Disclosed Exchanges Show Epstein and Summers as Confidantes
Numerous exchanges between adjudicated sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US treasury head Larry Summers have emerged this week, revealing the pair were confidants.
Their correspondence, dating from 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men discussing private – and at times improper – opinions on politics and personal connections.
I am attempting to determine why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by beating and desertion 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 beating and abandonment it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 email. However flirted with a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT.”
Back then, Harvard University was dealing with an admissions controversy after a previously 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, added in the message to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was previously a prominent figure in Democratic circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s approach to the financial crisis, and a stalwart figure in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a wide-ranging exploitation operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following the release of a earlier set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a representative for Summers commented that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.
Left-leaning lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein was of the opinion Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Republican lawmakers released a more extensive tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The documents show that Summers kept up friendly contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s detention.
Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “role and connection” with Summers, among other well-known Democratic figures and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – notably Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the aspects of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unnamed woman, and being turned down.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” 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 reiterated his sorrow in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he wrote. “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 gave more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later determined Epstein “was missing 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.
At that point Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would later receive appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers exited the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After news about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.
