Luke Garrett

And we need to go back a few days to better understand this move and this moment.

Last week, Representatives Thomas Massey of Kentucky, a Republican, and Ro Khanna of California, a Democrat, gathered 218 signatures.

That's enough to

force a vote on the release of the DOJ documents regarding the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

And a source familiar but not authorized to share the House schedule publicly confirmed that Speaker Johnson would bring this vote up on Tuesday.

This teed up a really difficult vote for Republicans who had to decide whether to vote with Trump and against the bill or vote to release the Epstein files.

And this was also tough for Trump himself, who faced dozens of potential defectors.

All right, so if the vote is on Tuesday, why did Trump make this Sunday late-night announcement?

Well, in a social media post last night, Trump said he wanted the GOP to move on from what he called the Democratic hoax and distraction.

And notably, on the Sunday morning news shows, two House Republicans publicly and loudly rebuked Trump over the Epstein files.

On ABC News, Massey took a warning shot against Trump's legacy and any GOP member willing to vote against his bill.

In 2030, he's not going to be the president, and you will have voted to protect pedophiles if you don't vote to release these files, and the president can't protect you.

Massey then said he believed 100 or more House Republicans would vote for the Epstein file bill, even though only a handful signed on to force the ballot.

Wasn't one of them Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene?

Yeah, that's right.

And Trump recently called her a traitor and revoked his political endorsement from her after she became more critical of his policies.

Now, both Massey and Green said they don't believe Trump himself will be implicated in the files, but these public breaks with the president represented a growing and powerful fissure in the party.

Well, my sources say the House vote is still set for Tuesday.

And with Trump giving Republicans permission to support it and every Democrat signing the discharge petition, this bill has a really good chance of advancing.

In the Senate, it remains unclear if and when Majority Leader John Thune will bring this up for a vote.