“Everyone I meet is anxious and hopeless,” Kara Swisher said to Melinda French Gates on her podcast, On with Kara Swisher. She continues by asking: What would be your advice to people who are feeling that way?
To me, her answer fell flat. She said: Think local. Call your senators. Let them know you’re upset. “Protest if that feels right for you.”
Don’t get me wrong—I agree with those things. But she spoke with soft passion. It did not feel authentic.
Earlier, she lamented DOGE’s near elimination of USAID, an agency French Gates has worked closely with, especially in Africa—where she has proudly visited 30 times.
Women and girls center her philanthropic work. French Gates has donated some $1 billion to efforts advancing the equality of what Simone de Beauvoir calls the “second sex”—women, girls, us, we, I.
Bur her conversation with Swisher left me expecting more. She sounded a bit out of touch, for instance, when saying she was not afraid of Trump—unlike some of her big money peers. In my mind, all I thought was: Little easy for you to say… You’re still a billionaire after all.
Other topics they touched on: Toxic masculinity—She says boys need better role models and worries about the “horrific” suicide rates of men in America. More girls in tech—French Gates contends more women should work in AI (“the new frontier”).
Oh, and she briefly talked about Bill, her ex-husband whom she divorced in 2021 after infidelity rumors spread and his past relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was revealed.
Swisher, a very good interviewer, shared her own story about the complexity of divorce to get the conversation going: apparently, Swisher’s ex wife, Megyn Smith, is good friends with her kids from her second and current marriage to Amanda Katz—to the muted chagrin of Katz.
French Gates found the story amusing—but she could not relate. “Weddings and funerals,” was her cheeky reply to Swisher’s inquiry about her relationship with Bill.
Last year, French Gates was confirmed to be dating a tech entrepreneur, and a good looking one at that, Philip Vaughn. On Stephen Colbert last week, she said dating has been “pretty great!”
Bill has been officially dating Paula Hurd, ex-wife of late Oracle CEO Mark Hurd, since 2023.
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