Uncovered Communications Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Confidantes
Numerous messages between convicted offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US treasury head Larry Summers came to light this week, indicating the pair acted as confidants.
These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men sharing personal – and at times questionable – views on political matters and interpersonal dynamics.
I'm struggling to determine why [the] American elite feel if u murder your baby by violence and abandonment it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 communication. “But hit on a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS IDEA.”
At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an acceptance discussion after a previously incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a scandal after making gender-biased comments about female academics, went on to say in the message to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of population.”
Summers was previously a key player in the Democratic Party circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the market collapse, and a stalwart figure in the left-leaning punditry. But doubts have persisted about his relationship with Epstein, a longtime connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a wide-ranging child sex trafficking operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.
Following publication of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a agent for Summers stated that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.
Democratic lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein was of the opinion Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, Republican lawmakers issued a more extensive collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers maintained friendly contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “role and association” with Summers, among other prominent Democrats and corporate executives.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – especially Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the particulars of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an unnamed woman, and being rebuffed.
“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein replied 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 affirmed his regret in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he said. “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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later concluded Epstein “did not have the educational background visiting fellows normally possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.
Harvard only stopped accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.
By that time Obama’s star was rising. Summers would ultimately win 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 non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After reporting about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.
