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The woman Larry Summers asked for advice on how to get “horizontal” with in emails to Jeffrey Epstein is a high-flying economist, The Post can reveal.
The ex-Treasury Secretary was referring to Chinese macro-economist Keyu Jin, 43 — then a tenured London School of Economics professor and Harvard graduate — and daughter of a top Chinese associate of President Xi Jinping.
In several messages from 2018 and 2019, married former Harvard president Summers, 70, confided in his “wing man” Epstein about a woman he was chasing and delivered blow-by-blow updates of his pursuit.
Throughout their correspondence, Summers and Epstein referred to the woman as “peril” — never using her name in messages, but he also forwarded some of her emails for commentary, in which Jin’s name is unredacted
In one such exchange, Summers asked Epstein whether it was “meaningful” to talk about the probability of “my getting horizontal w peril”.
“U r better at understanding Chinese women than at probability theory,” Summers told Epstein.
Epstein went on to suggest the probability of Summers ending up in bed with her was “0,” then added: “she is never ever going to find another Larry summers. Probability ZERO.”
People speculated online that the nickname is drawn from the racist “yellow peril” trope of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which was used to stoke fear that Asian immigrants — especially Chinese and Japanese people — were a danger to Westerners.
Civil-rights attorney Alejandra Caraballo, a clinical instructor at Harvard Law School’s Cyberlaw Clinic, described the exchanges as “absolutely disgusting” and wrote online “Larry Summers needs to resign or be pushed out of Harvard”.
Summers announced Monday that he will step back from public commitments at the university, although it is unclear if he will remain teaching there. In a statement to The Harvard Crimson, Summers said it was part of an effort “to rebuild trust and repair relationships with the people closest to me.”
Jin did not respond to The Post’s request for comment. In the messages, part of a trove of 20,000 files from late financier Epstein’s estate released last week, she never suggests any romantic relationship with Summers, and it’s unclear whether she even knew he was pursuing her.
The earliest interactions about Summers’ pursuit of the woman appear in late November and early December 2018, when he and the person — apparently Jin — crossed paths at an academic conference, according to the Harvard Crimson.
“Think for now I’m going nowhere with her except economics mentor,” Summers wrote in November 2018, adding that she had not wanted to have a drink with him “cuz she was ‘tired'” and he feared he was “in the ‘seen very warmly in rear view mirror’ category.”
On Dec. 1, Summers — who married Elisa New in 2005 — bragged that she’d been “interested in my commentary on her outfits” but confessed to feeling torn.
“When I’m reflective I think I’m dodging a bullet,” he wrote. “Think right thing is to cut off contact. Suspect she will miss it. Problem is I will too.”
By the next morning, he’d flipped: “Game day at conference she was extremely good Smart Assertive and clear Gorgeous. I’m f—-d.”
Later that month, the pair discussed Summers’ relationship with Jin’s father, Jin Liqun, who spent nearly two decades at the Chinese Ministry of Finance, where he served as Vice Minister. He is now the outgoing president for the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank
Summers was close to him, according to the Harvard Crimson. In one email to Epstein, he explained he had messaged Jin while “in mtg w her father flattering her father and saying other China officials had flattered him as well.”
However, by March 2019, Summers was venting Jin canceled plans and seemed interested in someone else. “I think she is tired of this alas. Sustaining w secrecy hard,” he wrote.
It’s not the first time Summers has come under fire for his behavior towards women.
He previously complained about what he called over-the-top penalties for men who “hit on” women at work and made derogatory comments about female intelligence in a controversial speech about gender differences that helped sink his Harvard presidency in 2006.
The emails between the pair continued even as the walls were closing in around Epstein after federal prosecutors opened a February 2019 probe into him for sex trafficking.
The messages end July 5, 2019. That morning, Summers told Epstein he was in Cape Cod with his family — “Bit of an Ibsen play,” he joked, referring to the Norwegian playwright — and the two tossed around literary references into the afternoon.
The next day, Epstein was busted on federal sex trafficking charges. A month after that he died in his jail cell while preparing for trial.
The Economic Club of New York had been due to host a discussion with Summers this week but said it was postponing it on Monday morning just hours after the Harvard Crimson first reported on the messages pertaining to the woman between Summers and Epstein.
English (US)