Revealed Exchanges Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Larry Summers as Close Associates

Multiple messages between convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair were close contacts.

The messages, covering 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging intimate – and at times improper – perspectives on public affairs and interpersonal dynamics.

“I’m trying to understand why [the] American elite feel if u murder your baby by beating and neglect it must be not a factor to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling 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 acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 email. “But flirted with a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS OBSERVATION.”

At that time, Harvard University was wrestling with an acceptance discussion 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 gender-biased comments about women in academia, continued in the message to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”

Summers was once a leading light in liberal circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main architects of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a committed figure in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have lingered about his connection with Epstein, a long-standing contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a extensive sex trafficking of minors operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.

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

Democratic lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein thought Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Republican lawmakers issued a much bigger batch of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers maintained friendly contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “participation and association” with Summers, among other influential Democrats and industry figures.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – particularly 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 anonymous woman, and being rebuffed.

“she's intelligent. holding you accountable for past mistakes,” Epstein responded 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 regret in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” he commented. “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 contributed more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later determined Epstein “lacked the educational background visiting fellows typically possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.

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

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

After Summers left the White House, he began asking Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects linked 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 came out, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.