Larry Summers resigns from Harvard professorship amid Epstein probe
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Larry Summers, the former treasury secretary and Harvard president, is officially out of a job at the university.
Why it matters: Summers' exit from his professorship at Harvard is the latest in a reckoning over U.S. college leaders' ties to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Driving the news: Summers said he made the "difficult decision" to retire from his academic and faculty appointments at the end of the academic year.
- A Harvard spokesperson confirmed that Summers resigned in connection with the university's probe into the Epstein documents released by the Department of Justice.
- Summers also resigned as co-director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government.
Zoom in: The emails released last year showed that Summers regularly corresponded with Epstein about women, politics and projects linked to Summers' wife, Harvard English professor emerita Elisa F. New.
- That included a $110,00 donation Epstein made in 2016 to Verse Video Education, the nonprofit behind New's "Poetry in America" show.
- Epstein had considered donating $500,000 at one point, per the Harvard Crimson.
The fallout: Summers said in the fall he would step back from public commitments and teaching.
- He resigned from the OpenAI board and parted ways with the New York Times before Wednesday's announcement.
- President Trump and Harvard both said they'd launch investigations into Summers.
Zoom out: Epstein had deep ties to several donors and academics, prompting U.S. colleges and universities to reckon with revelations from recently released documents.
- The files appear to show genetics professors Martin Nowak and George Church on Epstein's island.
- Harvard students are calling for the resignation of Andrew Farkas, chair of the Hasty Pudding Institute, over his close relationship with Epstein.
- Others tied to Boston-area colleges, such as Boston University College of Communication Dean Mariette DiChristina (then head of American Scientific) and Tufts University alumnus and donor Steve Tisch, have come under fire for their correspondence with Epstein.
Yes, and: The revelations stemming from the documents have prompted some big names at Columbia University and Yale University to step back.
- Molecular biologist Richard Axel on Tuesday stepped down as co-director of Columbia University's Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute.
- Computer science professor David Gelernter will not teach classes at Yale University while the school reviews his conduct. (In an email to Epstein recommending a student for a job, Gelernter described her as a "v small good-looking blonde.")