Jeffrey Epstein Files and Fallout

Yale University has removed prominent computer science professor David Gelernter from classroom teaching while it reviews his conduct after newly released Justice Department Epstein files showed he emailed Jeffrey Epstein in 2011 recommending a Yale senior for a job as a "v small good-looking blonde." The email, sent several years after Epstein’s 2008 conviction for soliciting prostitution from a minor, described the student as an "editoress" Epstein might hire, and Gelernter has since defended the message in correspondence with his dean, saying he was mindful that Epstein was "obsessed with girls" and that he was glad he wrote it. Yale issued a statement saying it "does not condone" his described manner of providing recommendations and confirmed he will not teach his computer science class during the review. Students say they were shocked to learn a current professor appears in the Epstein files and more disturbed by his unapologetic defense, which frames his comments about the student’s looks as acceptable so long as they were not, in his view, dishonoring. The episode adds another U.S. academic name to the growing list of figures facing institutional scrutiny as thousands of pages of Epstein-related records are combed for evidence of how powerful men interacted with—and sometimes sexualized—young women around them.