Lawmakers investigating the relationship between Jeffrey Epstein and a high-powered corporate lawyer ended up on the receiving end of a veiled threat.
Based on transcripts from a closed-door meeting between members of the House Oversight Committee and attorney Kathy Ruemmler, the former Goldman Sachs general counsel gave her questioners an earful.
Ruemmler arrived at the July 15 interview, where she claimed she provided Epstein legal advice "as many people do" and worked with him only because he expressed remorse for his 2008 guilty plea for solicitation of a minor for prostitution, ABC News is reporting.
"I understand why, you know, sitting here in 2026, the emails can come across as if there is callousness to victims. That's not what I intended at the time. It wasn't my state of mind at the time," she claimed.
According to ABC News, "Ruemmler said Epstein sought her legal advice from time to time 'as many people do' and defended her relationship with Epstein as strictly professional -- but acknowledged that Epstein helped her secure work with French banker Ariane de Rothschild, and that he connected another attorney at her firm with a client in a criminal case."
Near the end of her appearance, she went on offense and lectured the members of Congress.
"In the American legal system we hold people accountable for their conduct. We don't hold people accountable for their associations," she stated while observing that some of the lawmakers themselves "publicly endorsed a candidate who has been credibly accused of sexual assault," without specifying who.
"And so if we start applying a standard that somehow a mere association with someone who has been accused or, you know, convicted of criminal conduct—I think that's a very dangerous road to go down," she added.