The release of millions of U.S. Department of Justice files about Jeffrey Epstein on Friday has had effects around the world, bringing powerful people back into the spotlight. The DOJ released more than 3 million pages of documents, along with thousands of videos and pictures, that show how Epstein interacted with famous people after he was found guilty of sex crimes in Florida.

The files, which were gathered over 20 years of investigations, show connections to people like Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, who used to be Prince Andrew, and other political and business leaders.

This information led to the resignation of a high-ranking Slovak official on Saturday. In Britain, there have been new calls for Mountbatten-Windsor to help U.S. investigators.

The fallout has led to a lot of discussion about who is responsible, how open the government is, and how it handles private information.

Robert Fico, the Prime Minister of Slovakia, accepted the resignation of national security adviser Miroslav Lajcak on Saturday after photos and emails showed that they had met with Epstein in 2018.

Even though there were no accusations of wrongdoing against Lajcak, the former foreign minister and U.N. General Assembly president, opposition parties and coalition partners put pressure on him. He said that all of his interactions were strictly diplomatic.

Breitbart reported that an email from Epstein’s office in March 2018 invited Lajcak to a meeting with Kathy Ruemmler, a former Obama adviser, and Steve Bannon, a former Trump adviser.

On Saturday, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Mountbatten-Windsor to tell American investigators everything they knew about Epstein’s actions.

The former prince has turned down a request from the U.S. House Oversight Committee for a full interview about his long relationship with Epstein.

The Justice Department’s huge release includes Epstein’s emails with famous people like Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and Steve Tisch, as well as thousands of mentions of Donald Trump.

There have been no public accusations against Trump or former President Bill Clinton, and both have said they didn’t know about Epstein’s abuse.

FBI records from 2006 show that agents were looking into Epstein for paying underage girls for sexualized massages.

By May 2007, a draft indictment was ready that named him and three of his assistants. But a plea deal with then-U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta let Epstein avoid federal charges.

He pleaded guilty to a lesser state crime and got an 18-month sentence. People who care more about justice than privilege still don’t like this leniency.

The FBI’s disturbing interview notes from 2007, which were made public on Friday, show an employee at Epstein’s Florida estate talking about things like fanning $100 bills near his bed and cleaning up after massages with young girls.

These stories show how bad it is when exploitation becomes normal. It’s still unclear how such behavior went unnoticed for so long.

Epstein’s private emails, including a 2010 exchange where he told Mountbatten-Windsor, “I have a friend who I think you might enjoy having dinner with,” add a personal dimension to the scandal. Mountbatten-Windsor replied he “would be delighted to see her.”

Epstein later called the woman “clevere beautiful, trustworthy” in a message full of typos.

Epstein killed himself in a New York jail in 2019, a month after he was charged, and Ghislaine Maxwell was found guilty of sex trafficking in 2021 and given a 20-year sentence. These events close some chapters but not all.

There are no other people charged in connection with Epstein’s crimes, which leaves a feeling of unfinished business.

Victims like Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who settled a lawsuit against Mountbatten-Windsor before she tragically killed herself at 41 last year, deserve better answers.

Back in December, Larry Summers, the former president of Harvard University, announced that he will scale back his public commitments, according to the university’s student newspaper.

The announcement comes after the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released seven years of correspondence between Summers, a longtime figure in and supporter of the Democratic Party, and financier Jeffrey Epstein.