Uncovered Emails Illustrate Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends

Multiple messages between found guilty offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers have emerged this week, showing the pair were close contacts.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men discussing personal – and at times questionable – views on public affairs and personal connections.

I'm struggling to determine why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by beating and desertion it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 message. However hit on a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS IDEA.”

Back then, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment discussion after a previously incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about female academics, added in the message to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without mentioning 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 engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a stalwart voice in the liberal commentariat. But questions have persisted about his connection with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a wide-ranging exploitation operation before his death in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a previous set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a spokesperson for Summers stated that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.

Left-leaning lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers published a larger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers maintained amicable contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.

Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and connection” with Summers, among other prominent Democrats and industry figures.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – especially Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the aspects of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an unidentified woman, and being rejected.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” 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 affirmed his sorrow in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” 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 designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later concluded Epstein “was missing the academic qualifications visiting fellows usually possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.

At that point Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would eventually win appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers exited the White House, he began asking Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

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