Revealed Exchanges Show Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Confidantes
Numerous messages between convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers came to light this week, showing the pair acted as confidants.
The messages, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging private – and at times unseemly – perspectives on political matters and relationships.
“I’m trying to understand why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by physical abuse 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 believe if u kill your baby by beating and desertion it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 communication. Yet flirted with a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS INSIGHT.”
During that period, Harvard University was wrestling with an enrollment discussion after a previously incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who lost his position amid a scandal after making sexist comments about female academics, added in the email to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”
Summers was at one time a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key architects of Barack Obama’s approach to the market collapse, and a stalwart figure in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have persisted about his connection with Epstein, a longtime contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a wide-ranging exploitation operation before his death in custody in 2019 in New York City.
Following disclosure of a previous set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a spokesperson for Summers said that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.
Democratic Party lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein thought Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Conservative lawmakers released a more extensive collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.
These records show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the most recent email exchange taking place only months before Epstein’s arrest.
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and connection” with Summers, among other well-known Democratic figures and business leaders.
In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – especially Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the details of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an anonymous woman, and being turned down.
“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” 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 restated his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he wrote. “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 related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later concluded Epstein “lacked the academic qualifications visiting fellows normally possess and his application proposed 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 then Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would eventually secure appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.
After Summers departed the White House, he began soliciting Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men met a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.
After reporting about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.
