In 2014, current CIA director William Burns had three meetings with Jeffrey Epstein when Burns was Obama’s deputy secretary of state, and after Epstein had been convicted of child sex exploitation, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Burns and Epstein first met in Washington prior to Burns visiting Epstein and his Manhattan townhouse, according to a trove of leaked documents that include Epstein’s schedules which were not contained in Epstein’s “black book” of contacts or flight logs.
Burns, who became CIA Director under Biden in 2021, met with Epstein while he was preparing to leave his position in the government, according to agency spokeswoman Tammy Kupperman Thorp.
“The director did not know anything about him, other than that he was introduced as an expert in the financial services sector and offered general advice on transition to the private sector,” she said, adding “They had no relationship.”
Mr. Burns, 67 years old, a career diplomat and former ambassador to Russia, had meetings with Epstein in 2014 when Mr. Burns was deputy secretary of state.
A lunch was planned that August at the office of law firm Steptoe & Johnson in Washington. Epstein scheduled two evening appointments that September with Mr. Burns at his townhouse, the documents show. After one of the scheduled meetings, Epstein planned for his driver to take Mr. Burns to the airport.
Mr. Burns recalls being introduced in Washington by a mutual friend, and meeting Epstein once briefly in New York, said Ms. Thorp. “The director does not recall any further contact, including receiving a ride to the airport,” she said. -WSJ
One month after meeting with Epstein, in October 2014, Burns stepped down from this role at the State Department to serve as president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a think tank. He ran it until he was nominated by Biden to serve as CIA director in early 2021.
Epstein also had dozens of meetings with then-Obama White House attorney Kathryn Ruemmler, who went on to become Goldman Sachs’ top lawyer in 2020. Epstein also planned for her to join him in 2015 on a trip to Paris, and in 2017 to visit his private island in the Caribbean.
Obama White House attorney Kathryn Ruemmler appears on Meet the Press, June 2014. (Ccredit: Meet the Press)
According to a spokesman for Goldman, Ruemmler had a ‘professional relationship’ with Epstein tied to her role at law firm Latham & Watkins LLP, and did not travel with him.
“I regret ever knowing Jeffrey Epstein,” she said.
According to the documents, however, they knew each other well enough… following Epstein’s 2006 conviction for sexually abusing girls in Florida as young as 14-years-old.
He asked for avocado sushi rolls to be on hand when meeting with Ms. Ruemmler, according to the documents. He visited apartments she was considering buying. In October 2014, Epstein knew her travel plans and told an assistant to look into her flight. “See if there is a first class seat,” he wrote, “if so upgrade her.”
(…) Other notables in the new report include;
- Leon Botstein, president of Bard College
- Noam Chomsky, who was scheduled to fly with Epstein to have dinner at the pedophile’s Manhattan townhouse in 2015
- Anthropologist Helen Fisher, who says she ‘didn’t have anything to do with Jeffrey Epstein, “But I remembered it because of his spectacular house and because of the six young women.”
- Joshua Cooper Ramo, then co-chief executive of Henry Kissinger’s corporate consulting firm.
- Harvard professor Martin Nowak
- Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak