Uncovered Emails Show Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends
A series of communications between adjudicated sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US finance chief Larry Summers have emerged this week, revealing the pair were trusted allies.
Their correspondence, dating from 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging personal – and at times improper – views on public affairs and personal connections.
I'm struggling to figure why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be not a factor to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite believe if u murder your baby by beating and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 email. However hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS IDEA.”
During that period, Harvard University was wrestling with an admissions debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who resigned amid a scandal after making sexist comments about women scholars, continued in the email to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was once a leading light in Democratic circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the primary designers of Barack Obama’s handling to the economic downturn, and a stalwart figure in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have remained about his association with Epstein, a longtime contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a broad sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a earlier tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a representative for Summers commented that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.
Democratic lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein thought Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, GOP lawmakers released a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
The released materials show that Summers kept up friendly contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s apprehension.
Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and connection” with Summers, among other prominent Democratic figures and business leaders.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – particularly Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the particulars of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an anonymous woman, and being rebuffed.
“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 affirmed his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he commented. “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 affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later determined Epstein “was missing the scholarly credentials visiting fellows usually possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.
Harvard only ceased accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.
By that time Obama’s star was rising. Summers would eventually receive appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers exited the White House, he began asking Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After reporting about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.
