File photo: Bard College President Leon Botstein speaks on the “Changing the Landscape: From the Digital Classroom to the Global Campus” panel at the TIME Higher Education Summit on October 18, 2012 in New York City.
Countess Jemal | Getty Images
Bard College President Leon Botstein announced Friday that he will step down at the end of June after 51 years leading New York’s prestigious liberal arts school. The next day, the board’s personal law firm filed a critical report about its ties to the late notorious sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“Nothing President Botstein did in connection with his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was illegal,” WilmerHale’s attorney Jamie Gorelick said in a summary to the trustees obtained by CNBC.
“However, President Botstein made decisions during that relationship that reflected Mr. Byrd’s leadership,” wrote Gorelick, who served as deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration.
Byrd trustees hired WilmerHale in February to investigate the 79-year-old president’s relationship with Epstein after the release of documents by the Justice Department revealed details of their interactions that revealed they were more extensive than previously known.
Mr. Botstein, 79, a prominent orchestra conductor, said he cultivated Mr. Epstein as a donor to the Bard in Annandale-on-Hudson. The hunt for Epstein comes years after the shady money manager pleaded guilty in a Florida court to soliciting prostitution from a minor and was sentenced to 13 months in prison.
“President Botstein has made a strong case that Mr. Byrd’s financial needs are paramount,” Mr. Gorelick wrote in the summary of Mr. Byrd’s report to the trustees.
“His view was, ‘If you will allow God to work, you will accept money from Satan,'” Gorelick noted.
“President Botstein said he believed there was no risk to Epstein or Mr. Byrd’s reputation by pursuing him.
“He did not consider the potential risk of exposing Bard students to Epstein, nor did he consider that his actions might legitimize and legitimize Epstein to potential victims and their parents,” the lawyers wrote.
“In public statements and statements to the Bard community, President Botstein downplayed his relationship with Epstein and was not entirely accurate.”
In addition to Botstein, Epstein was friends with a number of other prominent people, including President Donald Trump, former Harvard University President Larry Summers, and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, brother of King Charles III. Epstein died by suicide in a Manhattan jail in 2019, weeks after he was arrested on child prostitution charges.
A woman who answered the phone at Botstein’s home on Friday referred questions to the university’s media relations department.
“For more than 50 years, President Botstein has been a transformational leader with the vision and unwavering commitment to grow Bard College into the world-class institution it is today,” Bard College said in a statement.
“We are confident in the future of Bard College and are committed to ensuring that the university we all love continues to grow, thrive, and be a model of excellence,” the university said.
Mr. Botstein’s retirement statement
Mr. Botstein did not mention Mr. Epstein by name in his retirement announcement, but in it he touted his role in Mr. Bird’s $1 billion endowment effort, which was completed in January. The campaign was launched in 2021 with a $500 million challenge grant from the Open Society Foundations, a philanthropic network founded by billionaire hedge fund investor George Soros.
But Botstein referenced the WilmerHale investigation when explaining the timing of his retirement announcement.
“We believe it was prudent and in Byrd’s best interest to wait to make this announcement until the Wilmer-Hale review was complete,” Botstein wrote.
In an email to Bard students and faculty, he previously informed the board of his intention to retire and said he would “focus my energies as a faculty member, teacher, and musician.”
He also said, “I will continue with the Bard Festival, Summerscape, and the Bard Conservatory and live at Finberg House.”
Byrd’s Wilmer Hale research on presidents
Professor Golick said in his summary that in deciding to pursue potential donations from Epstein in 2012, Botstein did not seek to understand the details of Epstein’s 2008 conviction for soliciting underage girls into prostitution and “did not agree with the view of the senior faculty member he had asked to help make the recommendation to Mr. Epstein that Mr. Byrd should not be involved with Mr. Epstein.”
“President Botstein said that any person convicted of a crime involving sexual activity with a woman must
“Minors — in his words, “ordinary sex offenders” — may, in his view, be presumed to be rehabilitated in the same way that that presumption is afforded to other convicted persons,” Gorelick wrote.
He said Botstein had not discussed with the board whether he would accept donations from Mr. Epstein or “whether he would be able to properly receive payments from Mr. Epstein.”
“When President Botstein approved donations by an organization called Enhanced Education in 2011 and 2012, he did not disclose or report to the board that these funds came from Epstein,” Gorelick wrote.
And when billionaire Leon Black made a donation to Byrd in 2014, “President Botstein understood it to have been made at Epstein’s orders, but it was only disclosed as money coming from Black,” Gorlick wrote.
“In 2016, President Botstein accepted fees under a consulting agreement with the Epstein Company,” Gorelick wrote. “He did not disclose the agreement to the board because he intended to donate these funds to Byrd.”
The lawyers said Botstein explained that the funds were “contributed together with contributions from Mr. Byrd and his wife over the years and were not individually identified as coming from Mr. Epstein.”
“As a result, the Board is unable to document that these fees contributed to Byrd,” Gorelick wrote.
“While we are pleased with Leon Botstein’s decision to step down, it is not enough,” Bard student Owen Denker, a spokesperson for Take Back Bird, a group that called for Botstein’s ouster after his relationship with Epstein was exposed, said in a statement to CNBC.
“He must immediately cease coaching and command,” Denker said.
“Additionally, we need to address the systemic culture of sexual abuse and share governance, including faculty, staff, and students, to ensure similar negligence never occurs again,” Denker said.
In a statement obtained by CNBC, the Bard College Board of Trustees executive committee said the board is “grateful to President Botstein for his 50 years of service to Bard College, his countless accomplishments, and the lasting impact of his leadership.”
But the committee also said that “the concerns raised in recent months are serious and deeply felt.”
The committee said Bard is “committed to strengthening its donor vetting, fundraising, and conflict of interest policies.”
“External counsel is reviewing existing policies and will present its findings and specific recommendations, including donor vetting procedures, to the Board and the Development Office,” the committee said. “Funds related to Jeffrey Epstein will go to organizations that support survivors of sexual assault.”
