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In a world with billions of alternatives, former Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers picked Jeffrey E. Epstein — literally the most infamous pedophile on the planet — as a confidant.

Last week, a slew of emails released by congressional Republicans revealed that Larry Summers maintained a close personal relationship with convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein after the disgraced financier’s crimes were uncovered. While appalling, this is only the latest episode in Harvard’s sordid entanglement with Epstein — and it demands a continued University-wide response.

Although Summers has since described his relationship with Epstein as “a major error of judgement,” the email cache paints an ugly picture. Epstein was Summers’s self-described “wing man” in Summers’s relationship with a woman who Summers described as a mentee. Being amiably close with a convicted pedophile is bad enough — but seeking advice from that sex criminal about an apparent affair reflects a shocking ethical failure. The emails are also peppered with abhorrent misogyny: In one, Summers seemed to joke that women were less intelligent than men.

What’s more, Epstein donated $110,000 to a nonprofit tied to Summers’s wife, Harvard English professor emerita Elisa F. New. Seeking Epstein’s advice on a project with that nonprofit, New even told him that a donation would “absolutely be a Harvard gift” — well after Harvard had stopped taking money from Epstein.

But this saga isn’t just about Summers — at the end of the day, it’s about Harvard. These revelations are only the latest in our University’s yearslong entanglement with Epstein: For example, after donating $6.5 million to Harvard’s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, Epstein was granted unrestricted access to the program’s offices — complete with a private office.

Harvard shouldn’t be for sale — and known pedophiles certainly shouldn’t be allowed to buy access. In 2020, a Harvard investigation revealed that Epstein visited his office at Harvard over 40 times between 2010 and 2018 — even after becoming a registered sex offender in New York and Florida. On those visits, he even met with Harvard professors.

Given this new information about Epstein’s relationship with Summers, Harvard should reopen the investigation into its ties with Epstein. The investigation and report from 2020 provide a model to follow now and in the future — but they certainly don’t absolve Harvard from its responsibility to probe new evidence that its association with Epstein ran deeper than previously thought.

First and foremost, an investigation will help determine whether any additional University policy violations have come to light — and if so, what steps Harvard should take moving forward. But this also gives Harvard the chance to revisit deeper issues.

The University adopted a number of new donation policies in the wake of revelations about Epstein’s closeness to Harvard. As the University looks ahead to raising money in financially uncertain times, ensuring our donation policies are transparent and ethical is all the more important.

The personal and structural flaws that led to the decade-long perverse relationship between Harvard and Epstein are inexcusable. Harvard took its first few steps toward doing better. It clearly still has work to do.

This staff editorial solely represents the majority view of The Crimson Editorial Board. It is the product of discussions at regular Editorial Board meetings. In order to ensure the impartiality of our journalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on similar topics.

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