Disclosed Emails Show Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Confidantes
Multiple messages between convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US finance chief Larry Summers have emerged this week, indicating the pair acted as confidants.
Their correspondence, covering 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging private – and at times questionable – views on public affairs and interpersonal dynamics.
“I’m trying to understand why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by violence and neglect it must be unimportant to your entry 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 beating and desertion it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 email. “But made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS INSIGHT.”
Back then, Harvard University was wrestling with an admissions debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who stepped down amid a controversy after making sexist comments about female academics, added in the correspondence to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of population.”
Summers was previously a key player in the Democratic Party circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key engineers of Barack Obama’s response to the financial crisis, and a committed voice in the liberal commentariat. But questions have remained about his association with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a wide-ranging exploitation operation before his passing in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following the release of a earlier tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a representative for Summers commented 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 was of the opinion Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, Conservative lawmakers issued a larger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers maintained friendly contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s detention.
Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “participation and association” with Summers, among other well-known liberal leaders and business leaders.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – particularly Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the particulars of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an anonymous woman, and being rejected.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein responded 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 affirmed his remorse in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he said. “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 named a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later determined Epstein “did not have the educational background visiting fellows typically possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he admitted guilt to child sex offenses in 2008.
By then Obama’s career was advancing. 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 requesting 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 multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After reporting about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.
