Epstein Files Debate Gets Pedophilia and Power Wrong

The release of the Epstein files continues to dominate headlines for what is and isn’t included.

On Feb. 25, 2026, almost a month after the Jan. 30, 2026, document dump by the Department of Justice, both the New York Times and NPR reported on missing memos related to President Donald Trump’s relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Earlier in February, members of the Congress were given access to unredacted versions of these documents. Rep. Cynthia Lummis, a Republican from Wyoming, had this to say when she emerged from the viewing room: “I’ve not been one of the members who has glommed on to this as an issue. … But 9-year-old victims … wow.”

“Well, initially, my reaction to all this was, ‘I don’t care. I don’t know what the big deal is,” she added. “But now I see what the big deal is, and it was worth investigating.”

Whether she meant to do this or not, Lummis’ comments suggested that an alleged global sex trafficking ring involving some of the world’s most powerful people—including, possibly, the president of the United States and several of his high-ranking officials, though they deny all allegations—was not such a big deal when she thought the survivors were teens and young adults.

This sentiment echoes something former Fox News host Megyn Kelly said about the survivors’ ages when a previous round of Epstein files was released in November 2025. On her podcast, Kelly expressed sympathy for the idea that Epstein was not really a pedophile because he was into 15-year-olds—not 8-year-olds. He didn’t like children, Kelly explained, so much as he liked them “barely legal.”

But “barely legal” isn’t a thing (I’ll get to that in a minute), and randomly nuancing the definition of pedophilia shouldn’t be either.

Age isn’t just a number

Let’s start by getting our terms straight: Pedophiles are people who have a sexual preference for children, usually prepubescent children or those who are around the age of puberty. Pedophilia is a psychiatric diagnosis. You can be a pedophile without sexually abusing children, and you can be a child abuser without meeting the diagnostic definition of a pedophile.

The word pedophile instantly conjures up abuse of small children, which makes our hearts break and our skin crawl. This visceral reaction is understandable, and it may explain why Lummis, Kelly, and other public figures have insisted on drawing a distinction between the abuse of young children and the rape of teenagers.

To be clear, the law does not distinguish between a 9-year-old and a 15-year-old—both minors—when it comes to sex. While age of consent laws vary by state, all states see 15 as too young to consent. With the possible rare exception of consenting couples who are close in age (for example, the 18-year-old high school senior dating a 15-year-old sophomore), any adult who has sex with someone 15 or younger has committed a crime.

In some cases that crime is statuatory rape. In others it might be rape or sexual assault. And in some states, teens having sex with teens is illegal, too.

As I said, there’s only legal and illegal—not “barely legal.”

When consent isn’t possible

I believe that teens should be experimenting with sex. I’ve spent much of my career as a sex educator arguing that sexual development and experimentation are natural parts of adolescence that help young people understand themselves and develop the relationship skills they’ll need as adults. Grown-ups should see high school students as capable of having consensual sexual relationships with each other.

But relationships can only be consensual if the couple is on equal footing. When one holds too much control because of their age, status, or position of authority over the other (think coach, teacher, or boss), true consent is rarely possible. Age is not the only power imbalance, but it seems obvious that a 51-year-old man looking for sex from a 14-year-old is a predator—not a partner.

The late financier Epstein has been accused of sexually abusing at least 1,000 young women and children. He had a pattern of offering teenage girls as young as 14 money for massages, during which he would masturbate and touch their genitals with his fingers or sex toys. He would offer these children more money if they would recruit other girls for the same thing.

Epstien has also been accused of forcibly raping girls as young as 14. (Epstein pled guilty to soliciting a minor for sex in Florida in 2008 and was indicted on sex trafficking charges in 2019, but died in jail before a trial could take place.)

Survivors have also said they were abused, assaulted, or raped by friends and acquaintances of Epstein; President Trump has been named in these allegations. The accusations against Trump have not been investigated or verified, but he has previously been found civilly liable for sexual abuse.

Let’s stop saying ‘underage women’

Questioning whether Epstein or others among his we-just-like-them-young buddies were “really pedophiles” as Megyn Kelly did is a twisted game of splitting hairs.

It opens the door for letting some perpetrators of sexual abuse off the hook by implying thatthe pedophile who goes after young children is a pervert, while the CEO who preys on teenagers is just misbehaving. It’s bad but not that bad.

I have to wonder whether this is what some of the men involved in Epstein’s sex ring have told themselves as well. When Trump embraced the QAnon conspiracy theory that there was a secret cabal of powerful pedophiles abusing children and made exposing it part of his 2024 campaign strategy, did he not remember partying with Epstein? Or did he think his name wouldn’t come up because he didn’t consider himself a pedophile?

For some people—and I’m betting that Trump, Lummis, and Kelly fall into this group–the distinction between an 8-year old and a 15-year-old likely seems important because 15-year-old girls can be sexual. Most have breasts and curves and pubic hair. They may wear make-up and short skirts. They probably think about boys or girls or both. They might read spicy books and have sexual fantasies.

Some 15-year-olds even have sex: In 2023, 16 percent of ninth graders and 25 percent of 10th graders reported they had had sexual intercourse. This is likely why we’ve seen so many people—including some legitimate news sources, like NPR—refer to the young girls as “underage women.” Again, that’s not a thing. Even in high heels and mascara, being “underage” means that you’re a child.

And children are children—not women. Suggesting otherwise could lead to blaming girls for wearing the wrong clothes, making bad choices, leading men on, or any number of other things that we tend to put on rape survivors after the fact.

It’s about power

We should stop talking about the age of Epstein’s victims and start talking about their sexual agency—that is, their ability to make conscious, informed, and empowered decisions. Agency is about having a voice and being able to negotiate what you want.

It seems clear to me that the men of this decades-long sex-ring were looking for those who had no agency. The girls and women were reportedly lied to, coerced, threatened, and possibly held against their will. The men didn’t want sexual partners; they wanted control.

None of this is meant to downplay the horror of 9-year-olds being trafficked. If anything, I want to up-play (I know that’s not a word, but I need it to be) the horror of 19-year-olds being trafficked, too. Even though the law may see them as adults, these young women were not empowered to make their own decisions about how they were treated or what they would and wouldn’t do.

The emerging revelations that young children suffered in Epstein’s crimes may make some people, like Lummis, start paying attention, and it may make others, like Kelly, shut up. My hope, though, is that we can stop debating whether the men were pedophiles and start focusing on the survivors.

We can give the survivors back some agency by listening to their stories and believing them—no matter how old they were at the time of their abuse.

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