Disclosed Emails Depict Epstein and Summers as Close Associates

A series of communications between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US treasury head Larry Summers came to light this week, showing the pair were close contacts.

Their correspondence, dating from 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men exchanging private – and at times unseemly – perspectives on public affairs and relationships.

I'm struggling to figure why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite think if u kill your baby by violence and desertion it must be irrelevant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 message. However made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS IDEA.”

During that period, Harvard University was wrestling with an acceptance debate after a once incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who stepped down amid a uproar after making discriminatory 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 possessed by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of population.”

Summers was previously a leading light in Democratic circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main architects of Barack Obama’s approach to the economic downturn, and a committed voice in the progressive media. But questions have remained about his association with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging child sex trafficking operation before his demise in prison in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a previous set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a spokesperson for Summers said that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.

Democratic lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein thought Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Republican lawmakers issued a larger batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers kept up friendly contact with the adjudicated 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 asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “role and relationship” with Summers, among other influential liberal leaders and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – especially Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the aspects of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unnamed woman, and being turned down.

“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein wrote 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 sorrow in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he wrote. “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 named a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later found Epstein “lacked the educational background visiting fellows usually possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he admitted guilt to child sex offenses in 2008.

By then Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would later secure appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers exited the White House, he began requesting Epstein for philanthropic 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 media coverage about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.