Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has acknowledged having affairs with two Russian women during his marriage to Melinda French Gates, identifying one as a bridge player and the other as a nuclear physicist whose name has not been made public.
Speaking at a Gates Foundation town hall meeting on Tuesday, the Microsoft co-founder 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.”
Gates’ remarks came amid renewed scrutiny over his past meetings with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The bridge player was previously identified by The Wall Street Journal in 2023 as Mila Antonova. She reportedly met Gates around 2010 at a national bridge tournament in Washington, D.C., when she was in her 20s and he was still married.
Antonova later described their introduction at a talk in New York as less than romantic, saying, “I didn’t beat him but I tried to kick him with my leg,” and adding that she had spent years trying to meet him.
The timeline and duration of their alleged relationship have not been publicly confirmed.
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| Bill Gates and Mila Antonova at a bridge tournament in 2010. Photo from X |
Antonova was also reported to be acquainted with Russian spy Anna Chapman, with a photo showing them walking near Wall Street before Chapman, the daughter of a former KGB officer, was expelled from the U.S. according to the New York Post.
Rumors of Gates’ affair with Antonova first emerged over her ties to Epstein. Epstein met her in 2013 while she was seeking funding for an online bridge-teaching platform, though he ultimately did not invest.
Antonova said Epstein paid for her programming school tuition as part of helping her pursue a career in software development, she said in 2023, when she had initially refused to confirm the affair with Gates.
She has said she was unaware of Epstein’s criminal conduct at the time, adding: “I had no idea that he was a criminal or had any ulterior motive. I am disgusted with Epstein and what he did.”
The second woman Gates referenced was described only as a Russian nuclear physicist, and her identity has not been disclosed publicly.
Gates said she had worked at one of his companies, though it remains unclear whether their relationship, which allegedly began in 2010, overlapped with her employment, according to the Daily Mail.
In a July 4, 2013 email to Boris Nikolic, Gates’ chief adviser for science and technology, Epstein named the two women with whom he alleged Gates had affairs and claimed the women risked “becoming overnight sensations.”
“Bill risks going from richest man to biggest hypocrite, Melinda a laughing stock, pledges will disappear as a result,” Epstein told Nikolic.
Gates and Melinda announced their divorce in May 2021 after 27 years of marriage, saying they could no longer “grow together as a couple in this next phase of our lives.”
Melinda recently told NPR’s “Wild Card” podcast that the resurfaced Epstein-related emails brought back memories of “very, very painful times” during their marriage