Melinda French Gates Remains Committed to Foundation After Split

Sophie Alexander and Emily Chang
·2 min read
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(Bloomberg) -- Melinda French Gates said she’s “completely committed” to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and to working with her ex-husband a year after the pair’s divorce threw into question her role at the $70 billion philanthropic behemoth.

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“We met for the first time with our board of trustees last week in person,” French Gates said in an interview with Bloomberg TV’s Emily Chang. “What I think they would all tell you is that Bill and Melinda remain completely committed to this institution and to working effectively together. And that’s what we’re doing today.”

Last year, after the pair announced their split, the foundation said French Gates might step down from her roles as co-chair and trustee if she and Bill Gates were unable to work together. If she departs, French Gates, 58, will receive money from her ex-husband for her charitable work that’s separate from the foundation’s endowment.

Gates, 66, has already transferred billions of dollars of stocks to French Gates, who’s built her own philanthropic investment firm Pivotal Ventures. Dow Jones reported in February that French Gates would increasingly give away her fortune through philanthropies other than the foundation, citing people familiar with the matter.

“I give my time equally to those two institutions,” French Gates said in the Bloomberg interview, which was pegged to the release of the foundation’s 2022 Goalkeeper’s Report. “The foundation, I’m deeply and continue to be committed to. That is my global platform. Then, with Pivotal Ventures, I’m really working on social inequities here in the United States.”

Read more: French Gates Pivots $11 Billion Fortune Away From Foundation

She said the pandemic has stalled progress on critical issues like poverty and climate change. “The most alarming to me is gender equality,” French Gates said. “It has set us back three generations.”

The lack of gender parity among elected officials and political appointees is a major reason for the recent overturning of abortion protections in the US, she said. After the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, she said the country was “taking a big step backward.”

“At Pivotal I’m really focused on how do we get more women in political positions of power,” she said. “We would not have these laws overturned if we had more females in the House and Senate.”

French Gates is the world’s 171st-richest person with a net worth of $11 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Bill Gates is the fifth-richest, with a $117.8 billion fortune.

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