Disclosed Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Confidantes

Multiple communications between convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers were released this week, showing the pair acted as confidants.

The messages, spanning 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men sharing intimate – and at times unseemly – perspectives on public affairs and relationships.

I am attempting to figure why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite feel if u kill your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet flirted with a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS OBSERVATION.”

During that period, Harvard University was dealing with an admissions controversy after a previously incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who resigned amid a uproar after making discriminatory comments about women in academia, went on to say in the email 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 at one time a prominent figure in liberal circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key designers of Barack Obama’s handling to the market collapse, and a committed figure in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have persisted about his association with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a wide-ranging sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a previous batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a representative for Summers commented that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Left-leaning lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein was of the opinion Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Republican lawmakers issued a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers continued congenial contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

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

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – notably Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the aspects of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unnamed woman, and being rebuffed.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein responded 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 reiterated his sorrow in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he said. “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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later determined Epstein “was missing the educational background visiting fellows typically possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.

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

By that time Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would ultimately win appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers left the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

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