A prominent financier this week for U.S. Senate candidate John Hickenlooper, a week before the former governor and presidential candidate files his first fundraising report in the Senate race.
Bob Hurst hosted an event Tuesday night at his estate in Aspen. Hickenlooper’s campaign declined to comment on the fundraiser.
Hurst spent 30 years at Goldman Sachs before retiring as vice chairman in mid-2004, a few years before the prominent investment bank suffered losses in the financial crisis and was bailed out by taxpayers to the tune of $10 billion. He’s now a vice chairman at , a private equity firm founded by former Goldman Sachs executives.
In 2002, Hurst was one of many wealthy art aficionados He was never charged but agreed .
Hurst also turned up, along with other figures from the world of finance, in the of Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender who died by suicide last month. According to a source close to Hurst, he was introduced to Epstein by a mutual friend and the two saw each other at several parties. Hurst had no contact with Epstein after moving to Aspen in 2006, according to the source. Epstein was first charged with sex crimes that year.
Hurst, once a Republican donor, has in the past year, including to Hickenlooper’s presidential campaign.
He hosted a $2,700-per-person fundraiser for Hillary Clinton in 2015 that in Pitkin and Garfield counties because security, provided by deputies from those counties, cost taxpayers thousands of dollars.
Pitkin County Sheriff Joe DiSalvo, who tried to recover the money from Clinton’s campaign and Hurst in 2015, said this week that he was never able to do so. Hurst has said he and his wife could not cover the cost because it would be a violation of federal campaign finance laws.
Hickenlooper appointed Hurst to the Colorado Economic Development Commission in 2017, a post Hurst has since retired from. He and his wife, Soledad, who are involved with the Aspen Music Festival and School and other civic institutions there. After the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, he founded the 9/11 United Services Group to coordinate charities providing aid to victims of the attacks.