Hollywood talent agent Casey Wasserman, whose clients include stars such as Chappell Roan, Ed Sheeran, and Kendrick Lamar, said Friday he will sell his talent and marketing agency after his suggestive emails with Ghislaine Maxwell, the girlfriend of late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, were exposed in the recent dump of documents by the Department of Justice.
Wasserman, in announcing the sale through a memo to his staff, said that he felt he had "become a distraction" to the agency's work and that the company was feeling an impact from his "past personal mistakes," reports The Wall Street Journal.
"I’m deeply sorry that my past personal mistakes have caused you so much discomfort,” he wrote in his memo to employees, which the publication reviewed.
"It’s not fair to you, and it’s not fair to the clients and partners we represent so vigorously and care so deeply about," he added.
Wasserman said longtime executive Mike Watts will take over control of the agency, while he continues to focus on his chairmanship of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
His move to sell the agency, Wasserman, comes following pressure to resign after the agency's high-profile talent, including Roan, the Dropkick Murphys, and athletes such as soccer legend Abby Wambach left the agency's services.
Wasserman remains as chairman of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, after its organizing committee voted unanimously this week to keep him on.
The board found that the relationship between Wasserman and Maxwell "did not go beyond what has already been publicly documented.”
Wasserman, the grandson of famed Hollywood dealmaker Lew Wasserman, founded his self-named talent agency more than 20 years ago.
He built the agency into one of the largest sports-marketing and talent-management firms in the nation through acquisition, and today it has about 4,000 employees.
Wasserman is also a major donor to the Democratic Party, and worked for years to bring the Olympics, which Los Angeles hosted in 1932 and 1984, back to the city.
The Epstein documents, meanwhile, revealed that in 2002, Wasserman and his then-wife flew on Epstein's private jet to Africa to visit HIV/AIDS project sites with Maxwell, Epstein, former President Bill Clinton, and others.
An emergency physician on the trip told federal agents in 2020 that there were several young women on the flight, including a model, a ballerina, and a masseuse, for reasons that he did not understand, reports CNN.
Wasserman issued an apology after the communications were disclosed between himself and Maxwell, and acknowledged going on the 2002 flight, but insisted that he "never had a personal or business relationship with Jeffrey Epstein."
In Friday's memo, Wasserman said he regretted the emails and said that the 2002 trip was "years before their criminal conduct came to light."
He added that he was "heartbroken that my brief contact with them 23 years ago has caused you, this company, and its clients so much hardship over the past days and weeks."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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