Emails Reveal Larry Summers Sought Romantic Advice From Jeffrey Epstein

Before he gained the title of convicted sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein was a well-known financier who had relationships with some of the world’s most widely recognized figures — Donald Trump, Prince Andrew, and Bill Clinton, to name a few. When they were all mixing and mingling, it wasn’t a big deal. But after Epstein’s crimes and schemes came to light, it was, and still very much is.

In fact, anyone who has any affiliation with Epstein is getting put through the wringer for it, especially those who were close with him, like former Harvard University president Larry Summers. It has come to light that Summers and Epstein exchanged hundreds of emails and messages between 2013 and 2019, with the two still in contact just months before Epstein’s death in August 2019, per The Crimson.

So ... you’re probably wondering what these emails said, huh? Here's what we know.

Larry Summers isn’t just your average person. He was serving on OpenAI’s board up until mid-November 2025 when he resigned, and he’s also the Charles W. Eliot University Professor and President Emeritus of Harvard University. He served as both Bill Clinton’s Treasury Secretary and Barack Obama’s National Economic Council director.

So when a slew of emails was released by a House committee in November 2025, revealing he was pretty tight with Epstein, it was a big deal. The exchanges between the two included both business talk and some personal conversations here and there.

In one of the more controversial emails from 2019, Summers described to Epstein his situation with a woman he was apparently seeing, calling himself “a friend without benefits.”

Summers told Epstein that he had talked to the woman on the phone, but she said she would be busy. “Didn’t think I can talk tomorrow,” she told him. When he asked, “What are you up to?” her response was simply, “I’m busy.” Summers then told her “awfully coy u are” and asked, “Did u really rearrange the weekend we were going to be together because guy number 3 was coming?”

She denied it and told Summers that “his schedule changed.” Summers replied, “Ok I got to go, call me when u feel like it. Tone was not of good feeling,” then added in his message to Epstein, “I didn’t want to be in a gift-giving competition while being the friend without benefits.”

Epstein responded with some romantic advice, which seems to be what Summers was seeing, saying, “She’s smart. Making you pay for past errors. Ignore the 'daddy I’m going to go out with the motorcycle guy,' you reacted well… annoyed shows caring, no whining showed strength.”

In another email from November 2016, the conversation shifted to business, where Summers asked Epstein who he was being set up with and made it clear he didn’t want any ties to Trump. “Spend zero effort on anything about me w Trump,” he wrote. “Seeing his approach to conflict of interest, his Putin proximity, and his mindless response on Castro death I’m best off a million miles away,” Summers said.

Epstein replied, explaining he was meeting with Karim Wade, a former Senegalese minister who at the time was living in exile. Epstein described him as “well educated and one of the most important figures in West Africa.”

Summers has since said in a statement to The Crimson that his association with Epstein “was a major error of judgment.”

Larry Summers’s estimated net worth is $40 million, per Celebrity Net Worth, but since the release of the hundreds of emails between him and Epstein, there’s a good chance that figure will drop. Not only did he resign from the OpenAI board in November 2025, but Harvard has launched an investigation into the matter, which could impact his educational role at the university. The Crimson also wrote that Summers had either resigned or been let go from his roles at Bloomberg and The New York Times.