Uncovered Exchanges Show Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Close Associates

A series of communications between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair served as close contacts.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men sharing personal – and at times questionable – views on political matters and personal connections.

“I’m trying to determine why [the] American elite believe if u murder 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} figure why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by violence and neglect it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS INSIGHT.”

At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment discussion after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who lost his position amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about women scholars, continued in the correspondence to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”

Summers was once a key player in liberal circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key engineers of Barack Obama’s approach to the financial crisis, and a stalwart figure in the left-leaning punditry. But questions have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a former connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging exploitation operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a prior batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a spokesperson for Summers commented that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Democratic lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein was of the opinion Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, GOP lawmakers released a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The released materials show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

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

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – particularly Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the details of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an anonymous 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 restated his sorrow in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he wrote. “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 related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later found Epstein “lacked the academic qualifications visiting fellows typically possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.

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

By then Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would later secure appointment as director of the White House NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers departed the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

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