Uncovered Emails Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Confidantes

Numerous exchanges between convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair served as close contacts.

The messages, dating from 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging personal – and at times questionable – views on political matters and relationships.

“I’m trying to figure why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by violence and neglect it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by violence and neglect it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 message. “But made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS IDEA.”

During that period, Harvard University was wrestling with an acceptance debate after a previously incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a scandal after making gender-biased comments about female academics, continued in the email 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 leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s response to the financial crisis, and a steadfast figure in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have lingered about his association with Epstein, a longtime contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a broad exploitation operation before his death in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a prior batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a representative for Summers said that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.

Left-leaning lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, GOP lawmakers released a more extensive batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers maintained amicable contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange taking place only months before Epstein’s arrest.

Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “role and relationship” with Summers, among other well-known liberal leaders and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – especially 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 unidentified woman, and being turned down.

“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein wrote 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. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” 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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “was missing the scholarly credentials visiting fellows normally possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.

Harvard only ceased accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.

At that point Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would ultimately win appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers departed the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing 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 multiple 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.