Gates Foundation launches external review of Bill Gates’ ties to Epstein

SEATTLE — The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation said Tuesday it has launched an external review of its engagement with the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, according to reports.

The news comes amid revelations of a yearslong personal relationship between Epstein and Bill Gates, uncovered in the U.S. Department of Justice released Epstein-related emails,

The organization also announced it will eliminate up to 500 jobs — roughly 20% of its global workforce — by 2030.

Foundation CEO Mark Suzman commissioned the external review earlier this year to assess past foundation engagement with Epstein and to evaluate the organization’s current policies for vetting and developing new philanthropic partnerships, the foundation said in a statement.

The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the news Tuesday, said Suzman told staff in a memo that “this is a challenging time for our organization in many ways, but it also highlights the critical importance of taking the tough actions now.”

According to a news release from the foundation, the staffing reductions and the Epstein review are not directly linked.

Bill Gates, the co-founder of Microsoft and one of the world’s richest people, remains chair and a board member of the foundation he launched in 2000 with his then-wife Melinda French Gates. One of the world’s largest philanthropic institutions, it provided $8.0 billion in charitable support in 2024 and works with partners across the United States and in more than 130 countries.

In February, Bill Gates apologized to foundation staff for his association with Epstein and acknowledged having affairs with two Russian women that Epstein had learned of, according to the Wall Street Journal.

“I did nothing illicit. I saw nothing illicit,” Gates told staff, according to a town hall recording reviewed by the WSJ.

In a statement after the DOJ’s release of the Epstein files, the foundation said a small number of employees had interacted with Epstein because he had claimed he could mobilize significant philanthropic resources for global health and development. The foundation said it never pursued collaboration with him, never created a fund with him, never paid him and never employed him.

Epstein visited the Gates Foundation headquarters in Seattle at least once, according to the Seattle Times.

DOJ documents included photos of Bill Gates posing with Epstein, as well as with women whose faces were redacted. Gates has said his relationship with Epstein was confined to philanthropy and that it was a mistake to meet with him. He has also denied spending time with victims of the financier’s sexual abuse.

Gates is scheduled to appear before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on June 10 as part of the committee’s ongoing investigation into Epstein.

Gates became friends with Epstein in 2011, three years after Epstein pleaded guilty in Florida state court to soliciting an underage girl for prostitution. Epstein died by suicide in August 2019 while in a New York City federal jail, weeks after his arrest on federal child sex trafficking charges.