Epstein’s world: Inside his network of wealth, power and hustle

The late convicted sex offender’s private correspondence reveals the methods he used in cozying up to the one percent.

By MARION SOLLETTY, PAUL DE VILLEPIN
AND KATHRYN CARLSON
in PARIS

^{Illustration by Natália Delgado/POLITICO}

When Jeffrey Epstein wanted an introduction to former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, he turned to a well-connected friend.

“Id like to meet him,” the disgraced financier wrote to Olivier Colom, a former French diplomat, in October 2013. “If you think fun.” 

“I’ll ask,” Colom replied. “He can be fun. And he can speak English now!” 

The exchange is one of the many messages included in the release of millions of emails by the U.S. Justice Department that offer a rare, detailed look at a discreet ecosystem of wealth and power, where Epstein and his associates frenetically collected contacts, traded favors and blurred the lines between personal relationships and public influence. 

Taken together, the emails show how Epstein — a convicted sex offender who died in prison in 2019 — positioned himself at the center of a kind of subterranean Davos: a globe-spanning network that included a Norwegian princess, top officials from the world of finance, and former European heads of state and government.

It’s not clear from the emails if Epstein ever secured his meeting with Sarkozy. A representative for the former French president said they found no evidence that one occurred. 

But he did make it to Paris. Epstein was a frequent traveler to the French capital, where he owned an apartment on Avenue Foch, just down the street from the Arc de Triomphe. 

In March 2019, Epstein sent Steve Bannon, a former chief strategist for U.S. President Donald Trump, a snapshot of himself outside the Louvre with former French Culture Minister Jack Lang.

“Now at the pyramid,” he wrote. “With the entire govt.”

“Amazing photo,” Bannon replied. “Powermove.”

Hustler

The episode epitomizes the Epstein method: leveraging existing connections and often inflating their significance to reinforce his standing among the world’s rich and powerful — a practice that continued right up until his arrest in July 2019 on charges of sex trafficking and conspiracy to traffic minors.

At the time Epstein was posing with the former culture minister at the Louvre, Lang’s political career was far behind him. The photo was likely taken on the sidelines of a ceremony celebrating the 30th anniversary of the museum’s iconic glass pyramid, where Lang would have been invited as the culture minister who initiated the monument’s construction in the 1980s.

The exaggeration was part of a broader pattern of relentless hustle that is unmissable in Epstein’s correspondence, the latest batch of which was released last week by order of the U.S. Congress. Over the years, Epstein’s conversations routinely blended personal and professional matters, with offers of material favors or moral support flowing easily between business relationships that turned into friendships, and vice versa.

Whether proposing tea in Paris, crossing paths in Davos or extending invitations to his private Caribbean island — where prosecutors alleged he trafficked and sexually abused underage girls — Epstein presented himself as an attentive, compassionate friend to his fellow one-percenters, who shared intimate details of their private lives as they sought his advice on business or personal matters. 

Often working alongside his longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell, later convicted for her role in Epstein’s sex-trafficking scheme, the financier insinuated himself into the highest reaches of global wealth and power.

“Billionaires and very wealthy people really like to stick together,” said William Cash, founder and former owner of Spear’s Magazine, a bimonthly British publication for high-net-worth individuals, and editor-in-chief of The Mace. “They’re in a club of their own and they like to glue themselves together.”

“You see that in Davos,” he added. “They’re a social tribe unto themselves. And Epstein and Maxwell understood and exploited that and became ringmasters.” 

That dynamic helps explain how figures like Colom — a senior French diplomat with no obvious reason to gravitate toward Epstein — ended up in his orbit.

A graduate of the École nationale d’administration (ENA), a French elite school for public servants, Colom coordinated global summits like the G20 or the United Nations climate talks for Sarkozy, moving to the private sector after the French president lost the 2012 election. Three French officials who worked with him at the time described Colom as a skilled diplomat and trusted colleague. 

He surfaces in Epstein’s correspondence in an email from a Norwegian diplomat who offered to introduce the financier to the then-Sarkozy advisor in 2011. 

The connection continued after Colom left public service to work for the Edmond de Rothschild private banking group. In the emails, the former diplomat appears eager to please Epstein, offering to put him in touch with ambassadors, a member of the European Parliament, “an Indian rising star of politics” and “the Russian vice-minister of Economy.” He also suggested he could provide “a good French butler.” 

“I’m interested in meeting anyone you think I would enjoy,” Epstein wrote him in June 2013. 

“When in Paris, what kind of people do you want to meet?” Colom asked him a few weeks later, in September. 

“Interesting. Smart science. Or very very cute 20s.”

That month, Colom brought Bruno Le Maire, a prominent French politician who would later become finance minister, to Epstein’s New York home.

A person close to Le Maire, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said Colom had invited Le Maire to meet people from the business world, but that he hadn’t known whose house he was visiting and left quickly after seeing Epstein.

Confidant

The help flowed both ways. In 2014, Colom thanked his “great friend” for his support during his marital troubles and sought Epstein’s advice on his personal finances. 

“Want to make a lot of money,” he wrote the next year ahead of one of Epstein’s many trips to Paris. “I don’t make enough now. Would love to come and see you.”

