Revealed Communications Depict Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends
Multiple exchanges between adjudicated offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US finance chief Larry Summers came to light this week, showing the pair were confidants.
These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, show the two men discussing intimate – and at times unseemly – views on public affairs and interpersonal dynamics.
“I’m trying to understand why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by beating and neglect it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by violence and neglect it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 message. However flirted with a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS OBSERVATION.”
During that period, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who resigned amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about women scholars, went on to say in the email to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of population.”
Summers was at one time a leading light in liberal circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main designers of Barack Obama’s response to the market collapse, and a committed voice in the left-leaning punditry. But doubts have lingered about his association with Epstein, a long-standing contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a broad exploitation operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a agent for Summers said that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.
Left-leaning lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein thought Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Conservative lawmakers released a more extensive tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers continued amicable contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s detention.
Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “role and relationship” with Summers, among other influential Democrats and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – notably Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the aspects of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an anonymous woman, and being rejected.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein replied in an exchange on 16 March. “overlook the 'daddy' remark, I'm dating the motorcycle guy, you responded appropriately.. frustration signals affection., no protests revealed fortitude.”
Summers reiterated his regret in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he wrote. “As previously stated, my connection to Jeffrey Epstein represented a serious lapse in judgment.”
Summers was president of Harvard University from 2001 to 2006. Epstein gave more than $9m to Harvard and its related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later determined Epstein “was missing the academic qualifications visiting fellows typically possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.
Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he admitted guilt to child sex offenses in 2008.
By that time Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would ultimately secure appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers left the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.
