Disclosed Exchanges Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends

A series of communications between adjudicated sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and former US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair acted as close contacts.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men sharing personal – and at times questionable – opinions on political matters and interpersonal dynamics.

“I’m trying to determine why [the] American elite believe if u murder your baby by beating and neglect it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite think if u kill your baby by beating and desertion it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 email. Yet made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT.”

At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment controversy after a previously incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who resigned amid a scandal after making gender-biased comments about women in academia, went on to say in the correspondence to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of society.”

Summers was once a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key designers of Barack Obama’s approach to the economic downturn, and a stalwart presence in the progressive media. But concerns have remained about his connection with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a broad exploitation operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a earlier set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a agent for Summers said that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.

Democratic lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein believed Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, GOP lawmakers published a more extensive collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers continued congenial contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “role and association” with Summers, among other influential Democratic figures and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss 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 unidentified woman, and being rebuffed.

“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 remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he said. “I’ve expressed this previously: my relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was a grave mistake.”

Summers was president of Harvard University from 2001 to 2006. Epstein donated more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “lacked the academic qualifications visiting fellows usually possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.

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

By that time Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would ultimately secure appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers departed the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After reporting about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.