Larry Summers, a former Treasury secretary under President Bill Clinton and the former president of Harvard University, said he's stepping back from public life after his apparent conversations with Jeffrey Epstein were released last week by the House Oversight Committee.
"I am deeply ashamed of my actions and recognize the pain they have caused. I take full responsibility for my misguided decision to continue communicating with Mr. Epstein," Summers said in a statement on Monday.
Summers is currently a member of Harvard's faculty, according to the Harvard Crimson.
"While continuing to fulfill my teaching obligations, I will be stepping back from public commitments as one part of my broader effort to rebuild trust and repair relationships with the people closest to me," he said.
It has been previously reported that Summers maintained a relationship with Epstein for many years, particularly during Summers’ term as president of Harvard from 2001 to 2006.
He flew at least four times on Epstein’s aircraft, according to flight records made public during litigation against Epstein, and he was the top official at Harvard during a time when the university received millions in gifts from Epstein.
All of those gifts were received prior to Epstein’s guilty plea in Florida in 2008 to charges of solicitation of prostitution with a minor, according to the university’s review of its Epstein connections....
No Epstein survivor has alleged wrongdoing by Summers and there is no public record evidence to suggest Summers was involved in any of Epstein’s crimes. However, the newly released emails suggest a closer bond between the two men than has been previously reported. [emphasis added]
The messages just made public include a number of exchanges about dating advice that appear to demonstrate a close relationship between the two that continued long after Epstein’s 2008 conviction in Florida, and lasted until at least a few months before Epstein's death in August 2019.
In one March 2019 email exchange, Epstein gives Summers advice, though the context is unclear and the woman involved is not named. “I said what are you up to. She said ‘I’m busy’. I said awfully coy u are,” Summers wrote to Epstein in the lengthy email. “Shes smart. –making you pay for past errors,” Epstein responded, in part.
Summers' error was keeping in contact with a convicted child molester and pimp. Whatever professional contacts Epstein could provide would seem irrelevant with Epstein's history.
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