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Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer; Photos: House Oversight Committee, Getty Images

The House Oversight Committee’s release of a swath of new documents from the Jeffrey Epstein estate forced several prominent figures uncomfortably in the spotlight. The 20,000 pages, new to the public, included thousands of emails between the disgraced financier and notable names spanning the globe including investor Peter Thiel and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor of the British royal family whose connections to Epstein would later result in the revocation of his official titles. But nobody is having a worse time than Larry Summers, the former U.S. Treasury secretary, whose friendship and correspondence with Epstein have come under intense scrutiny and prompted a fierce backlash forcing the long-revered economist to retreat from public life.

Summers announced on Wednesday he was resigning from his position on OpenAI’s board of directors. The Associated Press reports that Summers has withdrawn from the advisory board for The Budget Lab at Yale and is no longer a senior fellow for the Center for American Progress, a progressive think tank. Summers was even booted from his gig writing for the New York Times’ opinion section with a paper spokesman saying Summer’s one-year contract that began in January would not be renewed. And the loss of these roles might just be the beginning of the fallout for Summers.

Harvard University confirmed on Tuesday that it would be conducting an investigation into Summers, a former president of the university, and his ties to Epstein, according to the Harvard Crimson. The news comes following reporting from the Crimson that Summers sought romantic advice from Epstein as he attempted to pursue a woman he described as his “mentee.” The pair exchanged emails and text messages from 2018 to ’19 with Epstein referring to himself at one point as Summers’s “wing man.” Summers and Epstein continued to communicate up until the day before Epstein was arrested in July 2019.

In a statement issued on Monday, Summers said he intended to continue his teaching obligations as a professor at Harvard but would 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.”

“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,” he said, per NBC News.

Video obtained by Semafor appears to show Summers addressing the ongoing situation to one of his Harvard classes:

Larry Summers in the classroom today at Harvard pic.twitter.com/dLLU326xAf

— Liz Hoffman (@lizrhoffman) November 19, 2025

In addition, President Donald Trump, who has downplayed his own personal associations with Epstein, posted on Truth Social that he has directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to “to investigate Jeffrey Epstein’s involvement and relationship with Bill Clinton, Larry Summers, Reid Hoffman, J.P. Morgan, Chase, and many other people and institutions, to determine what was going on with them, and him.”

Bondi responded on social media, saying that she had tasked U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton with leading the inquiry. “As with all matters, the Department will pursue this with urgency and integrity to deliver answers to the American people,” she wrote.

Larry Summers’s Epstein Fallout Is Getting Worse

Larry Summers’s Epstein Fallout Is Getting Worse