The late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein (1953-2019) may have threatened Bill Gates (67) with making an alleged affair of the Microsoft co-founder public. This is indicated by a report by the Wall Street Journal. According to anonymous sources, Epstein found out about Gates’ extramarital affair and wanted to use this as a means of pressure against him.
Gates, who has been married to his then-wife Melinda (58) since 1994, met the Russian bridge player Mila Antonova around 2010. Epstein, in turn, met her in 2013 and later paid her for programming training. Finally, in 2017, he emailed Gates, who was due to participate in an Epstein charity fund, and asked him to cover the cost of the training.
Sources familiar with the matter have said that the email clearly implied that Epstein knew about the alleged affair and could make it public. Because of the wealth of both men, it could not really have been about the course costs.
“Mr. Gates met with Epstein solely for philanthropic reasons,” a spokesman said. After “repeatedly failing to lure Mr. Gates beyond these matters, he unsuccessfully attempted to use a previous relationship to threaten Mr. Gates.” There was “no financial relationship” between the two.
In 2019, the New York Times reported that Epstein and Gates had met several times. A spokeswoman for the entrepreneur explained at the time that it had always been about philanthropy. Gates regrets ever meeting Epstein.
Melinda Gates, who divorced her husband in 2021, is said to have been in contact with divorce lawyers at the end of 2019, as the Wall Street Journal wrote at the time. Concerns about her ex-husband meeting Epstein were reportedly one of the reasons for the divorce filing.
“It was a huge mistake to spend time with him,” Gates told CNN about the meetings. There would have been several dinners together because Gates had hoped Epstein would be able to get sponsors for his goal of global health: “When it looked like it wasn’t going to work, this relationship ended.”
