Revealed Communications Illustrate Epstein and Summers as Confidantes

Numerous messages between convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers came to light this week, revealing the pair served as confidants.

The messages, dating from 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men exchanging private – and at times questionable – views on political matters and personal connections.

I am attempting to figure why [the] American elite feel if u take the life of your baby by physical abuse and abandonment 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 kill your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be unimportant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers wrote to Epstein in a 2017 email. Yet made advances toward a few women 10 years ago and are unable to work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL 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 one-time president of the university who stepped down amid a uproar after making gender-biased comments about female academics, went on to say in the message to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of population.”

Summers was previously a prominent figure in liberal circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main engineers of Barack Obama’s handling to the financial crisis, and a stalwart presence in the progressive media. But doubts have remained about his association with Epstein, a longtime associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was charged with a broad sex trafficking of minors operation before his death in jail in 2019 in New York City.

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

Democratic Party lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein believed Trump was knew about conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, GOP lawmakers published a larger collection of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The documents show that Summers continued friendly contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange occurring only months before Epstein’s arrest.

Trump stated on Truth Social on Friday that he would be asking the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate Epstein’s “participation and connection” with Summers, among other prominent Democrats and business leaders.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – especially Summers’s disdain for Trump – as well as the details of non-profit social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his advances toward an unidentified woman, and being rejected.

“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein replied in an exchange on 16 March. “disregard the 'daddy' comment, I'm going out with the motorcycle guy, you handled it well.. irritation indicates concern., no complaining demonstrated strength.”

Summers restated his sorrow in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he commented. “As previously stated, my connection to Jeffrey Epstein represented a serious lapse in judgment.”

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 designated a visiting fellow to perform research. The university later determined Epstein “was missing the academic qualifications visiting fellows normally possess and his application proposed 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 then Obama’s star was rising. Summers would ultimately win appointment as director of the White House economic advisory body from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers left the White House, he began asking Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made philanthropic donations to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men got together a dozen 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-exploitation organizations.