Harvard University professor Larry Summers will take a leave of absence while the school investigates his and others’ ties to late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a spokesperson confirmed.
The former U.S. Treasury secretary and former Harvard president will stop teaching and step down as director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at Harvard Kennedy School.
A spokesperson told the BBC’s US partner CBS News that Summers believes “it is in the best interest of the Centre”.
Recently released emails indicate that Summers corresponded with Epstein until the day before the financier’s 2019 arrest for alleged sex trafficking of minors.
In a statement to The Harvard Crimson, the university said it was “conducting a review of information about individuals at Harvard included in Jeffrey Epstein’s recently released documents.”
The BBC has contacted Summers for comment on the new Harvard review.
On Tuesday, Summers directed his communication with Epstein to students in a class he had been teaching at Harvard.
“Some of you may have seen my statement of regret, expressing my shame regarding what I did in communication with Mr. Epstein. And that I have said that I am going to step back from public activity,” Summers told his students, according to a video recorded by a student.
“I think it’s very important to fulfill my teaching obligations. So, with your permission, let’s go ahead and talk about the material in class.”
But on Wednesday night, Summers spokesman Steven Goldberg said in the statement provided to CBS that “the co-teachers will complete the remaining three class sessions of the courses he has been teaching with them this semester, and are not scheduled to teach next semester.”
The public fallout for Summers began after Congress released more than 20,000 pages of documents from the so-called Epstein files last week, which included multiple emails between Epstein and Summers.
Timestamps on the emails showed that the two communicated up until the day before Epstein’s arrest, a decade after he pleaded guilty to soliciting an underage girl for prostitution.
Summers, a married father of six, messaged Epstein in November 2018, apparently asking for romantic advice related to his interest in someone he said viewed him as an “economics mentor.”
“I don’t think I’m going anywhere with her for now except to her economics mentor,” Summers wrote in an exchange in which Epstein referred to himself as Summers’ “wing man.”
“Am I thanking you or am I sorry that I’m married? I think it’s the former,” he wrote in another email.
The emails also indicated that Summers and Epstein frequently dined together, and Epstein often attempted to connect Summers with prominent world figures.
No Epstein survivor has accused Summers of misconduct and there is no publicly available evidence to indicate he was involved in any of Epstein’s crimes.
Summers announced earlier Wednesday that he was leaving OpenAI’s board of directors, and the artificial intelligence company said it respected Summers’ decision to step down.
“We appreciate his many contributions and the perspective he brought to the Board,” OpenAI said.
He joined the board of directors of OpenAI, which makes ChatGPT, in 2023, following a failed attempt to oust its CEO, Sam Altman.
Summers said in a statement to the BBC about the move that he was “grateful for the opportunity to have served, excited about the company’s potential and looking forward to following its progress.”
After the emails were shared with the public, Summers said he took “full responsibility for my mistaken decision to continue communicating with Mr. Epstein.”
He added that he wanted to “rebuild trust and repair relationships with the people closest to me.”
Summers held senior positions under two Democratic presidents; He served as Secretary of the Treasury during the Bill Clinton administration and as director of the National Economic Council during the Barack Obama administration. He directed Harvard from 2001 to 2006 and remains a professor there.
The Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank in Washington where Summers was a senior fellow, also confirmed that Summers is no longer affiliated with the organization.
Both houses of Congress agreed Tuesday to pass a measure to require the U.S. Justice Department to release its files on Epstein, providing for the potential release of tens of thousands more documents.
President Donald Trump signed the bill on Wednesday, after changing his position on the issue following opposition from his supporters.
