Disclosed Exchanges Depict Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends

Multiple exchanges between found guilty child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers have emerged this week, indicating the pair served as trusted allies.

Their correspondence, covering 2013 to early 2019, show the two men exchanging personal – and at times unseemly – perspectives on political matters and relationships.

I'm struggling to figure why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite feel if u murder your baby by beating and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers emailed 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. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS OBSERVATION.”

During that period, Harvard University was dealing with an enrollment controversy after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a ex- president of the university who stepped down amid a uproar after making discriminatory comments about female academics, added in the correspondence to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of society.”

Summers was at one time a key player in liberal circles – a ex- treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s approach to the economic downturn, and a steadfast presence in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have lingered about his connection with Epstein, a long-standing contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a broad child sex trafficking operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a earlier batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a representative for Summers stated that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.

Left-leaning lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein thought Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In retaliation, GOP lawmakers issued a much bigger 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 final email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.

Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “involvement and connection” with Summers, among other well-known liberal leaders and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – particularly Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the particulars of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an unidentified woman, and being turned down.

“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 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 contributed more than $9m to Harvard and its related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later determined Epstein “lacked the scholarly credentials visiting fellows usually possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

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

By that time Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would ultimately 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 soliciting 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 associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a twelve times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After reporting about Epstein’s donations came out, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.