Goldman Sachs exec denies contingency plan to oust top lawyer who had Jeffrey Epstein ties
A top Goldman Sachs executive is denying a report that he quietly explored a contingency plan to oust the company’s general counsel after it was revealed that she had a close, yearslong friendship with the late sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein.John Rogers, a key Goldman powerbroker known to have extensive ties to Washington, pushed back on a Wall Street Journal report that he was looking for a way to facilitate a “graceful” exit later this year for Kathryn Ruemmler, the firm’s top lawyer who has the ear of CEO David Solomon.“This is completely untrue,” Rogers, who recruited Ruemmler, 54, to 200 West St.nearly seven years ago, told The Journal in a statement.Ruemmler, the former Obama official who joined Goldman Sachs in April 2020, was first viewed as a reputational liability by the bank’s top executives as early as 2023, in the wake of reports detailing her chummy relationship with Epstein, according to The Journal.Her ties to the perv financier came into clearer focus late last year after lawmakers investigating thim released a trove of emails and correspondence showing regular contact between the two.That reportedly triggered internal panic at Goldman.The messages, made public by Congress in November, revealed a personal and at times casual tone that went beyond what some executives believed had been disclosed during her hiring process.The emails showed Ruemmler treating Epstein as a personal confidant on housing and daily life.In a January 2018 message, she updated him on her living arrangements, writing, “Finally got the apartment so can ‘move in’ tomorrow.” Epstein replied simply, “Great.”Other exchanges show Ruemmler confiding in Epstein about major career decisions at the highest levels of government.
As she weighed whether to pursue the role of US attorney general in 2014, Ruemmler wrote, “I think I should do it,” and discussed her financial situation, noting, “I signed the lease in my name for a year… It is $11,...