Latest / The Vault: The Epstein Files / The Bill Gates Epstein Related Congressional Transcripts (Part 2) (6/26/26)

Transcript

The Bill Gates Epstein Related Congressional Transcripts (Part 2) (6/26/26) · The Vault: The Epstein Files

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
• 0:03
  Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're going to pick up
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  where he left off with Bill Gates and the transcript
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  from his interview with Congress. Question what were your first
• 0:14
  impressions of mister Epstein? Answer? While he talked about a
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  lot of scientists that he would talk to, were business
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  leaders he would talk to, And he made that sound
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  fairly extensive, you know, across a wide range of topics,
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  somebody who focuses time on a large number of subjects
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  and new people who were deeply engaged in those areas. Questions,
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  So he made a good impression. Answer, you know, he's
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  kind of a unique person. You know, based on the
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  limited knowledge I have had at the time, it was
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  kind of a unique thing to have this large house
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  in Manhattan and to mention quite a wide range of
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  people from both business and academic areas. I would say,
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  you know, I thought that was unusual. Question who else
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  was with you at this first dinner you had with
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  mister Epstein in twenty eleven? Answer for dinner itself, just
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  doctor Nikolich? Question were other people traveling with you for that?
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  Is that what you meant? Answer? No, questions who at
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  the dinner you were with doctor Nikolch, mister Epstein, and
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  nobody else was at the dinner? Is that right? Answer?
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  That's right question. And did you understand his job or
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  career to be when you met with him? Answer? I'm
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  not sure if it was at night, but over time
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  he suggested that he provided tax advice and advice on
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  wills and a wide variety of people, both from Wall Street,
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  from the Middle East. You know that he was in
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  a position of trust with a number of wealthy people.
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  Question and you said you didn't get the sense he
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  was offering you any kind of service, So he wasn't
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  offering you the tax or estate services of any kind. Answer? No,
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  There came a time later when he brought it up,
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  you know he could help on taxes, and I rather
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  sternly rebuff the effort. Question sure, and we can get
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  more into that a bit later. So at this point,
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  meeting him for the first time in twenty eleven, did
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  you understand him to already be wealthy at that point? Answer? Well, certainly,
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  you know, just the house alone represented a significant amount
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  of wealth I'd never seen. I don't think to this
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  day I've seen a private house in Manhattan. That's quite
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  that spacious question. Did you have any idea at the
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  time how he acquired his money? Answer? No, to this day,
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  I find it a bit confusing question. And again will
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  get a bit deeper into your interactions with mister Epstein later,
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  but just for now, could you briefly characterize the nature
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  of the relationship that you had with mister Epstein between
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  twenty eleven and twenty fourteen. Was he a friend? Was
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  he a business associate? Answer? No, he certainly wasn't a friend.
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  You know, he made an effort to extend the relationship
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  with various invitations, but you know, eventually, you know, as
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  I talked about my work in global health for the
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  Gates Foundation, he suggested that he could raise substantial amounts
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  of money from people that he knew to help with
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  that endeavor, and he became the primary focus out In
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  twenty thirteen, twenty eleven, we just had you know, two dinners,
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  one where it was with Jess Daily and Larry Summers,
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  one where he was just drop them by. So, you know,
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  three encounters in twenty eleven and then over a year
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  passes and I see him twice in late twenty twelve
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  and then it's I think Spring twenty thirteen where this
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  purported availability of people who then they would sit and
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  talk about their wills, their taxes, that as part of
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  the process they would realize they had significant amount of
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  access money and hopefully they would want to give that
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  philanthropically and hopefully they would consider giving that to global health.
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  So that became the focus in spring of twenty thirteen. Question,
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  so you said he would give invitations for things. Were
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  these social functions or philanthropic or otherwise? Answer? No, they
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  weren't social. I mean, there was one time at the
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  end of a dinner David Blaine came and so that
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  was a lighter thing. He's a magician. But the meetings
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  they were always about the world and you know what
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  was going on. Obviously when somebody like Larry Summers or
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  Jess Staley is there, they're talking about what they see
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  in the world, what they expect. So it's a wide
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  ranging discussion. Question So did you ever socialize with Jeffrey Epstein? Answer? No,
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  I would not say I was socializing with them. I
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  was at a dinner where a wide range of serious
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  topics came up. When he, for example, invited me to
