Former US treasury secretary Larry Summers is stepping down from the board at OpenAI, a week after a tranche of emails between him and late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was released.
Summers said in a statement to the BBC that he was 'grateful for the opportunity to have served, excited about the potential of the company, and look forward to following their progress.'
Summers, who was also once the president of Harvard University, said on Monday that he would be stepping back from public commitments over his ties to Epstein.
The recently released emails showed Summers communicated with Epstein until the day before Epstein's 2019 arrest for the alleged sex trafficking of minors.
In a statement, the artificial intelligence company said it respected Summers' decision to resign. 'We appreciate his many contributions and the perspective he brought to the Board,' OpenAI said.
The news comes after both chambers of Congress agreed on Tuesday to pass a measure to require the US justice department to release its files on Epstein. This measure will head to the desk of US President Donald Trump for approval.
Summers held senior posts under two Democratic presidents; serving as treasury secretary under Bill Clinton, and as director of the National Economic Council under Barack Obama. He led Harvard from 2001 to 2006 and remains a professor there. After the emails were shared with the public, Summers stated he took 'full responsibility for my misguided decision to continue communicating with Mr Epstein.' He added that he wanted 'to rebuild trust and repair relationships with the people closest to me.'
