Revealed Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends
A series of exchanges between adjudicated offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, revealing the pair served as confidants.
The messages, dating from 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men discussing private – and at times questionable – perspectives on politics and personal connections.
I am attempting to understand why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by physical abuse 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 feel if u kill your baby by violence and desertion it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 email. “But flirted with a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS INSIGHT.”
At that time, Harvard University was wrestling with an enrollment controversy after a once incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who resigned amid a uproar after making discriminatory comments about women in academia, continued in the email to Epstein: “I observed 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 once a key player in Democratic circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s approach to the market collapse, and a stalwart presence in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have remained about his connection with Epstein, a long-standing contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a extensive child sex trafficking operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.
Following the release of a earlier 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 legal finding”.
Democratic Party lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein was of the opinion Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Conservative lawmakers published a much bigger batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers maintained friendly contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “role and association” with Summers, among other prominent Democratic figures and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – especially Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the particulars of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with 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. “I have great regrets in my life,” he commented. “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 related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later concluded Epstein “was missing the academic qualifications visiting fellows normally possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.
Harvard only ceased accepting Epstein’s donations after he pleaded guilty to child sex offenses in 2008.
By that time Obama’s profile was growing. 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 charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a twelve 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.
