Uncovered Emails Show Epstein and Summers as Close Associates

A series of communications between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers came to light this week, indicating the pair served as trusted allies.

Their correspondence, covering 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men sharing intimate – and at times questionable – views on public affairs and personal connections.

I'm struggling to figure why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite think if u kill your baby by beating and neglect it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 message. However hit on a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS IDEA.”

During that period, Harvard University was wrestling with an acceptance controversy after a previously incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a controversy after making gender-biased comments about female academics, added in the message to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of society.”

Summers was once a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key architects of Barack Obama’s response to the financial crisis, and a stalwart presence in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have lingered about his connection with Epstein, a former associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a broad child sex trafficking operation before his death in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a earlier set 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 disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein was of the opinion Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers released a much bigger batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

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

Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “involvement and association” with Summers, among other well-known Democrats and industry figures.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – notably Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the aspects of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unnamed woman, and being rejected.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein wrote 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 restated his sorrow in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he wrote. “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 affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later found Epstein “lacked the scholarly credentials visiting fellows usually possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

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

By that time Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would later secure appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers left the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men met 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-sex-trafficking organizations.