Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers is stepping down from the board of directors of the OpenAI Foundation, the latest development in a saga that began with emails released between him and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Mr. Summers’ resignation Wednesday comes two days after he said he would step away from his public commitments.
He then ended his fellowship with the Center for American Progress and is also no longer a member of Yale’s Budget Lab advisory group. Mr. Summers also gave up positions with Bloomberg News, the Brookings Institution’s Hamilton Project, the Peterson Institute for International Economics and the Center for Global Development.
The New York Times will not extend his contract as a contributing writer for their opinion section.
“In line with my announcement to step away from my public commitments, I have also decided to resign from the board of OpenAI,” Mr. Summers said in a statement. “I am grateful for the opportunity to have served, excited about the potential of the company, and look forward to following their progress.”
Mr. Summers, who served as treasury secretary under President Clinton and was Harvard’s president for five years after, appeared to have maintained a friendly relationship with Epstein after the disgraced financier pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitution from an underage girl in 2008. Epstein later died in prison in 2019.
More than 20,000 documents released last week by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee showed that Mr. Summers sought romantic advice from Epstein.
Mr. Summers is currently a professor and is the director of Harvard’s Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government. It is unclear whether he will stay in this position.
He issued a statement last week that said his association with Epstein was a “major error in judgment.”
“I am deeply ashamed of my actions and recognize the pain they have caused,” he said in a statement Monday. “I take full responsibility for my misguided decision to continue communicating with Mr. Epstein.”
Several prominent names appeared in email correspondence with Epstein, including President Trump, as Epstein said he “knew about the girls.”
On Tuesday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries’ name turned up in an email soliciting money and a meeting with the financier, and U.S. Virgin Islands Del. Stacey Plaskett narrowly avoided being censured over her correspondence with Epstein.
Earlier this week, Mr. Trump took to Truth Social to request that the Justice Department and the FBI investigate Democrats’ relationship with Epstein, including Mr. Clinton and LinkedIn founder and Democratic donor Reid Hoffman. Attorney General Pam Bondi said she ordered a top federal prosecutor to lead the investigation.
On Tuesday, Congress agreed to pass a bipartisan bill ordering the Justice Department to release all of the Epstein files, and the president has said he would sign it into law if it landed on his desk.
• Mary McCue Bell can be reached at mbell@washingtontimes.com.
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