Disclosed Emails Show Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Close Associates
A series of exchanges between found guilty child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, revealing the pair served as close contacts.
Their correspondence, spanning 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men discussing private – and at times questionable – views on political matters and personal connections.
I am attempting to determine why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by beating and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by violence and abandonment it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS INSIGHT.”
Back then, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment discussion after a previously incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making discriminatory comments about women in academia, continued in the email to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was previously a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key engineers of Barack Obama’s approach to the economic downturn, and a stalwart presence in the liberal commentariat. But concerns have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a long-standing connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a broad child sex trafficking operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.
Following the release of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a spokesperson for Summers commented that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.
Democratic lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Republican lawmakers published a more extensive collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The documents show that Summers kept up amicable contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “role and association” with Summers, among other well-known Democrats and business leaders.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – particularly Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the particulars of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an anonymous woman, and being rejected.
“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein replied in an exchange on 16 March. “ignore the daddy im going to go out with the motorcycle guy, you reacted well.. annoyed shows caring., no whining showed strentgh.”
Summers affirmed his sorrow in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he said. “I’ve expressed this previously: my relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was a grave mistake.”
Summers was president of Harvard University from 2001 to 2006. Epstein gave more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later determined Epstein “did not have the scholarly credentials visiting fellows normally possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.
Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he pleaded guilty to child sex offenses in 2008.
At that point Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would later secure appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers exited the White House, he began asking Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.
