Revealed Communications Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends

A series of exchanges between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US finance chief Larry Summers came to light this week, revealing the pair were trusted allies.

The messages, covering 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men discussing personal – and at times questionable – perspectives on politics and personal connections.

I am attempting to determine why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by violence and desertion it must be irrelevant to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite believe if u take the life of your baby by violence and abandonment it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 email. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS IDEA.”

At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an enrollment controversy after a previously incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who stepped down amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about female academics, added 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 society.”

Summers was once a leading light in Democratic circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a steadfast voice in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a long-standing associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a broad sex trafficking of minors operation before his demise in custody in 2019 in New York City.

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

Democratic Party lawmakers released emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, Conservative lawmakers released a larger batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

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

Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “role and connection” with Summers, among other influential liberal leaders and business leaders.

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 advances toward an unnamed woman, and being rebuffed.

“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein wrote 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 affirmed his remorse in a recent statement. “I have great regrets in my life,” he said. “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 designated a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “was missing the educational background visiting fellows normally possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

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

By that time Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would ultimately win appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers left the White House, he began requesting Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor working on a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

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