Uncovered Emails Show Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends

Multiple exchanges between adjudicated offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair were confidants.

Their correspondence, spanning 2013 to early 2019, show the two men discussing intimate – and at times unseemly – views on public affairs and relationships.

I'm struggling to figure why [the] American elite feel if u murder your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite think if u kill your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 email. “But hit on a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS OBSERVATION.”

At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an acceptance controversy after a once incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a controversy after making sexist comments about women in academia, went on to say in the correspondence 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 prominent figure in liberal circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the economic downturn, and a committed presence in the progressive media. But questions have persisted about his association with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a wide-ranging sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a spokesperson for Summers stated that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.

Left-leaning lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein was of the opinion Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Republican lawmakers published a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

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

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

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – notably Summers’s disdain 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 advances toward an anonymous 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 sorrow in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he said. “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 gave more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later found Epstein “did not have the academic qualifications visiting fellows usually possess and his application suggested 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.

By that time Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would later win appointment as director of the White House NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers left the White House, he began asking 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 associated with 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 surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.