulling back the curtain, Congress left for August recess without a final vote on disclosing what the Justice Department really has.

After all this time, it’s baffling that Republicans—who usually champion law and order—didn’t respond more aggressively from day one. Now they’re backed into a corner, with skeptics everywhere accusing them of covering up a scandal that might reflect poorly on some big names. Courts aren’t giving them a free pass, either. Multiple judges have refused to simply unseal grand jury testimony from earlier Epstein cases, claiming it wouldn’t necessarily reveal anything meaningful beyond what is already known.

So here we are: the Justice Department was subpoenaed by a House committee demanding the full trove of Epstein files. But that agency continues to miss deadlines, and the legislature shows no stomach for throwing down the gauntlet yet. Representative James Comer, who chairs a key investigation panel, says the government will give them documents on a rolling basis. But folks are tired of the slow drip. People want everything on the table. The big question is whose names or associations might show up, and whether that’s the real reason for the foot-dragging.

Some Democrats are exploiting the situation, playing procedural tricks in committees to force votes on releasing the records. They know the GOP is itching to end the entire conversation, but can’t easily do so without looking complicit. This is more than a partisan scuffle. Americans deserve to know how this vile man operated and who in positions of power enabled or befriended him. And we also want assurance that the Justice Department thoroughly tracked his dark network.

We’ve heard the White House say it’s up to Congress to push this forward if they want justice served. Yet House leadership, pressed by constituents in their home districts, is drifting into September with no real resolution. People are furious that lawmakers keep punting Epstein subpoenas while focusing on other matters. There’s enough time to lecture the country on polling and politics, but apparently not enough time to address this.

The same puzzle confounds observers in the Senate. Democrats there are trying a seldom-used method to force the attorney general’s hand. They want her to release every scrap of Epstein-related material, from criminal case documents to details about his death in federal custody. The White House has stayed silent on that piece, perhaps hoping the matter will fizzle. But everything indicates the opposite: public interest keeps climbing.

Now, former Attorney General William Barr has testified behind closed doors, and the House says it wants to ask more ex-officials about how the Epstein fiasco got handled. As usual, that’s one more incremental step, but the pace is glacial. Republicans must revisit their stance. Voters despise high-level hypocrisy, and many stand behind President Trump’s repeated pledge to drain the swamp. If there’s one scandal that screams “swamp,” it’s Epstein’s story—a saga involving hush payments, questionable treatment in jail, and influential individuals who appear to dodge full probing.

The party in power on Capitol Hill must decide if it really stands for transparency. If so, surrender those files. End the speculation and prove you have nothing to hide. Perhaps revelations will embarrass certain figures, but sunshine is the best disinfectant. With midterms just around the corner, the cost of ignoring the public’s call for disclosure might be too high. A thorough airing of truth could finally put a stop to the rumors swirling around Epstein’s connections and reassert the principle that no one is above the law.