Larry Summers, who served as both former U.S. Treasury Secretary and a past president of Harvard University, is withdrawing from public life amidst the repercussions of his association with the late convicted sex offender .
In an announcement shared with The Harvard Crimson and other news organizations on Monday night, Summers stated his retreat is to “rebuild trust and mend relationships with the individuals closest” to him.
Last week, the House Oversight Committee released 20,000 documents pertaining to Epstein’s estate, which included records of emails exchanged between Summers and the disgraced financier. Most damming was the chronological sequence, which indicated Summers maintained their acquaintance long after Epstein’s initial conviction for sex crimes in 2008.
“I am profoundly ashamed of my conduct and acknowledge the suffering it has inflicted. I accept full responsibility for my ill-advised choice to maintain communication with Mr. Epstein,” he declared on Monday, having earlier referred to the correspondence as a “significant error in judgment.”
Summers, a Democrat, held the position of Treasury Secretary from 1999 to 2001 under former President Bill Clinton. He then served as Harvard president from 2001 to 2006, resigning amid various public disputes, including his contentious remarks suggesting men might genetically outperform women in the sciences. He continues his role as a professor at Harvard and has stated he will fulfill his teaching duties.
TIME has sought further comment from Summers.
The emails at the core of the media controversy reveal that Summers sustained amicable communications with Epstein until as late as , just months before Epstein died in a New York jail cell, where he was once again in custody awaiting trial on federal charges for the sex trafficking of minors. Summers was also observed with Epstein in the days prior to his re-arrest.
In addition to discussions concerning President Donald Trump, the pair also appeared to converse about women in a derogatory fashion throughout their correspondence.
from October 2017, Summers noted: “I observed that half of the IQ In world was possessed by women without mentioning they are more than 51% of [the] population.”
In the same communication, Summers seemed to voice complaints about men being held accountable for their past actions toward women.
“I’m attempting to comprehend why the American elite believes that if you murder your infant through abuse and desertion, it’s considered irrelevant to your Harvard admission, yet if you harassed a few women a decade ago, you can’t be employed at a network or think tank,” he is quoted as stating, alongside the admonition: “DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT.”
In another series of emails, dated July 16, 2018, Summers and Epstein appear to discuss a joint held by President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“Do the Russians possess compromising information on Trump? Today was dreadful, even by his benchmarks,” Summers queried. Epstein replied: “Not to my knowledge. I would be skeptical. He was entirely foreseeable!” The men then arranged a future phone conversation.
Trump alluded to the correspondence between Epstein and Summers aboard Air Force One on November 14, but refrained from detailing the specific content revealed in the emails.
The President has fielded numerous questions regarding the three , which indicated Epstein alleging that Trump “was aware of the girls” and “spent hours” at Epstein’s residence with one of them. Trump has consistently—and vehemently—disputed any prior awareness of Epstein’s activities.
When questioned about himself and the precise meaning of Epstein’s statement, “knew about the girls,” Trump informed reporters: “I have no knowledge of that.” He proceeded to mention other prominent individuals known to have had connections with Epstein. Trump remarked, “It’s truly about what he meant when he dedicated so much time with [former President] Bill Clinton, with the president of Harvard… Larry Summers, or whatever his name is.”
(Clinton, having admitted to a past association with Epstein, has forcefully denied any knowledge of his offenses and.)
Regarding Summers, his withdrawal from public engagement follows substantial criticism prompted by the recently disclosed Epstein emails.
Before his public declaration, Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who was also a Harvard professor, called on the Ivy League institution in her state to discontinue its association with the former Treasury Secretary.
“For many decades, Larry Summers has shown an inclination towards assisting the affluent and influential, but his readiness to align himself with a convicted sex offender displays extraordinarily poor judgment,” Warren informed TIME through an emailed statement on Tuesday.
“If he possessed such minimal capacity to disassociate himself from Jeffrey Epstein, even after all public knowledge concerning Epstein’s sexual offenses involving underage girls, then Summers is not fit to counsel our nation’s politicians, policymakers, and institutions—nor to instruct a generation of students at Harvard or elsewhere.”
