Revealed Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Confidantes

Multiple exchanges between adjudicated offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers came to light this week, revealing the pair served as trusted allies.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging personal – and at times improper – opinions on political matters and interpersonal dynamics.

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

Back then, Harvard University was dealing with an acceptance controversy after a formerly incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a controversy after making sexist comments about women in academia, continued in the message to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of population.”

Summers was at one time a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main architects of Barack Obama’s handling to the economic downturn, and a steadfast figure in the liberal commentariat. But concerns have lingered about his association with Epstein, a former contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a broad exploitation operation before his demise in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a prior batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a agent for Summers stated that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.

Democratic lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein thought Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, Conservative lawmakers published a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The released materials show that Summers maintained friendly contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s detention.

Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “role and relationship” with Summers, among other prominent liberal leaders and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – particularly Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the particulars of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an anonymous woman, and being turned down.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein replied 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 sorrow in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he said. “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 contributed more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to carry out 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 not prepared to pursue”.

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

By then Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would eventually secure appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council 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 working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects connected 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-exploitation organizations.