For years, “Wasserman” has functioned like a shortcut in the music business — a one-word signal for leverage, access, and scale. But over the past week, that brand has become the problem.
Casey Wasserman, the sports-and-entertainment executive whose company has grown into a major force in representation — and who also serves as chair of Los Angeles’ 2028 Olympics organizing effort — is facing intensifying pressure after sexually suggestive email exchanges with Ghislaine Maxwell surfaced in newly released government files tied to Jeffrey Epstein. The result has been swift and unusually public: artists calling for him to step away, clients departing, and a wave of internal instability that multiple outlets describe as a fight over what, exactly, the company can be if its founder becomes radioactive. (Los Angeles Times)
Update (as of Feb. 12, 2026): The following artists have publicly said they’ve left Wasserman / are no longer represented by the agency amid the fallout: Weyes Blood, and Orville Peck, with additional exits and departure announcements including Dropkick Murphys, Sylvan Esso, and Chelsea Cutler and Bully. For an up-to-the-minute running tally (including artists who are in the process of exiting or have issued formal demands), see Billboard’s updating tracker here: “Wasserman Fallout” (Updating).
The public artist backlash has been striking not just for its speed, but for who it’s aimed at. This isn’t a label boycott or a vague “industry issues” statement — it’s musicians and teams speaking directly to the name on the building. Chappell Roan announced she was leaving the agency, framing the decision around accountability and values. (Los Angeles Times) Billboard has tracked a growing list of artists posting statements and/or beginning the process of separating from the company, often while making a point to support their day-to-day agents and staff.
Inside the business, the situation reads like a slow-motion emergency meeting that never ends. The Los Angeles Times reports that artists and staff are pushing for Wasserman to exit the music agency, with industry sources anticipating imminent changes that could include rebranding, restructuring, or even a sale or spin-off of the music operation. One music manager told the paper they’d been informed Wasserman planned to step down from the music side and separate it into a newly named entity — a kind of “lifeboat” scenario meant to preserve the agency’s people and clients while cutting the most toxic linkage: the name itself.
That’s the deeper tension here: whether the modern Wasserman music business can survive as a functioning agency if every tour routing email, credential request, and deal memo carries the same signature line that’s now dominating headlines.
The Hollywood Reporter describes an internal schism, with some agents reportedly exploring a buyout of the music division to spin it off under a different brand — essentially a hard reset aimed at saving the infrastructure that artists actually interact with every day: the agents, assistants, and departments that keep tours moving. And in a hyper-consolidated era — where firms grow by acquisition and leverage is often built through scale — the irony is sharp: the very thing that made the company feel unstoppable (expansion, reach, and name recognition) is now what makes it harder to contain the blast radius.
Wasserman has issued an apology over the Maxwell emails, saying he “deeply regret[s]” the correspondence, stressing it occurred more than two decades ago and before Maxwell’s crimes were publicly known, and stating he never had a personal or business relationship with Epstein. But apologies don’t resolve the operational problem of reputational contagion — especially in music, where artists and audiences have become increasingly willing to demand ethical clarity, and where touring and booking relationships are built as much on trust as they are on spreadsheets.
The story also isn’t confined to music-industry optics. Wasserman’s role with LA28 has pulled the controversy into civic and political space, generating calls for resignation from some local officials and scrutiny from media covering the Olympics buildout. That pressure hit a counterweight this week when LA28’s executive board publicly backed him, saying it reviewed the matter with outside counsel and determined he should continue to lead the organizing effort. (AP)
That split-screen reality, boardroom support on the Olympics side, while the music side gets louder and more unstable by the day, is exactly what makes the agency crisis feel so unresolved. One side can vote. The other side can leave.
And in talent representation, leaving is leverage, possibly the only leverage they have.
What happens next is likely to come down to a question the business hates because it doesn’t fit neatly into contract language: how many clients are willing to stay put, and absorb the association, if Casey Wasserman remains the name and face of the company? The artists who’ve spoken publicly so far include both indie-leaning acts and at least one major star, and rival agencies are inevitably circling. (Billboard)
If the company does attempt a spin-off or rebrand of the music unit, it won’t just be a PR maneuver, it would be a structural acknowledgment of what’s already happening in real time: artists trying to protect their teams while refusing to be tethered to leadership they believe compromises their values.
In the end, the most revealing detail may be the simplest one: when your agency name becomes the headline, you’re no longer an invisible machine behind the music. You’re the story. And right now, “Team Wass” is watching the ground shift under its own feet.
