Uncovered Communications Illustrate Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends

A series of messages between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers were released this week, showing the pair acted as confidants.

Their correspondence, covering 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging personal – and at times improper – perspectives on politics and personal connections.

“I’m trying to figure why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by beating and desertion it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by beating and desertion it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 communication. However flirted with a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS IDEA.”

Back then, Harvard University was grappling with an admissions discussion after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who stepped down amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about women in academia, continued in the email to Epstein: I pointed out 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 at one time 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 response to the market collapse, and a steadfast figure in the liberal commentariat. But concerns have persisted about his association with Epstein, a long-standing contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a broad sex trafficking of minors operation before his demise in prison in 2019 in New York City.

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

Democratic lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein believed Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Conservative lawmakers released a larger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers continued amicable contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s detention.

Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “role and connection” with Summers, among other influential Democrats and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – particularly Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the particulars of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unnamed woman, and being rejected.

“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 remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he said. “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 appointed a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “was missing the scholarly credentials visiting fellows typically possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.

Harvard only stopped 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 NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers departed the White House, he began asking Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After reporting about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.