Bill Gates admitted having affairs with two Russian women but insisted they were not Jeffrey Epstein’s victims as he apologised to staff over his ties to the disgraced financier during a town hall meeting at the Gates Foundation on Tuesday. Gates told employees it had been a ‘huge mistake’ to spend time with Epstein and to involve foundation executives in meetings with the convicted sex offender, according to a Wall Street Journal report. ‘I apologise to other people who are drawn into this because of the mistake that I made,’ he said, according to a recording cited by the Journal.
The report said Gates acknowledged having two affairs with Russian women that Epstein later became aware of, but stressed they did not involve any of Epstein’s victims. During the town hall, Gates told employees: ‘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.’ ‘I did nothing illicit. I saw nothing illicit,’ he added. ‘To be clear, I never spent any time with the victims, the women around him.’ A spokesperson for the philanthropic organisation confirmed the Microsoft founder had ‘taken responsibility for his actions’.
