Uncovered Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Confidantes

Multiple messages between convicted offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers came to light this week, showing the pair were confidants.

Their correspondence, covering 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging intimate – and at times unseemly – perspectives on public affairs and interpersonal dynamics.

“I’m trying to determine why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by violence and abandonment it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by beating and desertion it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 communication. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS IDEA.”

During that period, Harvard University was grappling with an enrollment debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who resigned amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about women in academia, continued in the message to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”

Summers was at one time a prominent figure in Democratic circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main architects of Barack Obama’s response to the economic downturn, and a committed presence in the left-leaning punditry. But questions have persisted about his relationship with Epstein, a long-standing associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a wide-ranging sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a previous tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a representative for Summers said that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Left-leaning lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein was of the opinion Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, GOP lawmakers issued a more extensive tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers kept up friendly 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 stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and association” with Summers, among other well-known liberal leaders and corporate executives.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – especially Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the aspects of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unnamed woman, and being rejected.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein responded 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. “There are many things I regret 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 contributed 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 suggested a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.

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

By then Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would ultimately 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 asking Epstein for non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After media coverage about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.