{"id":152861,"date":"2026-07-15T12:45:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T12:45:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/152861\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T12:45:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T12:45:13","slug":"warren-buffett-talks-bill-gates-epstein-ties-gates-foundation-snub","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/152861\/","title":{"rendered":"Warren Buffett Talks Bill Gates’ Epstein Ties, Gates Foundation Snub"},"content":{"rendered":"

Warren Buffett shone a light on his relationship with Bill Gates, and his decision to end his annual donations<\/a> to the Gates Foundation, in a rare interview with CNBC’s Becky Quick on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The famed investor<\/a> and Berkshire Hathaway chairman said he’d “read a great deal” about Gates’ ties to Jeffrey Epstein, and while it was a “distasteful” situation, everyone makes mistakes in judging people.<\/p>\n

“I found nothing in there that was beyond what I could picture myself doing,” Buffett said about the transcript<\/a> of Gates’ voluntary testimony to the House Oversight Committee last month as part of its investigation into Epstein.<\/p>\n

Gates testified that he was introduced to Epstein by trusted associates, and the pair met several times between 2011 and 2014 in connection with philanthropic fundraising.<\/p>\n

The Microsoft cofounder said that he never witnessed any criminal conduct from Epstein, never visited his notorious island, and didn’t seek a personal relationship with him.<\/p>\n

Gates said that associating with Epstein was a “grave error in judgment<\/a>” driven by his hope to raise funds for his global health work.<\/p>\n

“No one bats a thousand in the business of choosing people,” Buffett said.<\/p>\n

Buffett, who announced this week that he’s donating a total of $6 billion in Berkshire stock to four of his family’s foundations<\/a>, told Quick why he wasn’t giving the lion’s share of his yearly gift to the Gates Foundation as usual.<\/p>\n

The legendary stock picker, who turns 96 in August, said that he’s already given the Gates Foundation a “great deal of money<\/a>,” it has plenty of financial firepower, Gates himself has ample resources, and Buffett now trusts his children with his estate.<\/p>\n

Buffett said in a news release announcing the donations on Tuesday that he hopes his three kids<\/a> can disburse all of his Berkshire stock \u2014 which accounts for over 99% of his wealth \u2014 by the end of 2034.<\/p>\n

“I’ve really done the same thing as Bill, in a certain sense,” Buffett said, referring to Gates saying last year<\/a> that he would “give away virtually all my wealth through the Gates Foundation over the next 20 years.”<\/p>\n

The Gates Foundation said in a statement that it is “grateful” to Buffett for his decades of support and more than $47 billion of gifts, and it remains in a “position of financial strength to advance our work through 2045, supported by Bill’s $200 billion commitment.”<\/p>\n

The former Berkshire CEO, who made way for Greg Abel<\/a> at the start of this year after six decades in charge, said that Gates had visited him in his hometown of Omaha a few weeks ago and that the pair had spent about three hours talking.<\/p>\n

Buffett, who first met Gates<\/a> on the Fourth of July weekend in 1991, said they have had an “enormous number of good times together<\/a> since we’ve met,” and have shared a “wonderful friendship.”<\/p>\n

After the interview aired, Quick revealed that Buffett broke his leg a few weeks ago and underwent surgery, but he’s recovering well and can walk with some assistance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Warren Buffett shone a light on his relationship with Bill Gates, and his decision to end his annual…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":152862,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[162],"tags":[71626,2479,651,34365,670,1781,71625,71627,7957,1812,71628,10037,669,6029,71629],"class_list":["post-152861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-warren-buffett","tag-annual-donation","tag-becky-quick","tag-bill-gates","tag-decade","tag-epstein-tie","tag-gates","tag-gates-foundation-snub","tag-great-deal","tag-last-year","tag-money","tag-pair","tag-relationship","tag-warren-buffett","tag-week","tag-yearly-gift"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@people\/116924063762234833","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=152861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/152862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=152861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=152861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=152861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}