Nathaniel Cullerton

Introduction

Nathaniel Cullerton, the 45-year-old litigation partner at Wall Street powerhouse Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, officially left the firm on September 17, 2026, after weeks on leave over a viral TikTok video that caught him kissing a junior associate on a Central Park bench. “Wachtell Lipton and Mr. Cullerton mutually agreed to part ways,” a spokesperson for the firm said in a statement to The New York Post. The departure capped a two-month fall from grace for one of corporate America’s go-to litigators, whom the Post described as a “hotshot partner”: the smooching scandal reportedly cost him a lucrative planned move to rival Gibson Dunn before it cost him his seat at Wachtell itself.

Background Information

Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz is one of the most profitable law firms in the United States — the firm known for inventing the “poison pill” defense against hostile acquisitions, and per the Financial Times the firm whose partners rake in higher average earnings than any other in the country, largely tied to a lockstep pay structure linked to tenure rather than performance. Cullerton earned his JD from Georgetown University in 2013 and clerked at the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit before rising to partner in the firm’s litigation department. He worked on the legal team defending OpenAI and Sam Altman against Elon Musk’s roughly $150 billion lawsuit — a case the team won — alongside Kelsey Borenzweig, a 29-year-old Wachtell associate with a JD from NYU School of Law who had also clerked before joining the firm. Cullerton married lawyer Moira Penza — a former federal prosecutor who led the government’s case against NXIVM cult leader Keith Raniere and now a partner at Wilkinson Stekloff — in February 2016.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Allegations. The claims in this section are allegations and reports from news coverage — the New York Post, the Financial Times (as reported by the Daily Mail), LADbible and VnExpress — describing a viral video and a reported internal firm investigation that reported substantiating them. Nothing here was admitted by Cullerton, nothing was criminally charged, and nothing was adjudicated in court: the underlying conduct is private and not illegal. No public denial, comment, or defense from Cullerton or Borenzweig appears in the coverage cited.

On July 23, 2026, TikTok comedian Jay Guapo (@jayguap3), who has some 3.5 million followers, filmed a couple kissing on a park bench on the western edge of Central Park in the shadow of Billionaires’ Row, scolding them: “Get a room. There’s kids watching.” The pair were identified by commenters as Cullerton and his junior colleague Borenzweig; when Cullerton realized he was being filmed he demanded “Put the phone down,” while Borenzweig asked for the recording to stop, and the clip spread “like wildfire” after Guapo posted it to his followers. The video drew some 9.6 million views, and much of the online backlash focused on the fact that Cullerton is married. According to sources with knowledge of the matter cited by the Post, Cullerton spent weeks on leave while Wachtell investigated his relationship with Borenzweig, and the firm was concerned about the rank discrepancy between a partner and a junior associate; the Financial Times first reported that he had been placed on leave amid the investigation. Notably, Wachtell did not have a policy against consensual relationships between colleagues.

Public Reaction and Consequences

The consequences were immediate and stacked. Within a week of the video, Cullerton had reportedly been suspended and placed on leave pending the internal investigation, with both his and Borenzweig’s profiles still active on the Wachtell website as of July 29. Cullerton had been among six Wachtell partners expected to jump to Gibson Dunn alongside star litigator Bill Savitt’s group, but Gibson scrapped his hiring after the TikTok video made waves online, according to sources cited by the Post and the Financial Times. Commentators drew comparisons to the 2025 Coldplay “kiss cam” scandal that ended Astronomer CEO Andy Byron and HR chief Kristin Cabot with resignations. It remained unclear whether Cullerton was paid while on leave and whether Borenzweig’s employment was affected; the firm had not announced any disciplinary action for her, and neither Cullerton nor the firms involved responded to media requests for comment.

Current Status

As of September 17, 2026, Cullerton is out of Wachtell after the firm announced the mutual separation in a statement. No successor firm, statement, or public appearance from Cullerton has been reported in the coverage cited, and it remains unclear whether Borenzweig’s employment status has been affected. His exit landed amid a broader wave of partner departures from Wachtell this year — Savitt’s group to Gibson Dunn, Joshua Feltman to Kirkland & Ellis on a reported $80 million package, Mark Gordon to Linklaters, and four younger partners to Latham & Watkins — though Cullerton’s was the only one driven by scandal.

Impact on Their Career/Life

The financial stakes are unusually high for a private, non-criminal scandal: Cullerton reportedly earns at least $4 million a year at Wachtell, and the abandoned Gibson Dunn move could have been worth tens of millions of dollars in future earnings, according to sources cited by the Post and reported by VnExpress. Professionally, a partner who two months earlier was photographed walking into federal court in Oakland to help win the Musk v. Altman case became, by September, a tabloid shorthand — “the canoodling Central Park lawyer” — who lost both a seven-figure-defying next act and his own partnership over a bench kiss that 9.6 million people watched. No criminal or regulatory consequences attach: the conduct was consensual and lawful, and the case stands as a reputation-and-employment cancellation rather than a legal one — the viral video itself was the verdict, and the market for elite legal talent delivered the sentence.