Multiple messages between adjudicated sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US treasury head Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair served as trusted allies.
The messages, dating from 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men discussing private – and at times improper – views on public affairs and personal connections.
I'm struggling to determine why [the] American elite think if u kill your baby by beating and abandonment it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be irrelevant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 message. “But flirted with a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS OBSERVATION.”
At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an acceptance discussion after a formerly incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about female academics, went on to say in the correspondence to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was at one time a leading light in Democratic circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a stalwart voice in the left-leaning punditry. But questions have remained about his association with Epstein, a former contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a extensive sex trafficking of minors operation before his death in jail in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a agent for Summers commented that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.
Democratic Party lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein thought Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers issued a more extensive collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers kept up friendly contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.
Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “role and association” with Summers, among other prominent liberal leaders and industry figures.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – notably Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the details of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an unnamed woman, and being rebuffed.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein wrote in an exchange on 16 March. “disregard the 'daddy' comment, I'm going out with the motorcycle guy, you handled it well.. irritation indicates concern., no complaining demonstrated strength.”
Summers restated his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he wrote. “As I have said before, my association with Jeffrey Epstein was a major error of judgement.”
Summers was president of Harvard University from 2001 to 2006. Epstein donated more than $9m to Harvard and its related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later concluded Epstein “lacked the educational background visiting fellows normally possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.
By then Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would eventually secure appointment as director of the White House NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers departed 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 charitable contributions to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After reporting about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.
