Yale University has sidelined veteran computer science professor David Gelernter from classroom duties after newly disclosed Department of Justice records linked him to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, reigniting questions about elite institutions long, opaque entanglements with the disgraced financier.
The revelations stem from the sweeping January 2026 DOJ document release mandated by the Epstein Files Transparency Act, legislation signed by President Donald Trump in November 2025 that compelled federal agencies to disgorge millions of pages of Epstein-related communications. According to Gateway Pundit, those records include years of email exchanges between Gelernter and Epstein, covering the period from 2009 to 2015, well after Epsteins 2008 guilty plea in Florida for soliciting prostitution from a minor.
One October 2011 email has drawn particular scrutiny, in which Gelernter recommended a Yale undergraduate to Epstein and described her in starkly physical terms as a v small good-looking blonde. The professor later told Yale administrators that he had framed the recommendation with the potential bosss habits in mind, an explanation university officials rejected before removing him from teaching duties pending a formal review.
In a sharply worded, unapologetic email to Yale Dean Jeffrey Brocksubsequently leaked to the Yale Daily NewsGelernter doubled down on his rationale. WRAL reported that he wrote Epstein was obsessed with girls like every other unmarried billionaire in Manhattan; in fact, like every other heterosex male and that he was simply keeping the potential bosss habits in mind.
So long as I said nothing that dishonored her in any conceivable way, Id have told him more or less what he wanted, Gelernter wrote to Brock, the paper reported. She was smart, charming & gorgeous. Ought I to have suppressed that info? Never! He added pointedly: Im very glad I wrote the note.
Students enrolled in Gelernters computer science course were informed that he would not be teaching on Tuesday as the controversy escalated. The university does not condone the action taken by the professor or his described manner of providing recommendations for his students, Yale said in an official statement, adding, The professors conduct is under review. Until the review is completed, the professor will not teach his class.
CT Insider reported that Gelernter has insisted he did not know Epstein had been convicted of a sex offense at the time of their correspondence. Justice Department emails between the two men reportedly contain no explicit indication that Gelernter was aware of Epsteins broader sex trafficking operation.
Fondness for little girls is a perversion that runs way outside ordinary locker-room talk, Gelernter wrote in a statement to CT Insider. No one would ever introduce it into normal conversation. He nevertheless described Epstein as one of the two (maybe three) smartest men Id ever met and a brilliant and funny conversationalist.
Gelernter, a prominent conservative intellectual who has often criticized the cultural left and the excesses of elite academia, highlighted what he sees as a troubling precedent in a message to his students. Calling the recommendation a personal, private email, dug out of the dump of Epstein files, he asked them, If someone handed you a stack of other peoples private correspondence, would you dive in and read them?
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