Revealed Emails Show Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Close Associates

A series of communications between adjudicated offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US finance chief Larry Summers came to light this week, revealing the pair served as trusted allies.

Their correspondence, dating from 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging intimate – and at times unseemly – views on political matters and personal connections.

I am attempting to understand why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be unimportant 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 physical abuse and desertion it must be not a factor to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 message. However flirted with a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT.”

At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an enrollment controversy after a once 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, continued in the message to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”

Summers was previously a prominent figure in liberal circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a stalwart presence in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have remained about his association with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a broad child sex trafficking operation before his demise in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following disclosure of a previous tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a agent for Summers stated that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.

Democratic Party lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein was of the opinion Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Republican lawmakers issued a larger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers maintained amicable contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange taking place only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “participation and association” with Summers, among other influential Democratic figures and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – particularly 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.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein wrote in an exchange on 16 March. “disregard the 'daddy' comment, I'm going out with the motorcycle guy, you handled it well.. irritation indicates concern., no complaining demonstrated strength.”

Summers affirmed his remorse in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” 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 affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later concluded Epstein “lacked the educational background visiting fellows usually possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

Harvard only stopped accepting Epstein’s donations after he pleaded guilty to child sex offenses in 2008.

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

After Summers left the White House, he began requesting Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men met a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After media coverage about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.