These influential Americans have been discredited by revelations from Epstein documents

Hotel billionaire Tom Pritzker announced his resignation this week over his ties to Epstein. He is the latest in a series of powerful Americans to see their position shaken by ties to the convicted sex offender.

The 75-year-old Pritzker (worth more than 6 billion dollars) held top positions within the global hotel brand Hyatt for many years. Pritzker’s name appeared several times in the millions of released documents surrounding Jeffrey Epstein, who was convicted of recruiting and sexually abusing underage girls.

Retired immediately

Even after Epstein’s conviction for sexual abuse in 2008, Pritzker is said to have had regular contact with Epstein. Pritzker also had contact with Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s regular accomplice, who was also later convicted.

In a letter to Hyatt’s board yesterday, Pritzker wrote that he will retire immediately. “My job and responsibility is to deliver good governance,” he wrote. “Good governance also means protecting Hyatt, especially in light of my association with Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, something I deeply regret.”

Last week, Casey Wasserman, the owner of one of the world’s most famous artist agencies, came under fire. His name also appears several times in the documents made public. These are e-mails between Wasserman and Ghislaine Maxwell from 2003. The tone of the contact is strikingly personal. “I think about you all the time,” he wrote to Maxwell, while Wasserman had a family with children at the time.

Famous clients

The revelations are extra sensitive because Wasserman has played an influential role in the American entertainment world for years. Twenty years ago he founded Wasserman Group, a sports and talent agency that represents thousands of major athletes and artists, including Coldplay, Ed Sheeran and Chappell Roan.

In an email to his employees, Wasserman responded that he wants to sell the company. He says he wants to focus entirely on the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, where he is chairman of the organizing committee. There is now also criticism about this: the mayor of Los Angeles wants him to resign from that position.

US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick previously said he had cut off all contact with Jeffrey Epstein in 2005. However, the new Epstein documents show that he regularly emailed Epstein in the years that followed.

The documents show email exchanges between Lutnick and Gishlaine Maxwell in 2012, who were planning a visit to Epstein’s private island in the Caribbean. Several Democratic senators are calling for Lutnick’s resignation. The White House does not appear to be taking any action against the minister for the time being.

Another member of the Trump administration who appears in the Epstein files is John Phelan, the Secretary of State for the Navy. His name appears on a passenger list for a 2006 flight on Epstein’s private plane from London to New York.

The recently made public Epstein files contain draft messages from Jeffrey Epstein suggesting that Bill Gates had extramarital affairs. In an email, Epstein wrote that he had helped Gates get drugs “to alleviate the effects of sex with Russian girls” and had arranged meetings for him with “married women.”

A spokesperson for Gates told The New York Times that “these claims are completely absurd and completely untrue.” The spokesperson calls Epstein ‘a proven, bitter liar’.

These are draft messages that Epstein sent to himself in 2013, but it is not clear whether these were ever actually sent to Gates.

What exactly was the deal with the Epstein dossier? You can see it in this video:

Epsteins private-eiland

Next week, former President Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary Clinton are scheduled to appear for a hearing in the US House of Representatives. An investigative committee wants to hear from them what exactly their connection with Jeffrey Epstein was, because Bill Clinton appears several times in the Epstein files.

Around 2002 and 2003, Bill Clinton flew regularly on Epstein’s private plane. There are also many photos of him with Epstein and Maxwell, including on Epstein’s private island. Clinton says he last had contact with Epstein more than 20 years ago.

It has been known for some time that President Donald Trump’s name also regularly appears in the documents. According to an analysis by The New York Times, the documents contain more than 38,000 references to Trump, his wife Melania and his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. Most references are to news articles or emails containing Trump’s name.

Trump himself says that he severed his ties with Epstein years ago and that he has nothing else to hide.