Jeffrey Epstein has been everywhere this campaign season. But voters wonder how much he should matter

Standing in front of red and green tractors on an unseasonably warm October afternoon, Sherrod Brown made his pitch for returning to the Senate: Inflation, diesel prices and the cost of healthcare were out of control, the former Ohio senator said, while his Republican opponent, Sen. Jon Husted, was a “special interest guy in Washington.” One name never came up: Jeffrey Epstein.

Brown’s in-person message as early voting was getting underway in Ohio was a far cry from some of the ads that had earlier this year flooded this battleground state, where the Senate race could help decide control of Congress. Epstein, a convicted sex offender whose name has become political shorthand for dark suspicions about the wealthy and powerful, has been used by candidates this election cycle to cast their opponents as morally compromised.

Yet in the final stretch of the midterms, the candidates are calibrating how much they lean into the issue as they court voters in cities, suburban towns and rural areas across the state.

“My first priority is how to bring prices down,” Brown told CNN when asked how high the Epstein issue would rank for the former senator if he were to return to Washington. “That means ending this war; that means ending these tariffs.”

He spoke to CNN at a “Farmers for Brown” event in Ashville, south of Columbus, shortly after meeting with a group of Epstein survivors who were in town. Brown declined to share details about the private gathering.

Brown’s campaign has run ads accusing Husted of receiving money from billionaire donor and Ohio native Les Wexner , who was identified in government documents as one of Epstein’s co-conspirators. Husted, in turn, has accused Brown of accepting money from Epstein “associates” — though the list of donors includes those with tenuous connections to Epstein or whose connection predates Epstein’s mid-2000s arrest.

How the Epstein issue might affect the midterms was anyone’s guess, Brown said, before once again emphasizing that the economy is the single concern he is hearing about most from his former constituents: “Everywhere, people are talking about prices.”

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Ahead of Husted’s meeting with a group of doorknockers on the same day in October, CNN asked the senator whether he believes Wexner had enabled Epstein — an allegation that some Epstein survivors have made.

Without addressing Wexner’s potential complicity, Husted told CNN that he donated any campaign contributions he received “from anyone that was in those files” to charity and that he was also working on legislation to stop human trafficking.

“I’ve always been supportive of releasing the Epstein files. What’s out there is because of what I made to make it happen,” he said when asked whether Congress should push the Justice Department to release the rest of the Epstein files.

Epstein was Wexner’s longtime money manager. Wexner has not been accused of criminal wrongdoing and in a voluntary interview earlier this year with the House Oversight Committee, he denied any knowledge of Epstein’s criminal activity.

A recent CNN analysis found that candidates and outside groups have aired more than 160 unique Epstein-related ads in the 2026 midterms, backed by more than $35 million in airtime. Epstein has been invoked overwhelmingly by Democrats — and occasionally by Republicans — to attack opponents or promote themselves.

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Epstein floods the midterms as campaigns spend $35 million on more than 160 ads

In Ohio, more than $6 million has been spent on Epstein ads, in races up and down the ballot.

In the closely watched House race for Ohio’s 9th Congressional District, the longtime incumbent Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur, who won in 2024 by just more than 2,300 votes, has issued ads this cycle saying she is not working for “the Epstein class.” She also hosted a roundtable in Toledo with Epstein survivors last weekend.

“There’s a little bit more Epstein juice in the air in Ohio than there might be in an average state” in no small part because Wexner is a household name there, said David Niven, an associate professor of American politics at the University of Cincinnati.

Kent Nishimura/Reuters

The Wexner donations mentioned in the Brown attack ads “fit exactly the story that Sherrod Brown wants to tell about Jon Husted: that he’s on their side,” Niven added. “He means billionaires, and he means Epstein, and he means the electric company … the data center folks.”

On the first day of early voting in Ohio this month, many of the people CNN spoke with outside of a polling station in blue-leaning Franklin County said they were sympathetic to Epstein survivors and believed the Epstein issue represented so much of what is wrong with Washington.

