Disclosed Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends
Numerous messages between found guilty sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair acted as close contacts.
The messages, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men sharing personal – and at times improper – perspectives on political matters and personal connections.
“I’m trying to figure why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by beating and neglect it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 email. Yet made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS OBSERVATION.”
At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment debate after a previously incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who stepped down amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about women in academia, added in the email to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was previously a key player in the Democratic Party circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the primary architects of Barack Obama’s response to the economic downturn, and a committed figure in the progressive media. But concerns have remained about his connection with Epstein, a longtime connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a broad child sex trafficking operation before his demise in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following the release of a prior tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a agent for Summers stated that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.
Democratic lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein was of the opinion Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Conservative lawmakers released a larger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers kept up friendly contact with the found guilty 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 asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “role and relationship” with Summers, among other prominent Democrats and industry figures.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – particularly 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 romantic gestures toward an anonymous woman, and being rebuffed.
“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” 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 reiterated his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he said. “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 gave more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later concluded Epstein “lacked the scholarly credentials visiting fellows normally possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only ceased accepting Epstein’s donations after he admitted guilt to child sex offenses in 2008.
By that time Obama’s star was rising. Summers would later secure 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 pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After news about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.
