Speaker Mike Johnson on Thursday expressed concerns with the Department of Justice’s tracking of lawmakers’ search history of the unredacted Jeffrey Epstein files, though he questioned whether the surveillance was intentional or a mistake — even though the data was compiled for the attorney general’s research binder at Wednesday’s House Judiciary hearing.
“I don’t think it’s appropriate for anybody to be tracking that. So, I will echo that to anyone in the DOJ. And I am sure it was an oversight, that’s my guess, OK?” Johnson said.
House Speaker Mike Johnson speaks in the Rayburn Reception Room after formally unveiling the Frederick Douglass Press Gallery at the Capitol, Feb. 12, 2026.
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On Wednesday, Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal accused Attorney General Pam Bondi of “spying” on her search history when the congresswoman visited the Department of Justice earlier this week to view unredacted files on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Since Monday, lawmakers have been allowed to visit the DOJ to review the unredacted files on four computer kiosks.
Photos from Reuters from a House Judiciary Committee hearing at which Bondi appeared on Wednesday show printouts titled: “Jayapal Pramila Search History” and include a diagram of several documents from the DOJ’s Epstein files that Jayapal searched.
The Justice Department on Thursday afternoon said that during the review of the unredacted Epstein files, “DOJ logs all searches made on its systems to protect against the release of victim information.” The DOJ did not offer any explanation for why Bondi had a printout of Jayapal’s search history.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi holds a piece of paper labelled “Jayapal Pramila Search History”, in reference to U.S. Representative Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), a member of the House Judiciary Committee, during the committee’s hearing on oversight of the Justice Department, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., February 11, 2026.
Kent Nishimura/Reuters
Johnson, who received Jayapal’s account of the episode in a phone call with the congresswoman Wednesday evening, added that members should “have the right” to view files at “their own speed and with their own discretion.”
Republican Rep. Nancy Mace also said she believed the DOJ was tracking her as she conducted her review of the unredacted documents.
Across the aisle, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said he was not surprised that the DOJ tracked their search history “because the bar is so low.”
“There is no bottom for the Trump administration, for Pam Bondi, for the other sycophants who are part of this corrupt administration,” Jeffries said on Thursday.
Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz said each lawmaker who reviews the unredacted Epstein files receives a specific login to sign on to a computer to see the documents — instead of terminals that are open to use, which Moscowitz called “suspicious.”
“I mean, I’m not embarrassed that the documents I was looking at, so I don’t know that it’s a big gotcha. But it’s inappropriate. We should have been informed of that,” Moskowitz said.
Rep. Jared Moskowitz holds up a Trump Bible as he questions Attorney General Pam Bondi in the House Judiciary Committee at the Capitol, Feb. 11, 2026.
J. Scott Applewhite/AP
Jayapal told reporters on Thursday that there “needs to be a whole new process” where lawmakers are assured that the Department of Justice “is not spying on us and keeping our search histories and then using it against us.”
“Surveilling us and spying on us and then using it in a ‘burn book’ binder against us, is absolutely unacceptable, and so the process has to change right away,” Jayapal told ABC News Capitol Hill Correspondent Jay O’Brien. “They cannot save our search histories. They cannot spy on us, and that’s what we’re demanding.”
Rep. Pramila Jayapal listens during a hearing before the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee at the Capitol, Feb. 12, 2026.
Alex Wong/Getty Images
Jayapal said there “needs to be accountability,” adding Democrats are “looking at all the options for that.”
Rep. Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on the committee leading the Bondi hearing Wednesday, said in a statement that he plans to ask the DOJ’s inspector general to launch an inquiry into the matter.
Jayapal said she would welcome Republican collaboration in the process.
“I think that there are several Republicans that don’t like this. They were also spied on when they went and so I hope that this can be a bipartisan effort to say this is absolutely inappropriate. It has to stop,” she said.
But the chairman who presided over Wednesday’s hearing, Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, brushed off concerns that the DOJ monitored lawmakers’ search history.
“I mean come on, it’s pretty rich. It’s pretty rich to hear the complaints after, after what the DOJ has done to Republican members of Congress under Jack Smith,” Jordan said, referencing “Arctic Frost,” which captured phone logs of several Republicans.
Jordan contended that the DOJ had his phone records for two and a half years, as well as former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy.
“They knew who the speaker was calling before votes, who he was calling after votes, when the call happened, how long it lasted, where he was at,” Jordan said. “And now they are raising this issue? Like, OK.”
Jayapal urged Republicans to “be consistent about this.”
“I’ve worked with several colleagues across the aisle, including Chairman Jordan, on [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] and surveillance. This is a prime example of that,” she said.