The two men also joked and commented about women. 

“where are you now?” Colom asked Epstein, in an exchange that had started with a possible business opportunity for Rothschild.

“On my island in the Caribbean, with an aquarium full of girls,” Epstein replied.

“Sure I would enjoy the view,” Colom wrote. 

Contacted by POLITICO, Colom did not respond to questions about his relationship with Epstein or the contents of the emails. The exchanges reviewed for this story do not indicate criminal behavior by Colom.

During the same period, the billionaire was regularly in touch with Colom’s boss, Ariane de Rothschild, to whom he extended similar offers of professional and personal help.

In an email to Rothschild, Epstein offered security advice ahead of a trip she was planning to Nicaragua. 

“I have dealt with children of the wealthy that for many reasons , want to lead , experience, enjoy  what they think is a “ normal “ life.   Problem is that we re a different world with different views,” he wrote.

After Epstein urged her not to take a car on her own in Nicaragua, Rothschild reassured him she would fly in by private plane and hire a driver. 

In another exchange dated December 2018 — as populist Yellow Jacket demonstrations were shaking France — Rothschild complained about protesters trying “to raid” her family’s sailboat in Brittany and, a few weeks later, one of her banks. 

When she alluded to the anti-Semitic attacks that have long targeted the Rothschild family, Epstein offered empathy — and practical security advice.  

“I suggest you board up the windows,” he wrote. “And doors … to get more aggressive  , there are microwave crowd deterrents. or very loud noise projectors.” 

A representative for Rothschild said she “had no knowledge of Mr. Epstein’s conduct and personal behavior.” 

“She has been deeply shocked by the actions revealed in recent years and wishes to reiterate that she unequivocally condemns these behaviors and the crimes of which he is guilty,” the representative added. 

Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde

In his correspondence with the world’s wealthy and connected, Epstein appears to have been adept at offering his interlocutors what they’re looking for, whether it be travel and business advice, sexual banter or a stroll through the streets of Paris to marvel at the monuments. 

Lang, the former culture minister, described Epstein as a sophisticated “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”  

“I got acquainted with him via Woody Allen,” who is “a friend,” Lang told BFM TV. He “came regularly to Paris for art shows … The Jeffrey I knew was a man passionate about art, charming.”  

Lang told POLITICO he “knew nothing of Epstein’s crimes.” 

Despite the fact that Epstein had pleaded guilty in 2008 to soliciting a minor for prostitution, the financier was able to ingratiate himself with high-profile executives, powerful politicians and members of royalty, who would entrust him with details of their daily struggles while indulging his flirtatious tone. 

“Come save us. Im dying of boredom,” Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway wrote in a 2012 email exchange. 

“I am on my wife hunt. paris is proving interesting, but i prefer scandinavians,” Epstein wrote to her a few weeks later. 

“Paris good for adultery,” the princess replied. “Scandis better wife material. But then again. Who am I to talk ?”

In a statement shared with the press by the Norwegian royal house, Mette-Marit of Norway said she regrets “having had any contact with Epstein at all.”  

“I must take responsibility for not having investigated Epstein’s background more thoroughly, and for not realizing sooner what kind of person he was.” 

Davos man

Epstein didn’t just circulate among the rich and powerful. He embedded himself in their shared infrastructure, including the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. 

He was close to the event’s leadership. In the emails, he is called upon by associates to secure access to the invite-only gathering, to broker meetings there and to help hopefuls get into mentorship programs linked to the WEF. 

When former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers complained in 2018 to Epstein that he had been snubbed, Epstein offered to “inquire” with his “good friend,” Børge Brende, who is the president and CEO of the WEF.

The following month, Summers asked Epstein: “If u can please if u can get me invited to next year Davos.” 

Summers’ spokesperson did not reply to a request for comment. 

Brende, a former Norwegian foreign minister, dined with Epstein at least three times in 2018 and 2019, and the two exchanged texts and emails. 

As recently as November, Brende denied having any contact with Epstein — but he has changed his story after their relationship came to light in the latest batch of emails. 

The WEF confirmed to POLITICO that Brende took part “in three business dinners with Jeffrey Epstein, along with subsequent email and SMS communications.” It has opened an independent review into the relationship, which it said Brende requested and is cooperating with. 

The first dinner, at Epstein’s New York townhouse in 2018, was on Brende’s birthday. 

“Candles,” Epstein wrote in an email ahead of the dinner. The two also exchanged views on the future of Davos. 

“we need a new global architecture,” Brende wrote. “World Economic Forum (Davos) is uniquely positioned – public private.”

“davos can really replace the UN,” Epstein replied. 

“:-) trust me,” Brende replied. 

“i do, 100% :),” responded Epstein.

Brende said he “was completely unaware of Epstein’s past and criminal activities” and would have declined any invitations or communication had he known. 

“I recognize that I could have conducted a more thorough investigation into Epstein’s history, and I regret not doing so,” he said. 

Ahead of another dinner in June 2019, Brende emailed Epstein’s assistant.

“I’m looking forward — sushi would be amazing,” he wrote.

Three weeks later, Epstein would be arrested. A month later, he would die in prison.

Jamie Dettmer and Pauline de Saint Remy contributed reporting to this article.