Revealed Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends

Multiple communications between convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers came to light this week, indicating the pair acted as confidants.

These exchanges, dating from 2013 to early 2019, show the two men sharing intimate – and at times improper – perspectives on politics and interpersonal dynamics.

“I’m trying to figure why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by beating and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 communication. Yet made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS INSIGHT.”

At that time, Harvard University was wrestling with an enrollment debate after a once incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making discriminatory comments about female academics, continued in the message 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 once a key player in liberal circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key engineers of Barack Obama’s approach to the economic downturn, and a stalwart figure in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have remained about his association with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a extensive child sex trafficking operation before his demise in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a prior batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a agent for Summers said that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.

Democratic lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein was of the opinion Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers released a much bigger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers continued congenial contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and relationship” with Summers, among other prominent Democratic figures and industry figures.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – notably Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the details of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unidentified woman, and being turned down.

“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” 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. “There are many things I regret 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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later found 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 confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.

At that point Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would ultimately 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 requesting Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After news about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.