Disclosed Exchanges Depict Epstein and Summers as Close Associates

Numerous exchanges between adjudicated sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair were trusted allies.

The messages, spanning 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men discussing intimate – and at times unseemly – views on political matters and relationships.

“I’m trying to figure why [the] American elite feel if u kill your baby by violence and desertion it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be not a factor to your admission to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT.”

At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an admissions discussion after a once incarcerated woman’s enrollment to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making sexist comments about women in academia, added in the email to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was possessed by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”

Summers was at one time a key player in Democratic circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key architects of Barack Obama’s approach to the market collapse, and a committed presence in the left-leaning punditry. But doubts have lingered about his association with Epstein, a long-standing associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a broad child sex trafficking operation before his demise in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a agent for Summers commented that he “deeply regrets 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 aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Conservative lawmakers issued a more extensive collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s arrest.

Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “involvement and relationship” with Summers, among other influential Democratic figures and corporate executives.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – notably Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the aspects of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an anonymous woman, and being rejected.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein responded 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 reiterated his regret in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he wrote. “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 donated more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later found Epstein “did not have the educational background visiting fellows usually possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

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

At that point Obama’s star was rising. Summers would later secure appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council 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 philanthropic donations to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After news about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.