Revealed Emails Show Epstein and Summers as Confidantes
Multiple exchanges between found guilty sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers have emerged this week, showing the pair acted as close contacts.
The messages, covering 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging private – and at times questionable – perspectives on politics and personal connections.
“I’m trying to figure why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be irrelevant to your acceptance 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 physical abuse and neglect it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 communication. Yet flirted with a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS IDEA.”
At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an acceptance debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who resigned amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about women in academia, continued in the message to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was previously a key player in liberal circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main architects of Barack Obama’s approach to the financial crisis, and a steadfast figure in the liberal commentariat. But questions have remained about his connection with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a extensive sex trafficking of minors operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a previous tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a spokesperson for Summers commented that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.
Democratic lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein believed Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers issued a larger batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the adjudicated 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 look into Epstein’s “participation and connection” with Summers, among other influential Democratic figures and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – particularly Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the aspects of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an anonymous woman, and being turned down.
“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 reiterated his sorrow in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he commented. “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 gave more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “did not have the scholarly credentials visiting fellows usually possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.
Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.
At that point Obama’s star was rising. Summers would eventually receive appointment as director of the White House NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers left the White House, he began requesting 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 associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After reporting about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.