Still, most of them said, the Epstein files were not their top electoral concern.

“The war, the economy, the corruption that’s going on within the government. Everything,” Columbus resident Ann Yurick, a 77-year-old independent who leans Democratic, said when asked to describe what is driving her vote.

Democrat Nancy Snyder said she’s planning on voting straight down the ballot for a few reasons: “Food, gas, housing, medical care, that’s it.” She said about Epstein: “You don’t hear a lot about it, but they’re also just screwing us and taking all the money they can.”

Another Democratic voter, retired air traffic controller Robert Ende, said he was not concerned about Wexner’s donations to Husted as he pointed out that the billionaire is also a generous donor to good causes throughout the state, including the Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus. The hospital has a research wing dedicated to Abigail Wexner, Wexner’s wife.

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The Epstein survivors who met with Brown earlier this month were in Ohio to help promote the “Epstein Reading Room,” a traveling installation of printed copies of the files released by the DOJ.

Funded by a non-profit, the exhibit has been going from one swing state to the next, trying to encourage people to vote for more accountability and transparency. Officially named “The Donald J Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room,” it features a large photo of Epstein and Trump together, as well as “Trump Collection” books that contain files in which Trump’s name appears.

Trump has consistently denied any wrongdoing related to Epstein.

Many of the survivors had lived privately prior to a press conference on Capitol Hill in September 2025 that called on the DOJ to release the Epstein files. One year later, some have transformed into full-time public advocates, pressing for accountability around a political controversy that has consumed Washington.

If Democrats were to take control of Congress after the midterms, the Epstein issue could become more inflamed still, as some Democrats have already vowed to explore Trump’s connections to Epstein and investigate what they see as important leads contained in the Epstein files.

Sharlene Rochard, an Epstein survivor who has been traveling with the Reading Room as it has made stops in states from Texas to Pennsylvania, told CNN that she believes they are, in fact, having an impact on voters.

“There’s 17,000 pounds of books in here. It’s unbelievable to realize that this is a crime and that’s evidence of a crime in those books and people are really receptive. I think we’re changing hearts and minds along the way,” Rochard said, standing in the middle of rows of bookshelves containing over three million pages of documents.

For Wendy Pesante, another Epstein survivor who now lives in Ohio, the installation hit close to home.

Pesante was around 15 when she first met Epstein in West Palm Beach — a meeting that she describes as the beginning of a dark downward spiral into abuse and exploitation. She wiped away tears as she stared at the year that she was abused on a large timeline of Epstein’s crimes.

“I should’ve been found back then. There’s so many girls that still should’ve been found from then,” Pesante said.

She is ultimately glad that the exhibition is there andsaid: “People should know.”

Pesante said that until last year — when she shared her story of abuse — she had paid little attention to politics and barely understood the distinction between a Republican and Democrat. Now, with a critical midterm election ongoing, she says she is getting ready to vote for the first time.

She plans to support Democrats.

Asked whether that is because of the Epstein issue, Pesante replied: “It’s 100% because of that.”

在一个十月异常温暖的午后，谢罗德·布朗站在几辆红绿相间的拖拉机前，阐述了他重返参议院的理由：这位前俄亥俄州参议员表示，通货膨胀、柴油价格和医疗保健成本都已失控，而他的共和党对手、参议员乔恩·赫斯特则是“华盛顿的特殊利益集团”。但有一个名字始终没有被提及：杰弗里·爱泼斯坦。

在俄亥俄州提前投票开始之际，布朗的面对面讲话与今年早些时候充斥这个关键摇摆州的广告截然不同。这场参议院选举的结果可能决定国会的控制权。爱泼斯坦是一名性犯罪者，他的名字已成为政治上对权贵阶层抱有阴暗怀疑的代名词。在本轮选举中，候选人利用爱泼斯坦来抹黑他们的对手，暗示他们道德败坏。

