Seattle, May 9 – Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has sharply criticized Elon Musk, accusing the Tesla CEO of contributing to the deaths of the world’s poorest children by backing sweeping cuts to U.S. foreign aid. The comments come as Gates unveiled a plan to give away nearly his entire fortune—valued at around $200 billion—by 2045 through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Gates, 69, said the foundation will accelerate its timeline and shut down by the end of 2045, years ahead of its original schedule. He pledged to increase the foundation’s annual budget to $9 billion by 2026, rising to $10 billion annually thereafter.
“The picture of the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children is not a pretty one,” Gates told the Financial Times, referencing Musk’s support for cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
Foreign aid budgets, especially from the United States, have seen sharp reductions in recent years. Under the Trump administration, with support from Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), USAID reportedly saw up to 80% of its programs—worth $44 billion in 2023—cut or defunded. Musk has publicly mocked the agency, once saying he had “fed USAID into the wood chipper.”
In a separate interview with Reuters, Gates warned that such cuts could reverse decades of progress in global health. “The number of deaths will start going up for the first time… it’s going to be millions more deaths because of the loss of resources,” he said.
Gates emphasized that private philanthropy, even on a scale as large as the Gates Foundation, cannot fill the gap left by government withdrawal. “There are too many urgent problems to solve for me to hold onto resources that could be used to help people,” he wrote in a blog post.
Since its launch in 2000, the Gates Foundation has donated $100 billion to global health and development causes, including vaccine delivery through Gavi and support for HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria programs via the Global Fund.
Musk, who leads Tesla, SpaceX, and the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), responded to a clip of Gates’s remarks by posting “Gates should be in prison.” The post was later deleted, and Musk’s team did not respond to requests for comment.
Gates and Musk were once aligned in their belief that wealthy individuals should use their fortunes to solve global problems, but the relationship has soured in recent years.
Despite the criticism and setbacks, Gates said he remains optimistic. “I think governments will come back to caring about children surviving,” he said. The announcement was made on the 25th anniversary of the Gates Foundation, which now plans to conclude its operations after donating nearly all of Gates’s current $108 billion fortune. The final figure will depend on market conditions and inflation.
While the foundation has been credited with saving millions of lives, it has also drawn scrutiny for its influence over global health policy and its close ties to organizations like the World Health Organization. Gates, who was a frequent target of conspiracy theories during the COVID-19 pandemic, said he has spoken with former President Trump multiple times this year to advocate for renewed investment in global health.
“The world does have values. That’s what my parents taught me,” Gates said.
