Disclosed Emails Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends
A series of communications between found guilty child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers have emerged this week, indicating the pair served as trusted allies.
The messages, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men discussing intimate – and at times unseemly – perspectives on political matters and personal connections.
“I’m trying to understand why [the] American elite feel if u murder your baby by beating and abandonment it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite feel if u kill your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be not a factor to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 email. “But made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS IDEA.”
At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an admissions controversy after a previously incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who lost his position amid a scandal after making gender-biased comments about female academics, added in the message to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of society.”
Summers was once a key player in the Democratic Party circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main designers of Barack Obama’s approach to the financial crisis, and a stalwart presence in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have remained about his relationship with Epstein, a longtime contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a extensive exploitation operation before his passing in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a previous batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a spokesperson for Summers said that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.
Democratic Party lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein believed Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, Republican lawmakers released a much bigger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers continued amicable contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s apprehension.
Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “role and connection” with Summers, among other influential Democrats and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – especially Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the particulars of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unnamed woman, and being turned down.
“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein responded 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 remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he wrote. “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 affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later concluded Epstein “lacked the academic qualifications visiting fellows normally possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.
Harvard only stopped accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.
By then Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would eventually secure appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers departed the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men met a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.
