Canton, Ohio - Vice President JD Vance recently broke his silence as President Donald Trump's administration continues to face backlash for refusing to fulfill its promise to release files related to Jeffrey Epstein.

During an event on Monday, Vance was asked if Trump is "protecting pedophiles" by not releasing the files, to which he insisted Trump and his administration are being "incredibly transparent."

"First of all, the president has been very clear. We're not shielding anything," Vance said.

"The president has directed the attorney general to release all credible information and, frankly, to go and find additional credible information related to the Jeffrey Epstein case."

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Vance argued that former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama went "easy" on Epstein, claiming they never "fully" investigated the case.

He then took aim at the press for supposedly not caring about the case until now, stating, "For four years, under Joe Biden's Department of Justice, the media didn't give a damn about the Epstein files or about the Epstein case."

In recent weeks, critics from both sides of the aisle, including members of Trump's MAGA base, have demanded that the files be released – just as Trump and many of his future administration members promised to do while on the campaign trail.

Trump has repeatedly attempted to divert MAGA's attention away from the subject, but to no avail.

Similar to Trump's recent U-turn, Vance's recent comments are quite stunning, as he, too, pushed the opposite sentiment in the past.

In an X post from 2021, Vance berated reporters for not caring enough about the Epstein files, writing, "If you're a journalist, and you're not asking questions about this case, you should be ashamed of yourself. What purpose do you even serve?"

Only a month ago, Vance said in an interview with podcaster Theo Von that it was "important" for the administration to release the files, prompting Von to ask in an X post last week, "What changed?"