Uncovered Exchanges Depict Epstein and Summers as Confidantes

A series of exchanges between convicted offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US finance chief Larry Summers were released this week, showing the pair were close contacts.

These exchanges, covering 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging intimate – and at times improper – opinions on political matters and interpersonal dynamics.

I'm struggling to determine why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your acceptance 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 unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers emailed to Epstein in a 2017 communication. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. DO NOT SHARE THIS INSIGHT.”

Back then, Harvard University was wrestling with an admissions discussion after a formerly incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who resigned amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about women in academia, continued in the email to Epstein: I noted that half of the IQ in [the] world was held by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of society.”

Summers was once a leading light in the Democratic Party circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main designers of Barack Obama’s response to the market collapse, and a stalwart presence in the left-leaning punditry. But doubts have remained about his association with Epstein, a longtime contact of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a wide-ranging sex trafficking of minors operation before his death in prison in 2019 in New York City.

Following disclosure of a earlier set of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a agent for Summers stated that he “deeply regrets being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Left-leaning lawmakers disclosed emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein believed Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Republican lawmakers issued a larger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers maintained amicable contact with the convicted 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 instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and connection” with Summers, among other influential Democrats and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – notably Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the particulars of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, disclosed to Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unnamed woman, and being rejected.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein responded 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 affirmed his remorse in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” 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 gave more than $9m to Harvard and its associated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later concluded Epstein “did not have the academic qualifications visiting fellows typically possess and his application suggested a course of study Epstein was ill-equipped to pursue”.

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

At that point Obama’s profile was growing. Summers would eventually 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 non-profit advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects connected to Summers’s wife, and the two men met a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

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