Uncovered Emails Illustrate Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends

Multiple communications between found guilty offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US finance chief Larry Summers have emerged this week, showing the pair acted as trusted allies.

The messages, dating from 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging personal – and at times questionable – views on politics and relationships.

I'm struggling to determine why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by violence and desertion it must be not a factor to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and neglect it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 communication. “But flirted with a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS INSIGHT.”

At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an acceptance debate after a previously incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who resigned amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about women scholars, added in the email 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 the populace.”

Summers was at one time a prominent figure in Democratic circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key designers of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a stalwart presence in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have remained about his association with Epstein, a long-standing connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging child sex trafficking operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a previous tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a representative for Summers said that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Democratic lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein thought Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, Republican lawmakers published a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The released materials show that Summers continued congenial contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange taking place only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump wrote 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 prominent liberal leaders and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – especially Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the details of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unnamed woman, and being rebuffed.

“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein wrote in an exchange on 16 March. “overlook the 'daddy' remark, I'm dating the motorcycle guy, you responded appropriately.. frustration signals affection., no protests revealed fortitude.”

Summers reiterated his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he commented. “As I have said before, my association with Jeffrey Epstein was a major error of judgement.”

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 designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later concluded Epstein “was missing the academic qualifications visiting fellows typically possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

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

By then Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would later receive appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers exited the White House, he began asking Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on 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 news about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.