Disclosed Emails Illustrate Epstein and Summers as Close Associates

Multiple messages between convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair served as confidants.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, show the two men sharing private – and at times improper – opinions on politics and personal connections.

I'm struggling to understand why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by violence and desertion it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite believe if u murder your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet flirted with a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS OBSERVATION.”

Back then, Harvard University was dealing with an admissions controversy after a previously incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who stepped down amid a controversy after making gender-biased comments about women scholars, added in the email to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of population.”

Summers was once a key player in the Democratic Party circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main architects of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a stalwart presence in the progressive media. But doubts have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a long-standing contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a extensive sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a previous tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a spokesperson for Summers said that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Democratic lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein thought Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Republican lawmakers published a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The released materials show that Summers kept up amicable contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s detention.

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

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – notably Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the particulars of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unidentified woman, and being turned down.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein replied 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 restated his regret in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret 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 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 typically possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was unqualified 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 eventually secure appointment as director of the White House NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers exited the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After media coverage about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.