Revealed Emails Show Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends
Multiple messages between convicted offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair acted as close contacts.
These exchanges, dating from 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men sharing private – and at times questionable – views on public affairs and personal connections.
I am attempting to figure why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite feel if u kill your baby by beating and desertion it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 communication. However hit on 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 enrollment debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who stepped down amid a scandal after making sexist comments about female academics, continued in the correspondence to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was once a leading light in liberal circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main designers of Barack Obama’s approach to the market collapse, and a stalwart presence in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have remained about his connection with Epstein, a long-standing connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a broad sex trafficking of minors operation before his demise in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following publication of a prior set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a spokesperson for Summers said 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 believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Republican lawmakers issued a more extensive batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The documents show that Summers continued congenial contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s detention.
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “role and relationship” with Summers, among other influential liberal leaders and industry figures.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – notably Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the aspects of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unnamed woman, and being rebuffed.
“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” 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 reiterated his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he wrote. “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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later concluded Epstein “did not have the educational background visiting fellows typically possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he pleaded guilty to child sex offenses in 2008.
At that point Obama’s star was rising. Summers would ultimately receive 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 pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.
