Kathy Ruemmler has said she’ll be stepping down as Goldman Sachs’ top lawyer at the end of June – but she also plans to set the record straight about her controversial ties with Jeffrey Epstein, On The Money has learned.
The 55-year-old ace litigator announced in February she would leave the bank June 30 because of the “noise and distraction” surrounding her emails with the dead pedophile, which she felt posed unwelcome risks for the bank. Now, insiders say she’s determined to correct what she views as a false narrative that will include a few choice revelations that they say will prove her point.
Those will include a bombshell that Ruemmler turned down an eye-watering $30 million to represent Epstein as his criminal defense attorney following his July 2019 arrest, according to a source close to the situation.
At the time, Epstein had implored Ruemmler through an intermediary to be part of his defense team, the source said. She was, after all, one of the nation’s top criminal and white collar defense attorneys. Ruemmler had responded that it would be impossible, noting among other things that her employer, the white-shoe law firm Latham & Watkins, wouldn’t allow it.
Epstein’s next move, again through the intermediary, was to beg her to quit her job and work for him on her own – for the $30 million flat fee, according to sources. Ruemmler said no. It was Epstein’s final oureach before he died of an apparent suicide in his jail cell in August 2019 after being arrested in the bombshell child-sex trafficking case.
Questions around Ruemmler’s past dealings with Epstein multiplied partly because of her presence at Epstein’s 2019 arraignment, which Ruemmler attended with a colleague at Latham & Watkins.
Insiders, however, say Ruemmler told her bosses at Goldman Sachs that she attended the hearing not out of friendship, but because Epstein was the gatekeeper she was charged to deal with for a major client of Latham & Watkins – in this case the Swiss bank Rothschilds. Plus, she was shocked by the arrest that could have had headline-risk implications for the bank, these people add.
Indeed, the above was just a small part of what Ruemmler had painstakingly disclosed to Goldman’s brass – including CEO David Solomon – before she was offered a top legal job at the white shoe investment firm. Likewise, with the 2023 release of Epstein’s private calendar, Ruemmler told Goldman to review her emails with Epstein; later in 2025 she paid out of her own pocket for outside counsel to review all interactions with Epstein – including the ones, she believes were misconstrued and would lead to her 2026 resignation, these people add.
Her scrupulous disclosures are partly why, I am told, Solomon implored that she stay when she informed him she was resigning in February. “You don’t have to do this,” he told her despite the growing media pressure, firmly believing that she had done nothing wrong, sources tell me.
While Ruemmler felt Goldman didn’t – and still doesn’t – need the spotlight, insiders say Solomon still believes the uproar is unfair. That’s why she continues her duties as Goldman’s general counsel – and why she is playing a significant role in the bank’s search for her replacement, sources said.
Meanwhile, however, Ruemmler also plans to provide her side of the story at some point – including how Epstein hysteria has damaged people who had zero to do with his crimes. Exactly how she does that still isn’t certain, although Ruemmler has volunteered to testify in July before a House committee investigating the Epstein imbroglio.
Through Goldman, Ruemmler declined to comment.
Before Ruemmler joined Goldman Sachs in 2020 and became its chief legal officer a year later, she forged a blue-chip career as a prosecutor working on the task force that investigated the Enron scandal. She served as White House counsel to President Barack Obama before joining Latham & Watkins in 2014 to lead the firm’s white-collar defense practice.
It was at Latham that she met Epstein, who my sources says cold-called her on a recommendation. The two had several mutual friends, including Larry Summers, the former Treasury secretary under President Obama (Summers didn’t respond to a request for comment).
That call involved legal work for a planned fund that would streamline the way uber-rich people can make charitable donations that Epstein was putting together. One of her first face-to-face meetings would be with Epstein and Microsoft founder Bill Gates involving the creation of the fund (Gates’ reps didn’t return repeated requests for comment; in the past Gates has said he had no business or personal relationship with Epstein, and that their meetings only involved potential philanthropic matters).
The fund never materialized, but Epstein was impressed enough with Ruemmler that he would eventually introduce her to do work for one of his clients, Edmond de Rothschild Group, advising the bank on legal and regulatory issues. Epstein served as a gatekeeper for the Swiss bank, which is why Reummler would have to deal with him over the next five years.
On their face, Ruemmler’s emails with Epstein over that period suggest a cozy friendship. But context provides a different side, I am told. Epstein offered trips to his infamous island in the Caribbean, which she repeatedly blew off. She gives legal and PR advice to Epstein but only when she was asked. She refers to Epstein as “Uncle Jeffrey” after receiving boots from him, which she has said is a sarcastic quip, I am told.
Based on my experience, most folks on Wall Street would have trouble seeing how any of this looks out of place in a typical business relationship. Ruemmler and Epstein never socialized; they didn’t know each other’s family.
As for Epstein’s conviction on a count of soliciting sex with an underaged prostitute, he explained it to Ruemmler as a mistake with a 17-year old. It was the same thing he told me during an interview in 2019, just before his arrest and apparent suicide in a Manhattan federal lockup.
At the time, Ruemmler was inclined to believe Epstein, I am told, because of the leniency of his sentence – a mere 13 months in a county jail. She was, afterall, a former federal prosecutor who understood sentencing guidelines. Plus, he maintained his well-heeled and reputable circle of friends. It was long before his second arrest that showed the alleged breadth of his crimes.
Meanwhile, Epstein assured her he changed his ways and showed remorse for his earlier conviction. He had an adult girlfriend. She never saw any of the behavior that made Epstein notorious; in fact press reports say he took pains not to bring young women to his Manhattan townhouse in Ruemmler’s presence. All their meetings were either in public places or his NYC residence, where he was known to hold such confabs, these people add.
Ruemmler never traveled on Epstein’s private jet despite offers to do so. The extent of his gifts to her – boots, an Apple Watch, a high-end handbag over a five year period – weren’t material given her salary at the time. Nor were they ethical violations since such gifts are commonplace in these circles, these people add.
Epstein once offered her an upgrade for a flight to Geneva to meet with the Swiss bank she represented, from business to first class, which she took because it was a client matter who was paying for the trip anyway. He once offered to fly her on his private plane to Germany for a client-related matter and she “demurred,” one person close to her said, because “she felt it was excessive.”
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