‘Mr Epstein’s brainstorming’: Bill Gates tells Congress he believes Jeffrey Epstein was planning to blackmail him for cheating on his wife

The relationship between Microsoft founder Bill Gates and the modern era’s most notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein is extremely well documented.

The two men first met in Manhattan in 2011, after Epstein had served his sentence for procuring a minor for prostitution and been registered as a sex offender. They proceeded to meet many times after that, with Gates socializing with Epstein at his home, on his private jet, and over Skype.

The official justification is that they were discussing global health philanthropy and raising money from wealthy donors, but by 2014, Gates is said to have concluded that Epstein wasn’t going to deliver on his promises and cut ties.

Gates has since insisted that he had absolutely no idea of Epstein’s criminal behavior, that he himself had “never victimized anyone”, and said getting involved with him was a “major mistake”. Now Gates has gone further, telling Congress that he believes Epstein was planning to blackmail him over his extramarital affairs with two Russian women.

As per the transcript released by Congress, Gates referred to Epstein’s “veiled” threats after he cut ties and said he believed that this was Epstein’s tactic to force him to continue meeting with him. Gates referred to the Epstein files and said:

“I was not blackmailed, but you know, as you look at these emails, you know, it looks like Mr Epstein’s brainstorming was going in that direction.”

When asked for clarification, Gates explained that “he never sent me anything that I would call blackmail”, saying he thought Epstein “was sort of rehearsing how either he or he, coaching someone else, might choose to blackmail me, but none of those messages were ever sent to me”.

“He was abhorrent. He was evil personified”

Gates isn’t facing any direct allegations of participating in abuse or consequential criminal charges, but has suffered high reputational damage. The Wall Street Journal notes that his public image is “cracking” and he was excluded from Microsoft’s annual CEO summit.

In addition, his former wife, Melinda French Gates, was public about her discomfort with Epstein. In 2026, she said she once met him and that “I regretted it from the second I stepped in the door. He was abhorrent. He was evil personified. I had nightmares about it afterward.”

She then named Gates’ association with Epstein as a factor in their 2021 divorce, with Gates himself saying, “To give her credit, she was always kind of sceptical about the Epstein thing.”