The ghost of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has struck again. This time, even though he died in 2019, his is still adding to the stress and criticism of the World Economic Forum.
On Feb. 26, WEF president and CEO Børge Brende resigned after revelations that he had three dinners, and some emails and SMS communications with Epstein. His ouster followed an independent investigation earlier in February.
Brende said he wasn’t aware of Epstein’s sex crimes.
"Had I known about his background, I would have declined the initial invitation to join Rod-Larsen and any subsequent dinner invitations or other communications," he said.
That response hasn’t been well received by observers, given that Epstein's conviction occurred in 2008 and would have been easy to uncover. As Norway's foreign minister from 2013 to 2017, perhaps he should have been more cautious, some observers say.
"If you are standing on a public stage, you have to know who you are standing with," said Ben Habib, right-leaning leader of the British political party Advance UK, and an entrepreneur.
Founder of the U.K.-based Henry Jackson Society, Alan Mendoza, added, "The moral is that people in positions of authority should be very careful with whom they have dinner. Mendoza also wonders how many people with a criminal record have attended the WEF.
The news of Brende’s resignation comes hot on the heels of other scandals and bad publicity for the WEF, commonly known as Davos, after the Swiss village in the Alps where the annual meeting takes place. Last year, Klaus Schwab, the founder of the WEF, stepped down in July after accusations that he had misused WEF funds and treated employees inappropriately.
Both Schwab and his wife were both ultimately cleared by the WEF board for any material wrongdoing, though a board of trustees global economy as the WEF has encouraged offshoring manufacturing to places with cheap labor, Lutnick said. He also encouraged other countries to follow the "America First" model, which is that the workers come first.
Lutnick also attacked Europe’s alternative energy push, which includes solar and wind energy. "Why would Europe agree to be net zero in 2030 when they don’t make a battery? he said at Davos. Achieving net zero means countries aim to have no increase in overall carbon emissions by 2050.
But if Europe does pursue Net zero, then the EU will be subservient to communist China, Lutnick says. China is by far the dominant producer, accounting for approximately one-third of global renewable energy, compared with 11% in the U.S.
"The WEF is the embodiment of power and wealth," Habib said. "Big money is diverting policy. It’s fascism." He says the world may have been tricked into believing the economic promises made by globalist organizations. "The shine is now off. It is failing and not gaining traction."
The WEF isn’t the only organization that is running roughshod over multiple countries. The European Union is also doing similar work with the countries in its bloc through a multitude of regulations, Habib said.
THE Associated Press contributed to this report.