Who Is Clay Higgins, the Lone House Member Who Voted Against Releasing the Epstein Files?
Inside the one dissenting vote against a bipartisan push for transparency.
WASHINGTON (TWP) — Democrats and Republicans arrived Tuesday expecting a rare moment of bipartisan unanimity: a clean, across-the-board House vote compelling the public release of case files linked to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Instead, one name broke the streak. Only one lawmaker opposed it — Republican Rep. Clay Higgins of Louisiana.
Higgins, now in his fifth term representing a southwest Louisiana district, released an extended statement ahead of the vote declaring himself a “principled ‘NO’ from the beginning.” His concerns mirrored some raised earlier by House Speaker Mike Johnson, also a Louisiana Republican. But even Johnson ultimately sided with the majority, telling reporters, “None of us want to go on record and in any way be accused of not being for maximum transparency.”
Higgins — a fierce Trump loyalist and a member of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus — had no such qualms.
While GOP base voters, survivors of Epstein’s abuse, and even former President Donald Trump threw their weight behind the legislation, Higgins held his ground. He argued the bill risked exposing “thousands of innocent people — witnesses, those who provided alibis, family members, and more.”
“If enacted as written, this sweeping release of criminal investigative files — dumped into a ravenous media environment — will absolutely result in innocent Americans being harmed,” Higgins wrote.
He suggested he might support the bill if the Senate amended it to shield individuals “named but not criminally implicated.” But hours later, the Senate passed the measure unanimously and without changes, leaving Higgins the only member of Congress on record against it.
Higgins’ dissent was not surprising to those familiar with his political history. Before coming to Congress, he served as a law enforcement officer, a role from which he departed amid a string of misconduct allegations. He later catapulted to national notoriety with aggressively theatrical Crime Stoppers videos, earning the moniker “Cajun John Wayne.” The persona stuck — and Higgins embraced it, even challenging critics to physical confrontations online.
In 2020, Facebook removed one of his posts for violating rules on violence and incitement after Higgins appeared to suggest the use of force against armed protesters.
In Congress, he chairs a House Oversight subcommittee that initiated a subpoena of the Department of Justice for the Epstein files. But even as Democrats on the panel persuaded several Republicans to join them in approving the subpoena, Higgins again broke ranks and opposed it. He also pushed the committee to subpoena former President Bill Clinton.
“I’ve never handled a subpoena like this. It’s fascinating stuff,” Higgins said at the time. On Tuesday, he pointed to the panel’s ongoing investigation into the government’s handling of the Epstein case, emphasizing that the committee was approaching the work “in a manner that provides all due protections for innocent Americans.”
Higgins has also faced criticism for inflammatory comments. Last year, Democrats attempted to censure him over remarks about Haitian immigrants that echoed Trump’s own comments about the Haitian community in Springfield, Ohio.
In a social media post, Higgins described Haitians as “wild. Eating pets, voodoo, nastiest country in the western hemisphere, cults, slapstick gangsters.”
After members of the Congressional Black Caucus confronted him, Higgins deleted the post and walked back the language partially, saying he intended the message for gang members, not the broader Haitian community.
Johnson defended him at the time, describing Higgins as “a very frank and outspoken person.”
Sounds like an ignorant asshole to me.
Clay Higgins isn’t some “tough-on-crime” hero — he’s a far-right firebrand wrapped in law-enforcement bravado. He’s aligned with the extremist “America First” wing, spread racist rhetoric about Haitian immigrants, and even voted against releasing Epstein’s files, all while wrapped in conspiratorial, militaristic posturing. His brand of “populist toughness” isn’t about justice — it’s about fear, power, and preserving a very narrow vision of America.