The Affair Drama That Destroyed Bill & Melinda Gates' Marriage Is Worse Than We Thought

Bill Gates may be known as the billionaire philanthropist who co-founded Microsoft, but with his questionable personal behavior raising eyebrows, he may be remembered by history as something much worse. Bill admitted to having an affair with a Microsoft employee early in his marriage to Melinda French Gates, which came to light in 2019 and ultimately contributed to the end of their marriage, although it's unclear if Melinda knew about the affair before 2019. With the partial release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, though, it's clear that Bill also had longstanding ties to the infamous predator and even more affairs. 

As reported by The Wall Street Journal, at a town hall meeting with the Gates Foundation on February 24, 2026, Bill admitted to having two separate affairs with Russian women that Epstein eventually discovered. "I did have affairs, one with a Russian bridge player who met me at bridge events, and one with a Russian nuclear physicist who I met through business activities," he reportedly confessed. As we know from the Epstein files, Bill contracted an STI from one of these women and allegedly attempted to secretly drug Melinda with medications to prevent her from finding out.

One of the affairs Bill confessed to was reported on by The Wall Street Journal in a 2023 article, noting that the deceased sex offender appeared to threaten the tech mogul about it when they were associating with each other. At the town hall, Bill admitted that there are photos of him with women whose faces are redacted in the Epstein files, but claimed that Epstein asked him to take photos with his assistants after meetings. "I did nothing illicit. I saw nothing illicit," he claimed, per WSJ, adding, "To be clear I never spent any time with victims, the women around him." Bill apologized and confessed, "It was a huge mistake to spend time with Epstein."

Bill Gates began associating with Jeffrey Epstein in 2011, several years after Epstein was already arrested and imprisoned for soliciting prostitution from a minor. However, he admitted in the town hall on Tuesday that his wife at the time, Melinda French Gates, discouraged him from continuing the relationship before he supposedly cut ties. "To give her credit, she was always kind of skeptical about the Epstein thing," he said.

Melinda doesn't need credit from her ex; her own words speak for themselves. "I did not like that he'd had meetings with Jeffrey Epstein, no," she told Gail King in a 2022 interview with CBS Mornings, when asked if Bill's relationship with Epstein contributed to her divorce. Melinda then admitted that she met Epstein once, because, she said, "I wanted to see who this man was ... And I regretted it from the second I stepped in the door."

"He was abhorrent. He was evil personified. I had nightmares about it afterwards," Melinda told King. "My heart breaks for [Epstein's victims] because that's how I felt, and here, I'm an older woman. My God, I feel terrible for those young women. It was awful." It's unclear if Epstein did anything specific to make Melinda feel the way she did; King didn't ask for those details. When she was asked about Bill's continued relationship with the criminal after she discouraged it, Melinda directed King to address any further questions on the matter to Bill. No matter what her ex-husband's relationship to Epstein was, it's clear from the verified affairs he had during their marriage that Melinda is better off without him.