Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass called upon Casey Wasserman to step down as head of the 2028 Olympics organizing committee after correspondence between him and Jeffrey Epstein’s accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell surfaced.
As the Epstein files release unfolded, emails from 2003 featured Wasserman engaged in a flirtatious exchange with Ghislaine Maxwell.
“I think of you all the time. So, what do I have to do to see you in a tight leather outfit?” Wasserman told Maxwell in one exchange.
In another exchange, Maxwell and Wasserman discussed massages wherein she asked him if it would be foggy enough “so that you can float naked down the beach and no one can see you unless they are close up?”
Wasserman responded, “or something like that.”
Though Wasserman said that he deeply regrets his past correspondence with Maxwell, saying they occurred “long before her horrific crimes came to light,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass called for him to step down even after the LA28 board voted that he stay following an investigation.
“My opinion is that he should step down,” Bass told CNN on Monday, adding that she could not fire Wasserman.
Bass also called the LA28 board’s decision to keep Wasserman “unfortunate.”
“I think that decision was unfortunate,” Bass told CNN. “I don’t support the decision. I do think that we need to look at the leadership. However, my job as mayor of Los Angeles is to make sure that our city is completely prepared to have the best Olympics that has ever happened in Olympic history.”
The International Olympic Committee has avoided the controversy by regularly deflecting questions.
“I understand there are many conversations happening at this moment, but I will not make any further comment,” IOC spokesman Mark Adams said Tuesday in Milan. “This is obviously a matter for the board of LA28, still at this stage.”
The entertainment and sports agency Wasserman, founded by Wasserman, has been struggling since the Epstein emails were released, with pop star Chappell Roan and soccer star Wambach terminating their clientship.
In December 2021, a jury convicted Maxwell of sex trafficking minors, including the transportation of a minor with the intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, along with three counts of conspiracy. She was later sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Read the full article here