David Merfield via Wikimedia Commons

A far-right political blogger who has espoused anti-democratic views is set to debate at Yale on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Curtis Yarvin — who has sparked controversy for advocating for a form of American monarchy and for his writings on race, slavery and apartheid — is set to participate in two debates this week, one hosted by the Yale Political Union and the other by the Yale Federalist Society. 

“A smart critic like Yarvin can force people to sharpen the case for their views, especially when those views have gotten sloppy over time,” Garett Jones, a professor at George Mason University who will debate Yarvin Wednesday on “for-profit governance” at the Federalist Society’s event, wrote to the News. “And the case for democracy has certainly gotten sloppy over time. Democracy’s defenders, which I count myself among, need to do a better job.” 

At the YPU debate Tuesday evening, Yarvin will argue for the resolution “end the democratic experiment” against Jed Rubenfeld, a professor at Yale Law School. 

Jones wrote that he believes the debate will be a helpful way to draw out distinctions between his position, which he describes as “10% less democracy” in reference to the title of his published book, and Yarvin’s, which he calls “100% less democracy.”

Neither Rubenfeld nor YPU President Brennan Columbia-Walsh ’26 responded to the News’ request for comment. 

Both debate topics land on familiar turf for Yarvin, who has consistently expressed anti-democratic beliefs. Yarvin, who is also known by his pen name Mencius Moldbug, has written about his distrust of the federal bureaucracy and his desire to institute a program called RAGE — retire all government employees. 

Ilani Nurick LAW ’27 and Elizabeth Bailey LAW ’27, co-presidents of the Yale Law Democrats, criticized the Yale Federalist Society for sponsoring the event. Yarvin could not be reached for comment.

“We all believe strongly in free speech, but what is the Federalist Society hoping to learn from someone who thinks white people are genetically predisposed to be smarter than other races?” Nurick and Bailey wrote in a joint statement to the News. “Yale Law students are smart enough to know that for-profit governance is not the solution to the problems facing our country without hearing from Curtis Yarvin on the subject.”

Yarvin asserts that American democracy is a failed experiment and that America should instead run like a company with a chief executive officer, which The New York Times characterized as “his friendlier term for a dictator.” 

In Yarvin’s view, the U.S. government should be run by a CEO-esque figure. In his 2008 article titled “An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives,” Yarvin proposed the “liquidation of democracy, the Constitution and the rule of law, and the transfer of absolute power” to that CEO-esque figure. 

Yarvin’s 2008 article furthered that this process would end the press, dismantle universities and transform the nation’s capital into a “heavily armed” version of a “corporation.” 

Additionally, Yarvin has sought to downplay the outcome of the American Civil War. The Times noted that he has previously written, “It is very difficult to argue that the War of Succession made anyone’s life more pleasant, including that of freed slaves.”

In the email to the Window, the internal email list server for the Yale Law School, David Haungs LAW ’26, president of the Yale Federalist Society, included brief biographies of Jones and Yarvin.  

Referring to Yarvin, the email states, “In 2002, he founded Urbit, a decentralized personal service platform. He later co-founded Tlon Corp, a company that helped build Urbit further. While innovating in the tech sphere, he also became a successful writer — first on the blog Unqualified Reservations, and now on Gray Mirror, one of the most popular pages on Substack.”

In an email reply to Haungs’ email obtained by the News, a student highlighted Yarvin’s views in relation to his ties to the Trump administration, a connection that was noted by The Guardian in December. 

Yarvin graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Brown University.