Former Harvard President Larry Summers will resign from his teaching appointments at the end of the academic year over the fallout from his ties to the late sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
Summers, who was the former U.S. treasury secretary under President Bill Clinton, will also relinquish his university professorship, Harvard’s highest distinction.
“In connection with the ongoing review by the University of documents related to Jeffrey Epstein that were recently released by the government, Harvard Kennedy School Dean Jeremy Weinstein has accepted Professor Lawrence H. Summers’ resignation from his leadership position as co-director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government,” Harvard University spokesperson Jason Newton told HuffPost in a statement.
“Professor Summers has announced that he will retire from his academic and faculty appointments at Harvard at the end of this academic year and will remain on leave until that time,” the statement added.
Summers has faced intense scrutiny since revelations in November showed him in contact with Epstein over the course of years. Millions of documents, including emails, have been released by the House Oversight Committee regarding Epstein, revealing the deep ties the billionaire pedophile had with people in high positions of power, including Summers.
“I’m trying to figure out why American elite think if u murder your baby by beating and abandonment it must be irrelevant to your admission to Harvard, but hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank,” Summers wrote in a 2017 email. “DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT.”
Not only did Summers maintain contact with Epstein for years after the billionaire financier pleaded guilty to soliciting sex from underage girls in Florida in 2008, the former Harvard president’s last message was just one day before Epstein was arrested on federal charges of sex trafficking minors in July 2019.
Rosie Couture, a Harvard student and organizer with the activist group Feminist Generation, had previously called for Summers’ resignation last year.
“Larry Summers’ resignation marks an important victory in the fight for justice for Epstein survivors, a victory made possible by the relentless advocacy of survivors and feminist students at Harvard and across the country,” Couture said in a statement to HuffPost. “Feminist Generation stands in solidarity with the survivors and students of Harvard as they continue to demand the resignation of all Epstein affiliates and Harvard’s reinvestment of $9.1 million received in donations from Jeffrey Epstein into survivor demands and sexual violence prevention.”
Couture said “a national day of student action to demand #EpsteinOffCampus” at Harvard will take place on March 9.
“Harvard students showed the nation that survivors and feminists have the power to win justice,” she added. “Now, we call on students everywhere to act together.”
Lydia O’Connor contributed reporting.