Disclosed Communications Depict Epstein and Summers as Confidantes

A series of messages between convicted offender Jeffrey Epstein and former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers have emerged this week, indicating the pair acted as close contacts.

Their correspondence, dating from 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men discussing intimate – and at times improper – views on politics and interpersonal dynamics.

I'm struggling to figure why [the] American elite think if u take the life of your baby by violence and neglect it must be unimportant to your admission to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} figure why [the] American elite think if u murder your baby by physical abuse and abandonment it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers stated 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 OBSERVATION.”

At that time, Harvard University was dealing with an enrollment debate after a formerly incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who lost his position amid a controversy after making sexist 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 at one time a prominent figure in the Democratic Party circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main designers of Barack Obama’s approach to the market collapse, and a committed presence in the left-leaning punditry. But concerns have lingered about his association with Epstein, a long-standing associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a broad exploitation operation before his passing in jail in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a earlier set 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 guilty verdict”.

Democratic 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 reply, GOP lawmakers published a more extensive tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

These records show that Summers continued amicable contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange taking place only months before Epstein’s detention.

Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be instructing the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “involvement and association” with Summers, among other well-known Democratic figures and industry figures.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – especially Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the particulars of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his romantic gestures toward an anonymous woman, and being rebuffed.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein wrote 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 reiterated his regret in a recent statement. “There are many things I regret in my life,” 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 related programs between 1998 and 2008, and was named a visiting fellow to carry out research. The university later found Epstein “did not have the educational background visiting fellows typically possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

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

By then Obama’s star was rising. Summers would eventually receive appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers departed the White House, he began requesting Epstein for philanthropic advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men met a dozen times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After media coverage about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “more than” of that received to anti-sex-trafficking organizations.