Disclosed Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends
A series of communications between found guilty sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair served as trusted allies.
These exchanges, dating from 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men exchanging private – and at times unseemly – perspectives on politics and relationships.
“I’m trying to figure why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by beating and neglect it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by violence and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 email. “But made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT.”
Back then, Harvard University was wrestling with an admissions debate after a previously incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making discriminatory comments about female academics, went on to say in the email to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was previously a prominent figure in the Democratic Party circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key designers of Barack Obama’s handling to the economic downturn, and a committed voice in the progressive media. But questions have persisted about his relationship with Epstein, a former connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a broad child sex trafficking operation before his passing in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a representative for Summers said that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.
Democratic Party 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 more extensive collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The documents show that Summers maintained friendly contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s detention.
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 prominent Democrats and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – especially Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the aspects of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unnamed woman, and being turned down.
“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein responded in an exchange on 16 March. “ignore the daddy im going to go out with the motorcycle guy, you reacted well.. annoyed shows caring., no whining showed strentgh.”
Summers reiterated his sorrow in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” 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 named a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later concluded Epstein “was missing the scholarly credentials visiting fellows typically possess and his application suggested 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.
By then Obama’s star was rising. 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 requesting Epstein for non-profit 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 multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After media coverage about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.
