Claim: FBI Director Kash Patel and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi spent nearly $1 million in overtime pay for personnel to redact the files related to the case of late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Snopes verified the records were authentic using public documents the FBI filed in response to the lawsuit.
A Nov. 28, 2025, post on X said the FBI had "quietly poured roughly $1M into overtime hours to scrub and redact the Epstein files," calling it "treason" (archived):.
Another version of the rumor appeared on X, where one user said the FBI "spent nearly $1 million for redaction training for the Epstein files," citing The Daily Beast.
In short, FBI documents confirm the agency spent more than $850,000 on overtime pay for agents tasked with processing and redacting files related to the Epstein case.
These documents, which Leopold said the FBI released following a FOIA request and lawsuit he filed, indicated that the FBI paid $851,344 in overtime to process the Epstein files — in other words, to scour and redact them, though the documents did not specify what information was being redacted.
The number of hours FBI personnel worked between March 17 through March 21 to process Jeffrey Epstein files. »