Uncovered Emails Show Epstein and Larry Summers as Confidantes
A series of communications between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers were released this week, showing the pair acted as close contacts.
Their correspondence, covering 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging intimate – and at times improper – perspectives on public affairs and relationships.
I am attempting to understand why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by violence and desertion it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet flirted with a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS OBSERVATION.”
During that period, Harvard University was dealing with an enrollment discussion after a formerly incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a scandal after making gender-biased comments about women in academia, went on to say in the message to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of society.”
Summers was previously a key player in Democratic circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key designers of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a stalwart voice in the progressive media. But doubts have persisted about his relationship with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging 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 report, a spokesperson for Summers said that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.
Democratic lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers issued a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers maintained amicable contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s detention.
Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “role and association” with Summers, among other influential liberal leaders and business leaders.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – notably Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the aspects of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unnamed woman, and being rejected.
“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” 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 commented. “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 contributed 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 determined Epstein “lacked the scholarly credentials 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 pleaded guilty to child sex offenses in 2008.
By then Obama’s star was rising. Summers would later 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 charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After news about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.
