(Ken Silva, Headline USA) A link between former President Barack Obama and Jeffrey Epstein was detailed in a court document filed Wednesday by the government of the U.S. Virgin Islands, which is suing JPMorgan Chase for allegedly helping the deceased pedophile finance his human trafficking network.
According to the court filing, Epstein had a business relationship with Kathryn Ruemmler, who was Obama’s White House counsel from 2011 to 2014 and now works at Goldman Sachs.
Mere months before Epstein’s arrest and death, he set up a meeting with a JP Morgan executive and Ruemmler in February 2019, the court filing said. Epstein scheduled the meeting because Ruemmler wanted to open an account with JPMorgan and Epstein thought she “would bond” with the JP Morgan exec, the filing said.
Ruemmler reportedly declined to comment on the filing. Her relationship with Epstein was first reported in April by the Wall Street Journal, which obtained Epstein’s private schedules showing that he met with the former White House counsel on numerous occasions after she left public service in 2014 and before she started working at Goldman Sachs.
“In 2014, Epstein called Ms. Ruemmler within weeks of her leaving the Obama White House. Epstein planned a lunch in August 2014 at his townhouse, followed by a series of meetings to introduce her to a wider circle of his acquaintances,” WSJ reported in April.
WSJ also reported at the time that Epstein and his staff discussed whether Ruemmler, now 52, would be uncomfortable with the presence of young women who worked as assistants and staffers at the townhouse.
At the time, a Goldman Sachs spokesperson told WSJ that Ruemmler didn’t see anything that would lead her to be concerned at the townhouse and didn’t express any concern.
The Goldman spokesperson also said Ruemmler had a professional relationship with Epstein “in connection with her role at law firm Latham & Watkins LLP,” and that she didn’t travel with him.
Ruemmler first met Epstein after he called her to ask if she would be interested in representing Bill Gates and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Goldman Sachs spokesman said. A spokeswoman for Gates told the WSJ that Epstein never worked for Gates, misrepresented their relationship, and that Gates regrets ever meeting with him.
JP Morgan has yet to respond to the USVI’s latest filing, which was made in relation to a motion for partial summary judgment in its lawsuit. The bank has denied any wrongdoing in the matter.
The USVI and survivor lawsuits filed against JPMorgan Chase came after Epstein’s estate reached the $105 million settlement with the U.S. Virgin Island’s government last November.
Epstein died at a federal jail in New York in August 2019 while awaiting trial. He had pleaded not guilty to charges of sexually abusing dozens of girls, some as young as 14 years old.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
