Uncovered Emails Show Epstein and Summers as Confidantes
Numerous communications between convicted offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US treasury head Larry Summers were released this week, revealing the pair served as close contacts.
Their correspondence, covering 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging personal – and at times unseemly – views on political matters and relationships.
I'm struggling to understand why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by beating and neglect it must be unimportant 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 violence and desertion it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 message. “But hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS IDEA.”
Back then, Harvard University was wrestling with an acceptance controversy after a once incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who lost his position amid a scandal after making sexist comments about women in academia, continued in the message to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of population.”
Summers was previously a leading light in liberal circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main designers of Barack Obama’s handling to the economic downturn, and a stalwart voice in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have persisted about his connection with Epstein, a former connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.
Following publication of a previous set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a representative for Summers commented that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.
Democratic lawmakers released 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 issued a more extensive batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The released materials show that Summers continued congenial contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.
Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and relationship” with Summers, among other prominent liberal leaders and corporate executives.
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, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an anonymous woman, and being rejected.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” 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 regret in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” 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 contributed more than $9m to Harvard and its related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later determined Epstein “lacked the educational background visiting fellows normally possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only stopped accepting Epstein’s donations after he admitted guilt to child sex offenses in 2008.
At that point Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would eventually receive 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 working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.
