Disclosed Communications Show Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Close Associates

Numerous messages between adjudicated child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US treasury head Larry Summers have emerged this week, showing the pair were confidants.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging private – and at times questionable – perspectives on public affairs and interpersonal dynamics.

I'm struggling to understand why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by beating and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by beating and abandonment it must be not a factor to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 communication. However made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS IDEA.”

At that time, Harvard University was grappling with an admissions controversy after a once incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who stepped down amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about female academics, added in the email to Epstein: I noted 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 key player in liberal circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main architects of Barack Obama’s handling to the market collapse, and a steadfast figure in the liberal commentariat. But concerns have remained about his relationship with Epstein, a former contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a extensive sex trafficking of minors operation before his death in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a prior tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 article, a agent for Summers commented that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.

Democratic lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that imply Epstein believed Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, GOP lawmakers released a much bigger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The released materials show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the found guilty child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the final email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

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

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – notably Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the details of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, confided in Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an anonymous woman, and being rebuffed.

“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein replied in an exchange on 16 March. “overlook the 'daddy' remark, I'm dating the motorcycle guy, you responded appropriately.. frustration signals affection., no protests revealed fortitude.”

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 gave 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 “did not have the academic qualifications visiting fellows typically possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.

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

By then Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would ultimately win 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 charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects connected 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 “above and beyond” of that received to anti-exploitation organizations.