然而，在中期选举的最后阶段，候选人们正在权衡他们在全州各地的城市、郊区城镇和农村地区争取选民支持时，应该在多大程度上重视这个问题。

当被问及如果这位前参议员重返华盛顿，爱泼斯坦事件对他来说会有多重要时，布朗告诉CNN：“我的首要任务是如何降低物价。这意味着结束这场战争；这意味着取消这些关税。”

在哥伦布市以南的阿什维尔，布朗在参加“农民支持布朗”活动时接受了CNN的采访。此前不久，他刚刚会见了一群在当地活动的爱泼斯坦性侵案幸存者。布朗拒绝透露此次私人聚会的细节。

布朗的竞选团队投放广告，指控赫斯特德收受亿万富翁捐助者、俄亥俄州本地人莱斯·韦克斯纳的捐款。韦克斯纳在政府文件中被认定为爱泼斯坦的同谋之一。赫斯特德则反过来指责布朗接受爱泼斯坦“同伙”的捐款——尽管捐款人名单中既包括与爱泼斯坦关系疏远的人，也包括那些与爱泼斯坦的联系早于爱泼斯坦在2000年代中期被捕的人。

布朗表示，爱泼斯坦事件可能会如何影响中期选举，谁也说不准。随后他再次强调，经济是他从以前的选民那里听到最多的担忧：“到处都是人们在谈论物价。”

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Francis Chung/Politico/AP

在 Husted 于 10 月同一天与一群挨家挨户拜访的选民会面之前，CNN 询问这位参议员是否相信 Wexner 曾为 Epstein 提供庇护——一些 Epstein 的幸存者提出了这一指控。

赫斯特德没有提及韦克斯纳可能存在的共谋，而是告诉 CNN，他已将“从那些文件中的任何人”收到的任何竞选捐款捐给了慈善机构，并且他还在努力制定立法来阻止人口贩运。

当被问及国会是否应该敦促司法部公布剩余的爱泼斯坦档案时，他说：“我一直支持公布爱泼斯坦档案。如今这些档案得以公开，是因为我为此付出了努力。”

爱泼斯坦是韦克斯纳的长期财务经理。韦克斯纳并未被指控有任何刑事不当行为，并且在今年早些时候接受众议院监督委员会的自愿问询时，他否认知晓爱泼斯坦的任何犯罪活动。

美国有线电视新闻网（CNN）最近的一项分析发现，在2026年中期选举中，候选人和外部团体播放了超过160条与爱泼斯坦相关的广告，广告投入超过3500万美元。爱泼斯坦事件主要由民主党人提及，共和党人偶尔也会提及，目的是攻击对手或为自己造势。

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埃普斯坦在中期选举中大举投入，各竞选团队花费3500万美元投放了超过160则广告。

在俄亥俄州，针对爱泼斯坦的竞选广告花费了超过 600 万美元，涵盖了从一级到二级的所有选举。

在备受关注的俄亥俄州第九国会选区众议员竞选中，长期担任该选区众议员的民主党人玛西·卡普图尔（Marcy Kaptur）在2024年的选举中仅以2300多票的微弱优势获胜。她在本轮选举中发布广告称，她不会为“爱泼斯坦阶层”服务。上周末，她还在托莱多与爱泼斯坦案的幸存者举行了圆桌会议。

辛辛那提大学美国政治学副教授大卫·尼文表示：“俄亥俄州空气中弥漫着比一般州更多的爱泼斯坦的气息”，这在很大程度上是因为韦克斯纳在那里是家喻户晓的人物。

肯特·西村/路透社

尼文补充道，布朗攻击广告中提到的韦克斯纳捐款“完全符合谢罗德·布朗想要讲述的关于乔恩·赫斯特的故事：他站在他们那边。他指的是亿万富翁，指的是爱泼斯坦，指的是电力公司……还有数据中心的人。”

