A former Harvard University president and U.S. treasury secretary has told the university newspaper he is withdrawing from his public duties to mend personal bonds in the wake of recent revelations of his connection with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The House Oversight Committee on Nov. 12 released over 20,000 pages of emails related to the disgraced financier. The trove included messages indicating Lawrence Summers, who served as Harvard president from 2001 to 2006, sought relationship advice in 2019 from the disgraced financier.

Epstein, whose death in 2019 while in jail awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges was ruled a suicide, had allegedly sexually abused potentially hundreds of women and girls and trafficked them to other wealthy men.

“I am deeply ashamed of my actions and recognize the pain they have caused,” the Harvard Crimson quoted Summers as saying in a statement to the newspaper Monday evening. “I take full responsibility for my misguided decision to continue communicating with Mr. Epstein.”

Summers, who served as treasury secretary under Bill Clinton, is a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and serves as director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at Harvard's Kennedy School. According to the Crimson, he is teaching five courses at the university, including two undergraduate classes and will stay on as the center's director.

“While continuing to fulfill my teaching obligations, I will be stepping back from public commitments as one part of my broader effort,” his statement continued.

Summers’ decision follows recent calls by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, for Harvard to sever ties with its former chief, who she said had demonstrated “monumentally bad judgment.”

“If he had so little ability to distance himself from Jeffrey Epstein even after all that was publicly known about Epstein’s sex offenses involving underage girls, then Summers cannot be trusted to advise our nation’s politicians, policymakers, and institutions — or teach a generation of students at Harvard or anywhere else,” Warren told CNN in a statement.

Last week, Trump said he had asked the Justice Department and FBI to investigate Democrats linked to Epstein, including Summers, Clinton and J.P. Morgan Chase.

The released emails show Summers corresponded regularly with Epstein until Epstein’s arrest in July 2019. Many of the wealthy, celebrity and academic elite who socialized with Epstein drew criticism after his sex trafficking indictment for staying in touch with him despite his guilty plea in 2008 to state child prostitution charges in Florida.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Former Harvard president steps away from public eye after Epstein revelations

Reporting by Marc Ramirez, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

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