Disclosed Communications Depict Epstein and Summers as Close Associates

Numerous communications between adjudicated sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and one-time US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, indicating the pair acted as confidants.

The messages, dating from 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men discussing intimate – and at times improper – views on politics and personal connections.

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

At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an acceptance debate after a previously incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who lost his position amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about women scholars, continued in the correspondence to Epstein: I pointed out that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of population.”

Summers was previously a key player in the Democratic Party circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the key designers of Barack Obama’s handling to the economic downturn, and a committed presence in the liberal commentariat. But concerns have persisted about his relationship with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a wide-ranging child sex trafficking operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following publication of a prior batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a agent for Summers stated that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his legal finding”.

Democratic Party lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein was of the opinion Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In response, GOP lawmakers issued a more extensive tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers kept up congenial contact with the adjudicated child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to look into Epstein’s “participation and association” with Summers, among other prominent Democratic figures and corporate executives.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein converse on politics – particularly Summers’s contempt for Trump – as well as the particulars of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an unidentified woman, and being rejected.

“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein wrote 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. “I have great regrets in my life,” he wrote. “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 contributed more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later found Epstein “was missing the educational background visiting fellows normally possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.

Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he pleaded guilty 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 NEC from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers exited the White House, he began asking Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects linked to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After media coverage about Epstein’s donations emerged, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.