Disclosed Communications Illustrate Epstein and Summers as Confidantes

Multiple communications between found guilty child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair acted as confidants.

These exchanges, covering 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging intimate – and at times improper – opinions on politics and relationships.

I'm struggling to understand why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by violence and neglect it must be irrelevant 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 kill your baby by beating and desertion it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 communication. Yet made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS IDEA.”

Back then, Harvard University was wrestling with an admissions debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who stepped down amid a scandal after making gender-biased comments about women scholars, added in the message to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of society.”

Summers was at one time a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s response to the market collapse, and a stalwart figure in the liberal commentariat. But concerns have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging child sex trafficking operation before his demise in prison in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a previous set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a representative for Summers commented that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Democratic lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein was of the opinion Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Republican 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 final email exchange taking place only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and relationship” with Summers, among other well-known liberal leaders and corporate executives.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – notably Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the details of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unidentified woman, and being rebuffed.

“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 affirmed his regret in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he said. “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 gave more than $9m to Harvard and its associated 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 usually possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

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

At that point Obama’s star was rising. Summers would ultimately receive appointment as director of the White House NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers exited the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

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