As Casey Wasserman faces growing fallout over his past ties to Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, the leaders of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics announced Wednesday that they had reviewed the sports mogul’s past conduct and determined that, based on the facts and his “strong leadership” of the Games, he should continue to serve as chair of LA28.
“We found Mr. Wasserman’s relationship with Epstein and Maxwell did not go beyond what has already been publicly documented,” the Executive Committee of the Board said in as statement after meeting Wednesday and hiring outside counsel to review his conduct.
“Twenty-three years ago, before Mr. Wasserman or the public knew of Epstein and Maxwell’s deplorable crimes, Mr. Wasserman and his then-wife flew on a humanitarian mission to Africa on Epstein’s plane at the invitation of the Clinton Foundation,” the committee said. “This was his single interaction with Epstein. Shortly after, he traded the publicly-known emails with Maxwell.”
“The Executive Committee of the Board has determined that based on these facts, as well as the strong leadership he has exhibited over the past ten years, Mr. Wasserman should continue to lead LA28 and deliver a safe and successful Games,” it added.
The LA28 executive committee of the board — a small subset of its broader 35-member board — said it took “allegations of misconduct seriously.” It met Wednesday after hiring outside counsel at O’Melveny & Myers LLP to assist reviewing Wasserman’s past interactions with Epstein and Maxwell. Wasserman, it said, fully cooperated with the review.
Los Angeles City Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, who serves on a city committee overseeing the Olympics, pushed back on the executive committee’s decision. She was one of a handful of city council members who last week called for Wasserman to resign.
“The people of Los Angeles deserve leadership that understands the gravity of these revelations,” Rodriguez said in a statement. “At a moment when public trust is already shaken, doubling down with defensiveness only deepens the concern Angelenos have about accountability at LA28.”
Earlier Wednesday, Rodriguez and fellow city councilmember Imelda Padilla submitted a resolution calling for “accountability” for LA28 leadership. Rodriguez said in a statement that new details of Wasserman’s emails with Maxwell, “along with accounts that he has privately minimized the seriousness of these revelations and shifted blame for the fallout,” raised “serious concerns about accountability” in the upper echelons of LA28.
“As a host city, we have a responsibility to ensure that those entrusted with leading this global event reflect the highest ethical standards” Rodriguez added. “This resolution calls for transparency and a thorough review, while recognizing the importance of due process. Public trust is essential to the success of the Games. Los Angeles must lead with integrity, and our Olympic leadership must do the same.”
Over the last few days, a stream of high-profile clients from singer-songwriter Chappell Roan to country music star Orville Peck have announced that they are breaking away from Wasserman’s talent agency after he appeared in the latest batch of the Epstein files released by the Department of Justice.
On Wednesday morning, retired U.S. women’s soccer player and Olympic athlete Abby Wambach announced that she, too, was leaving the Wasserman agency.
“I know what I know, and I am following my gut and my values,” Wambach wrote on Instagram. “I will not participate in any business arrangement under his leadership … He should leave, so more people like me don’t have to.”
Wasserman, 51, has not been linked to any of Epstein’s wrongdoings or accused of any crimes. The CEO of the Wasserman sports marketing firm traveled to Africa with former President Bill Clinton on Epstein’s private jet in 2002, when he was 28 years old. After the trip, he exchanged a flurry of salacious emails with Maxwell, who had also traveled to Africa with Epstein and Clinton.
“Where are you, I miss you,” Wasserman wrote on April 1, 2003. “I will be in nyc for 4 days starting april 22 … can we book that massage now?”
“Umm — all that rubbing — are you sure you can take it?” Maxwell wrote on April 2. “The thought frankly is leaving me a little breathless. There are a few spots that apparently drive a man wild — I suppose I could practise them on you and you could let me know if they work or not?”
Wasserman boarded Epstein’s jet three years before the family of a 14-year-old girl in Palm Beach, Fla., reported she was molested by Epstein, triggering a decades-long investigation that resulted in Epstein’s 2008 conviction for procuring a child for prostitution and 2019 arrest for sex trafficking underage girls.
Maxwell, the daughter of British newspaper magnate Robert Maxwell and a longtime companion of Epstein, was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2022 for conspiring with Epstein to sexually abuse minors.
In a statement to The Times on Sunday, Wasserman said the Africa trip was the only time he met Epstein.
“Following that trip, where I never witnessed anything inappropriate, I did not speak to, see him or communicate with him ever again,” he said.
After the emails were were released Jan. 30, Olympic leaders and the LA28 board indicated they continued to back him as a stream of L.A. officials demanded he step down from the organizing committee of the LA28 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Wasserman’s agency still represents a diverse range of A-list talent from star Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto to musicians such as Kendrick Lamar, Coldplay, and Geese. But in recent days he has dropped out of a string of public events in Los Angeles as he manages the fallout.
The well-connected sports executive was billed as headlining Telemundo’s Playmakers Feb. 12 event in L.A., alongside NFL Hall of Famer Tony Gonzalez.
“Unfortunately, Casey’s office informed us he was no longer available to join us at The Playmakers event,” a spokesperson for Telemundo told The Times.
Several LA28 Olympic board members are in Milan for the Olympics, as is a local delegation from the Los Angeles area. Former L.A. City Councilmember and Assemblymember Paul Krekorian, who is leading the Olympics planning for L.A., is also in Italy.
When asked Tuesday whether Wasserman should step down, California Gov. Gavin Newsom told reporters that he hadn’t had a chance to talk to Wasserman.
“I am looking forward to doing that,” Newsom said, adding that he would have a “stronger opinion” after that meeting.