本月俄亥俄州提前投票的第一天，CNN 在倾向民主党的富兰克林县的一个投票站外采访的许多人表示，他们同情爱泼斯坦的幸存者，并认为爱泼斯坦事件代表了华盛顿的诸多弊病。

不过，他们中的大多数人表示，爱泼斯坦档案并不是他们最关心的选举问题。

“战争、经济、政府内部的腐败。所有的一切，”哥伦布居民安·尤里克（Ann Yurick）说道。她是一位77岁的独立选民，倾向于民主党。当被问及是什么促使她投票时，她这样说道。

民主党人南希·斯奈德表示，她计划在所有选票上都投上一票，原因有几个：“食品、汽油、住房、医疗保健，就这些。” 她谈到爱泼斯坦时说：“你可能很少听到关于他的消息，但他们也在坑害我们，尽可能地攫取我们的钱财。”

另一位民主党选民，退休空中交通管制员罗伯特·恩德表示，他并不担心韦克斯纳向赫斯特捐款，因为他指出这位亿万富翁也是全州慈善事业的慷慨捐助者，其中包括位于哥伦布市的全国儿童医院。该医院设有一个以韦克斯纳的妻子阿比盖尔·韦克斯纳命名的研究部门。

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本月初与布朗会面的爱泼斯坦案幸存者们当时身在俄亥俄州，是为了帮助推广“爱泼斯坦阅览室”，这是一个巡回展览，展出了司法部公布的文件的印刷副本。

该展览由一家非营利组织资助，一直在各个摇摆州巡回展出，旨在鼓励人们投票支持更高的问责制和透明度。展览正式名称为“唐纳德·J·特朗普和杰弗里·爱泼斯坦纪念阅览室”，展出了一张爱泼斯坦和特朗普的大幅合影，以及名为“特朗普收藏”的书籍，其中收录了出现特朗普名字的文件。

特朗普一直否认与爱泼斯坦有任何不当行为。

在2025年9月国会山举行的新闻发布会上，许多幸存者一直过着隐秘的生活。那次新闻发布会呼吁司法部公布爱泼斯坦的档案。一年后，一些人转变为全职的公众倡导者，敦促各方就这场席卷华盛顿的政治丑闻追究责任。

如果民主党在中期选举后控制国会，爱泼斯坦事件可能会进一步激化，因为一些民主党人已经誓言要调查特朗普与爱泼斯坦的关系，并调查他们认为爱泼斯坦档案中包含的重要线索。

莎琳·罗查德是爱泼斯坦的受害者之一，她曾跟随“阅览室”巡回演出，足迹遍布从德克萨斯州到宾夕法尼亚州的各个州。她告诉 CNN，她相信“阅览室”实际上正在对选民产生影响。

“这里有17000磅重的书籍。难以置信的是，这竟然是一起犯罪，而这些书里竟然藏着犯罪的证据，人们对此却如此接受。我认为我们正在逐步改变人们的观念，”罗查德站在一排排书架中间说道，这些书架上存放着超过三百万页的文件。

对于另一位爱泼斯坦的幸存者、现居俄亥俄州的温迪·佩桑特来说，这个装置艺术作品让她感同身受。

佩桑特大约15岁时在西棕榈滩第一次见到爱泼斯坦——她将这次会面描述为她陷入虐待和剥削的黑暗深渊的开始。她凝视着爱泼斯坦犯罪时间轴上自己遭受虐待的那一年，不禁拭去泪水。

“我当时就应该被找到。还有很多女孩当时也应该被找到，”佩桑特说。

她最终很高兴展览能够举办，并表示：“人们应该了解这个展览。”

佩桑特说，直到去年她公开了自己的受虐经历之前，她对政治几乎不感兴趣，也分不清共和党和民主党的区别。如今，随着关键的中期选举正在进行，她说她正准备第一次投票。

她计划支持民主党。

当被问及这是否与爱泼斯坦事件有关时，佩桑特回答说：“百分之百是因为这个。”