Disclosed Exchanges Illustrate Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends
A series of exchanges between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US finance chief Larry Summers have emerged this week, showing the pair were confidants.
These exchanges, dating from 2013 to early 2019, show the two men discussing personal – and at times questionable – opinions on public affairs and relationships.
I am attempting to understand why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by violence and abandonment 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 feel if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 email. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS INSIGHT.”
Back then, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making discriminatory comments about female academics, added in the message to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was at one time a key player in liberal circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the primary engineers of Barack Obama’s response to the market collapse, and a stalwart presence in the left-leaning punditry. But questions have lingered about his connection with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a broad exploitation operation before his demise in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a previous batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a agent for Summers commented that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.
Left-leaning lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein was of the opinion Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, Conservative lawmakers published a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The documents show that Summers maintained congenial contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.
Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “involvement and association” with Summers, among other prominent liberal leaders and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – particularly Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the details of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an anonymous woman, and being rebuffed.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” 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. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he commented. “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 associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “was missing the academic qualifications visiting fellows usually possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only ceased accepting Epstein’s donations after he pleaded guilty to child sex offenses in 2008.
By then Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would eventually win appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers departed the White House, he began requesting Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.