Uncovered Emails Show Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends
A series of messages between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US treasury head Larry Summers have emerged this week, indicating the pair acted as confidants.
These exchanges, covering 2013 to early 2019, show the two men discussing personal – and at times improper – views on public affairs and personal connections.
I am attempting to determine why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by beating and abandonment it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 message. However made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS IDEA.”
Back then, Harvard University was dealing with an enrollment controversy after a once incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about women scholars, continued in the email to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was at one time a key player in the Democratic Party circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key architects of Barack Obama’s handling to the economic downturn, and a steadfast presence in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have persisted about his connection with Epstein, a former contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a wide-ranging exploitation operation before his death 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 representative for Summers commented that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.
Democratic Party lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein believed Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers issued a larger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The released materials show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.
Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “participation and association” with Summers, among other influential liberal leaders and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – especially Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the aspects of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an anonymous woman, and being turned down.
“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 restated his regret 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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later concluded Epstein “did not have the scholarly credentials visiting fellows usually possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.
Harvard only ceased accepting Epstein’s donations after he admitted guilt to child sex offenses in 2008.
By that time Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would eventually win 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 charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together 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-sex-trafficking organizations.