The Justice Department missed a judge's July 2 deadline to unseal names and emails, defended every redaction, and says it will appeal.
Judge Emmet Sullivan ordered the records opened in journalist Katie Phang's suit under the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
The department refused, defended every blackout in a court filing, and says it will appeal rather than comply.
Among the sealed records: at least eight email exchanges about a "torture video" and sex with young women, including minors.
Why it mattersCongress wrote this law to force exactly these names open, barring secrecy for "embarrassment" or "political sensitivity," yet they stay hidden by the government sworn to release them.
A US Congress task force says the agency is declassifying just-discovered documents from MKUltra, the Cold War program that drugged unwitting Americans.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna: the new files pertain to a forgery program housed under MKUltra.
They surfaced among 40 boxes of JFK and MKUltra records; after a standoff, the CIA agreed to release them.
Most MKUltra evidence was burned in 1973 on the CIA director's own order. What's known today survived through seven misfiled boxes found in 1977.
Why it mattersMKUltra is the reason "the government experimented on its own citizens" is history, not theory. Any file that escaped the 1973 bonfire rewrites part of that record.