Karen Bass can’t fire Casey Wasserman as the head of Los Angeles’ 2028 Olympic Games, but she wants the soon-to-be former agency boss out ASAP.
“My opinion is, is that he should step down,” LA Mayor Bass said this Presidents’ Day on CNN. “That’s not the opinion of the board,” the reelection seeking incumbent added of the unanimous backing that Wasserman recieved from his handpicked LA Olympics board on February 11.
“The committee that is involved with the Olympics has the discretion, the board made a decision,” Mayor Bass said Monday in a big break from her previous much more circumspect statements about Wasserman as more of his relationships with now dead pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and his currently imprisoned chief procurer Ghislaine Maxwell came to light. “I think that decision was unfortunate.”
“I don’t support the decision. I do think that we need to look at the leadership”
At that emergency LA28 board meeting last week, the most vocal advocat for keeping the increasingly besieged Wasserman in his role was Jeffrey Katzenberg, sources close to events said at the time.
The Katzenberg connection between Bass and the Eric Garcetti-appointed Wasserman has long been seen as fundamental to their relationship preparing the city for the 2028 Summer Games. With an emphasis on solutions for LA’s homelessness blight, Katzenberg was a major cheerleader and donor for the longtime Congresswoman getting LA’s top job in 2022.
Today, as the unpopular Mayor’s seemingly uncontested campaign now has real rivals, and as worries increase in influential circles over Wasserman’s credibility and judgement in not revealing his Epstein links earlier, Bass put the realpolitik of the well-connected Wasserman’s fate on the table.
Her remarks on cable TV come as more and more LA politicians, including one who wants Bass’ job, are calling for the LA28 Chair to resign. Time and time gain, the call is for Wasserman not be a “distraction” to theCity of Angels’ latest turn in the spotlight in two years.
“My job as mayor of Los Angeles is to make sure that our city is completely prepared to have the best Olympics that has ever happened in Olympic history,” Bass told CNN’s Dana Bash with some virtue and vice signaling to the board, the IOC and Wasserman buddy Donald Trump. “So my focus is a little different, but the behavior of Maxwell, what they were involved in is abhorrent,” she stated.
“Bass is a smart operator,” a well-positioned individual with strong links to City Hall and Hollywood told Deadline tonight. “She knows Wasserman is going to be a problem for her reelection, a problem for the Olympics, so she made her move. It’s up to the board again next, but how can he go on now ?”
Sports marketing and talent agency founder Wasserman left supporters and staff blindsided when a collection of seemingly adulterous and compromising emails from over 20 years ago between himself and press baron offspring Maxwell emerged on January 30 among the millions of heavily-redacted pages and images on Epstein. Less than 24 hours after the DOJ document dump, as Wasserman prepared to head to Italy for the opening of the XXV Winter Olympics Games, his PR team put out a circumspect statement insisting the exec was “terribly sorry for having any association” with the 2019 deceased Epstein and Maxwell.
Representatives for Wasserman had nothing to say on Mayor Bass’ insistence that he resigned from LA28. Wasserman pal Governor Gavin Newsom has returned to California and seems likely to be in contact with the LA28 chair, I hear.
With all that, as robust as the LA28 board support was last week, Wasserman has been feeling the tide turning in recent days.
After weeks of insistence that he would not step away from his Wasserman group, even as top clients liker Chappell Roan and soccer icon Abby Wambach left, Wasserman announced late on February 13 that he is selling his stake in his own company. Amidst promises to focus on LA28, Wasserman couldn’t avoid echoing the language of the likes of mayoral candidate and City Council member Nithya Raman and others, and pledge not to be a “distraction” due to his appearance in the toxic Epstein Files.
Out and about over NBA All-Star weekend in LA the past few days, Wasserman has also had to step back from other public events due to his Epstein and Maxwell links.
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