Uncovered Emails Show Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Trusted Friends

Multiple communications between adjudicated offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US treasury head Larry Summers have emerged this week, showing the pair were confidants.

The messages, dating from 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men exchanging personal – and at times unseemly – opinions on politics and interpersonal dynamics.

I am attempting to figure why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite think if u kill your baby by violence and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 communication. “But flirted with a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS INSIGHT.”

During that period, Harvard University was dealing with an acceptance controversy after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who lost his position amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about female academics, continued in the email to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of society.”

Summers was previously a leading light in liberal circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key architects of Barack Obama’s approach to the financial crisis, and a committed figure in the progressive media. But questions have persisted about his relationship with Epstein, a former contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging exploitation operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a previous set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a agent for Summers commented that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.

Democratic Party lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein believed Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Conservative lawmakers published a larger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers continued amicable contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “role and connection” with Summers, among other prominent Democratic figures and industry figures.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – notably Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the particulars of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unidentified woman, and being rebuffed.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” 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. “There are many things I regret 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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later found Epstein “lacked the scholarly credentials visiting fellows usually possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.

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

At that point Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would ultimately 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 charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a dozen 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 anti-exploitation organizations.