Revealed Communications Illustrate Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends

A series of communications between found guilty sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and former US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair acted as close contacts.

These exchanges, dating from 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men discussing private – and at times improper – perspectives on political matters and relationships.

I am attempting to understand why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by beating 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 feel if u take the life of your baby by violence and neglect it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 message. “But hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS IDEA.”

During that period, Harvard University was grappling with an acceptance controversy after a once incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who stepped down amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about women scholars, went on to say in the correspondence to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”

Summers was once a prominent figure in Democratic circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the market collapse, and a steadfast voice in the liberal commentariat. But concerns have lingered about his connection with Epstein, a longtime connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a extensive sex trafficking of minors operation before his death in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a prior tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a spokesperson 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 indicate Epstein was of the opinion Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Republican lawmakers published a larger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last 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 “role and relationship” with Summers, among other influential Democrats and business leaders.

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

“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein replied 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 restated his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he wrote. “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 gave more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “did not have the educational background visiting fellows typically possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.

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

At that point Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would later 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 non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After reporting about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.