President Trump may have ditched his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, but other power figures and media elite stuck by him, a trove of new emails revealed.
A batch of more than 20,000 documents from the “Epstein files” released Wednesday by a House committee showed that the disgraced financier had relationships with powerful members of the media and financial world, even with mounting evidence that he had victimized underage girls.
Mr. Trump had long cut off ties with Epstein, who was convicted in 2008 of soliciting prostitution from a minor, but influential people and members of the media elite continued to give and seek advice and friendship from Epstein and even tipped him off to bad publicity related to his sex abuse scandal.
In 2017, New York Times financial reporter Landon Thomas Jr. offered to introduce Epstein to one of the most powerful men in banking and sought Epstein’s investment advice.
He also gave Epstein a heads-up that a book author was “digging around” for dirt on the billionaire hedge fund manager as he faced media scrutiny over sex abuse allegations.
“He seems very interested in your relationship with the news media,” Mr. Thomas said of investigative reporter John Connolly, who later co-authored a book about Epstein’s sex abuse. “I told him you were a hell of a guy:)”
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Lawrence H. Summers, Treasury secretary in the Clinton administration and director of the National Economic Council in the Obama White House, complained to him about his own girlfriend troubles months before Epstein’s arrest on sex trafficking charges. Meanwhile, bestselling author Michael Wolff shared with Epstein his insights into Mr. Trump and the terms of his lucrative book deal while seeking introductions to his powerful associates.
None sought to distance themself from Epstein, who had been convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor and was settling lawsuits from women who said he abused them. They continued to converse with Epstein even as media reports indicated he had abused dozens of underage girls.
None of the emails show Epstein’s high-profile associates questioning him about his conviction or the mounting evidence of sexual abuse.
Instead, Epstein continued to be sought for his counsel, advice and connections to influential people.
One of the most prominent among them, Mr. Summers, maintained a close relationship with Epstein, as emails show, and confided in him about his troubles with a girlfriend who appeared to be stringing him along while dating other men.
Mr. Summers, who is married, wrote to Epstein that he told the unidentified woman, whom he accused of acting coy, “call me when you feel like it” and added in his email to Epstein, “I dint want to be in a gift-giving competition while being the friend without benefits.”
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Epstein responded that Mr. Summers had made the right move. “Ignore the daddy I’m going to go out with the motorcycle guy, you reacted well … annoyed shows caring, no whining showed strength,” he wrote to Mr. Summers.
The email exchange took place on March 16, 2019. Just four months later, Epstein was arrested on federal charges of operating a years-old sex trafficking ring that victimized dozens of underage girls. Five months later, in August 2019, Epstein died in a New York City jail cell. His death was ruled a suicide.
Emails between Mr. Summers and Epstein indicate that Epstein planned to donate $500,000 to a PBS television project run by Mr. Summers’ wife, Harvard English professor Elisa F. New.
Mr. Summers, who is currently a Harvard professor, said in a statement to the Harvard Crimson that his association with Epstein “was a major error in judgment.”
Mr. Wolff, a bestselling author and Trump biographer, sought help from Epstein for his Trump book, “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House.” He also provided advice for the disgraced financier as his reputation began crumbling amid the sex abuse allegations.
“So … I’m doing this Trump book for a pile of money,” Mr. Wolff wrote to Epstein in February 2017, a month after Mr. Trump took office.
Mr. Wolff shared with Epstein that he had “quite a bit of cooperation” from the Trump administration and said the president called him on the phone for 45 minutes, “ranting and raving about the media — alarming.”
Mr. Wolff asked whether Epstein would be back in New York City soon. He asked Epstein to connect him with Trump fundraiser Tom Barrack, now the ambassador to Turkey and special envoy for Syria, and Kathryn Ruemmler, President Obama’s White House counsel. Epstein was able to reach Ms. Ruemmler quickly and informed Mr. Wolff a few minutes later, “Kathy agreed.”
A 2015 message from Epstein to Mr. Wolff shows the two pondering what Mr. Trump, then running for the Republican presidential nomination, might say about his relationship with Epstein during an upcoming CNN interview.
Epstein asked Mr. Wolff, “If we were able to craft an answer for him, what do you think it should be?”
Mr. Wolff, writing back to Epstein, advised him, “should let [Trump] hang himself.”
Mr. Trump, along with other wealthy and influential people, including former President Bill Clinton, had taken trips on Epstein’s private plane. Mr. Trump also visited Epstein’s Palm Beach home, which is down the street from the president’s Mar-a-Lago estate.
“If he says he hasn’t been on the plane or to the house, then that gives you a valuable PR and political currency,” Mr. Wolff advised Epstein. “You can hang him in a way that potentially generates a positive benefit for you, or if it really looks like he could win, you could save him, generating a debt.”
Mr. Wolff offered a third possible outcome and said Mr. Trump might say, “Jeffrey is a great guy and has gotten a raw deal and is a victim of political correctness, which is to be outlawed in a Trump regime.”
On Wednesday, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee released 23,000 pages of documents related to Epstein, which were provided under subpoena by the Justice Department. The files uploaded to the committee’s website reveal Epstein’s efforts to tie Mr. Trump to the girls victimized by his sex trafficking ring.
After Mr. Trump’s 2016 victory, Mr. Thomas asked Epstein about his thoughts on whom Mr. Trump would nominate as Treasury secretary. In the same email exchange, he asked Epstein, “How are you positioned re market?” Epstein, who made millions of dollars as an investor, responded, “long dow, short yen euro and pound. long reits.”
A year later, Mr. Thomas offered to introduce Epstein to Masayoshi Son, the founder and chairman of SoftBank Group.
“Seems to me he is a natural guy for you,” Mr. Thomas wrote. “He is going to be in Florida in March for some Trump event. I know some of his financial guys pretty well: I might try to facilitate something if you are not opposed.”
Mr. Thomas’ email exchanges show the journalist was no Trump fan and feared his 2016 victory.
He wrote to Epstein in June 2016, as Mr. Trump narrowed opponent Hillary Clinton’s lead, “Does he win?” and in September 2016 wrote to Epstein, “I am getting worried. Is he ever going to implode?”
He asked Epstein for more financial advice that month: “If you knew Trump was going to win, how would you position your portfolio?”
Mr. Thomas left his job at The New York Times in 2019, according to the company website.
An NPR report revealed that Mr. Thomas was “benched” from “professional contact” with Epstein in 2019 after he told his editors that Epstein was a friend from whom he had solicited a $30,000 contribution for a cultural center in Harlem.
In 2008, Mr. Thomas wrote a forgiving profile of Epstein. He traveled to his private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands just before Epstein surrendered to serve an 18-month sentence for soliciting prostitution from a minor.
“People from all walks of life break the law, of course. But for the rich, wrapped in a cocoon of immense comfort, it can be easy to yield to temptation, experts say,” Mr. Thomas wrote.
The Washington Times was unsuccessful in reaching Mr. Thomas and Mr. Wolff for this report.
• Susan Ferrechio can be reached at sferrechio@washingtontimes.com.
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