Bill Gates may be one of the wealthiest, smartest men in the world. But even those elevated qualities and his high-profile advisors weren’t enough to stop Jeffrey Epstein getting his hooks in him.
The astonishing extent of Gates’ dealings with Epstein are laid bare in the Department of Justice’s latest release of evidence on the dead financier.
The emails feature tireless attempts by the pedo financier to arrange meetings with the ex-Microsoft boss, trying to get them together in New York, Seattle, at the Davos summit in Switzerland and the Caribbean.
The pair communicate directly in 17 emails between 2013 and 2015, but much more goes on behind the scenes, with Epstein regularly communicating with and grousing to Boris Nikolic, a scientist who worked for Gates.
In a poison-pen missive, sent on July 25, 2017, from Epstein to Nikolic, Epstein claimed, “The richest man in the world is so cheap.”
Epstein’s pique stemmed from an allegation he made that Gates left his “former bridge-girl and toy” at the point where “she had little money, couldn’t afford air conditioner, was living on a friend’s couch … Your friend Bill is nuts.”
Epstein started emailing Nikolic in 2010, and that same year he almost got an in-person meeting with the Microsoft founder.
Epstein’s house manager, Lesley Groff, reminded him in an email: “Bill Gates for dinner Sunday Dec. 5 … but last week you said you have Bill Gates on Dec. 6 (same night as the BBB Gathering [likely Barbo’s Best and Brightest, a Swedish organization of female college students] … Possibly, you changed the date?”
Epstein, who was by then a convicted sex offender, replied, “Girls should be from 5-7, Gates from 7”
Days before it was supposed to happen, Gates had Nikolic pull him out, sending him an email saying: “After talking to Melinda [French Gates, his then wife]. I have decided to leave New York City after the Pete Peterson meeting.
“So this means I won’t have time to do another meeting and I won’t be able to do the dinner with Jeff Epstein. I was looking forward to the dinner.”
Evidence shows the next year a meeting did happen, as a picture of Gates next to Epstein and alongside banker Jes Staley, former Harvard president Larry Summers and Nikolic at Epstein’s Manhattan town house has been released as part of the files.
Two years later Epstein had apparently gained Nikolic’s trust and was seemingly helping him negotiate with Gates.
In May 2013, Nikolic – a Harvard educated scientist – wanted to discuss an email from Gates where he had turned down Nikolic’s proposal he buy an $11 million apartment in Manhattan and let him live in it.
“I need your help in thinking through,” Nikolic wrote to Epstein who seemed familiar with the bid for luxury digs. “In the meantime, please cancel Steve Gold’s house.”
The Steve Gold in question is a Manhattan real estate broker. Nikolic did not respond to The Post’s request for comment.
Nikolic told USA Todayhe regrets any association with Epstein and added: “Epstein inserted himself as a mediator and then used lies to pursue his own agenda.”
Things had deteriorated a couple of months later when Epstein made astonishing claims in a draft statement on behalf of Nikolic, announcing his intent to leave the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation he had worked for.
In an email Epstein had sent to himself in July 2013 which he appears to be writing as Nikolic, he claimed he assisted Gates in securing medication “in order to deal with the consequences of sex with Russian girls.”
“During the past few weeks I have been caught up in a severe marital dispute between Melinda and Bill,” Epstein wrote in Nikolic’s voice.
“From helping Bill to get drugs … to facilictating [sic] his illicit trysts, with married women, to being asked to provide adderall [for] bridge [tournaments].
Gates’ team has strongly denied these allegations, calling them “absolutely absurd and completely false.”
In a separate draft email to Gates, Epstein as Nikolic wrote: “[You] implore me to please delete the emails regarding your std [sic], your request that I provide you antibiotics that you can surreptitiously give to Melinda.”
A spokesperson for Gates told The Post, “The only thing these documents demonstrate is Epstein’s frustration that he did not have an ongoing relationship with Gates and the lengths he would go to entrap and defame.”
After Nikolic was out of the way, Epstein managed to latch onto Gates himself and in August 2014 was pitching him to appoint him as one of the heads of his charity funds
Epstein referenced a gathering of wealthy people “dealing with the same issues. How to give some away … I would like to help you. No more, no less.”
Gates’ response included, “I will find a time for us to talk this week.”
Ever eager to get in with Gates, Epstein — who’s advertised specialty was advising billionaires how to cut back tax payments — added, “No way to minimize the tax except private foundations or yours … Then they are forced to hire a foundation exec (whoops).”
That last line appears to be Epstein’s cheeky way of pitching himself for the position.
Following a breakfast they both attended, Gates — apparently there to discuss fundraising, wrote in December 2014 — “We managed to talk about philanthropy enough to get their reaction without putting them on the spot too much.”
Epstein responded, “We can partner, enjoy the process, etc. I suggest we have another meeting.”
Then, at the end of the email, he extended an invitation to his notorious ‘pedophile island’ in the Caribbean: “[M]any interesting people visiting the island over the holidays. Of course, you and your family are welcome. [There will be] women that Melinda might take comfort with.”
Gates’ people insist that meet-up did not happen.
“Mr. Gates never visited Epstein’s island, never attended parties with him, and had no involvement in any illegal activities associated with Epstein,” a spokesperson for Bill Gates told The Post.
Like many men, Gates should have perhaps listened to his wife more. She has cited his relationship as one of the reasons for their 2021 divorce. Even within the emails, there is a sense Melinda took exception to Epstein.
She said she once met him. “I wanted to see who this man was … I regretted it from the second I stepped in the door,” she said during a 2022 interview with Gayle King – and “had nightmares about it afterwards.”
Speaking with NPR on Tuesday, after the release of emails between Gates and Epstein, French Gates said, “It brings back memories of some very, very painful times in my marriage … I am so happy to be away from all the muck.”
According to the Gates spokesperson, “While Mr. Gates acknowledges that meeting with Epstein was a serious error in judgment, he unequivocally denies any improper conduct related to Epstein and the horrible activities in which Epstein was involved.”
It’s unclear how many times Gates and Epstein met, but there are two photos of them together in the Epstein files, taken on different locations, and in an email exchange from July 2011, Epstein brags about them hanging out together.
“Spent the day with Gates, in Seattle,” Epstein wrote to the tarnished British politician Peter Mandelson. “Having monstrous fun.”
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