Revealed Exchanges Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Confidantes

Numerous messages between convicted offender Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers came to light this week, indicating the pair acted as confidants.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, demonstrate the two men exchanging personal – and at times improper – opinions on public affairs and personal connections.

“I’m trying to understand why [the] American elite think if u kill your baby by beating and abandonment it must be not a factor to your entry to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} understand why [the] American elite believe if u murder your baby by physical abuse and desertion it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 communication. “But flirted with a few women 10 years ago and cannot work at a network or think tank. KEEP CONFIDENTIAL THIS OBSERVATION.”

Back then, Harvard University was grappling with an admissions controversy after a previously incarcerated woman’s acceptance to a PhD program. Summers, a one-time president of the university who stepped down amid a controversy after making discriminatory comments about female academics, continued in the correspondence to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without stating they are more than 51 percent of society.”

Summers was previously a leading light in Democratic circles – a former treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the primary designers of Barack Obama’s approach to the market collapse, and a stalwart figure in the liberal commentariat. But doubts have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a long-standing connection of Donald Trump. Epstein was accused of a wide-ranging sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following the release of a earlier tranche of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 piece, a agent for Summers said that he “is very sorry for being in contact with Epstein after his conviction”.

Democratic Party lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that indicate Epstein believed Trump was had knowledge of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, GOP lawmakers issued a larger batch 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 taking place only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

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

In the emails, Summers and Epstein talk about politics – especially Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the details of charitable social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unnamed woman, and being rejected.

“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein replied 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 reiterated his remorse 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 named a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later concluded Epstein “was missing the educational background visiting fellows normally possess and his application proposed a course of study Epstein was not prepared to pursue”.

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

By then Obama’s career was advancing. Summers would eventually secure 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 charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor developing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made charitable contributions to projects linked 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 surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “above and beyond” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.