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  come to his island. That would have been socializing, and
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  I didn't do that. You know, one time in Paris
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  he asked me to go to a show, and I
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  said that would not be a good idea. I chose
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  not to do that. Question So he did invite you
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  to a couple of social functions and you just rejected him. Answer?
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  He did many things to try to deepen the relationship,
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  including various invitations. Question did you ever discuss sexual behavior
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  of any kind with Jeffrey Epstein? Answer no. Question Did
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  you ever witness Jeffrey Epstein engaging in sexual contact of
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  any kind? Answer no. Question did you ever witness Epstein
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  receive a massage from a young woman or a girl?
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  Answer no. Question Whether often young women or girls at
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  the places where you would meet with Epstein? Answer no.
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  The only time anyone who I'd call a girl was
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  around after that first dinner, Eva Dubin came and she
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  had her daughter with her. Other than that, there were
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  no young women at any other times I saw with Epstein.
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  Question so none of Epstein's employees, we understand, were younger women.
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  Did you ever meet any of those people? Answer? I
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  was not introduced to them, But you know, like when
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  you go to the New York thing. I think they
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  opened the door. Jeffrey, mister Epstein had what appeared to
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  be administrative assistance with them, and the extent of my
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  contact with them was that, you know, they were there
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  as I would go into the meeting. They never attended
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  any meeting that I was in. There were several occasions
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  where mister Ebstein asked me to be photographed with them
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  at the end of the meeting. I was not introduced
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  to them as part of that. That was quite brief.
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  One of the admins stayed when David Blaine did one
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  of his tricks, so she was standing around then. And
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  there was also a time when I took a flight
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  from Newark to Palm Beach and Jeffrey had two admin
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  assistants with them who sat in the front cabin. But
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  so I saw them as I walked onto the plane
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  and as I walked off the plane. So to the
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  other admins that were around, you know, who appeared to
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  be women, I believe they did not look to be underage.
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  I think I fully described any contact with women around
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  Epstein question, thank you, did you ever engage in sexual
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  contact of any kind in the presence of Jeffrey Epstein.
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  Answer no question. Did you ever engage in sexual contact
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  with a person introduced to you by or affiliated with
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  Jeffrey Epstein? Answer no question. Did Jeffrey Epstein or any
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  of his associates ever offer you a young woman or
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  a girl for the purpose of sex? Answer no question.
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  Did you ever receive a massage that was arranged by
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  Jeffrey Epstein or any of his staff or associates, answer
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  no question. We already discussed that you were aware that
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  he had been convicted of his sex crime, But to
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  be clear, at the time, were you aware that he
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  was a registered sex offender? Answer? I was not. Question.
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  Do you recall when you first learned that he was
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  a registered sex offender? Answer? You know it's really twenty
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  eighteen one, a Miami newspapers described the sort of extensive
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  and horrific details of what he had done before his
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  two thousand and eight two thousand and nine conviction, that
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  I became aware of the extent of his crimes, and
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  I believe that's when I first knew that he actually
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  registered as a sex offender. Question and so you ended
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  your relationship with mister Ebstein in late twenty fourteen, as
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  you've mentioned today, and you just said that you learned
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  he was a sex offender and more of the extent
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  of his crimes in twenty eighteen. To be clear, did
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  you have any interaction with mister Ebstein after twenty fourteen?
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  Did not? Question? Did you have any communication with mister
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  Epstein directly or through an intermediary during that time? Answer? Yeah,
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  right after twenty fourteen. There was an email sent to me.
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  After twenty fourteen, he sent me quite a bit of emails.
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  The majority of emails that he sent to me actually
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  were after I'd cut off all contact. Most of those
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  I did not read, but in the early period there
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  was some that I did read. One of those sought
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  reimbursement for what he purported was expenses that he paid
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  with a woman who he became aware of was a
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  woman who I had an affair with, and I communicated
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  to my key person, top person at Gates Ventures, Larry Cohen,
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  that we were never going to pay anything, and so
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  in that sense, I did have direct communication or indirect
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  communication with them, and I think that was in the
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  months after I cut off direct contact. Question. Okay, we'll
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  get into that a little bit more later, but just
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  a few questions about that. So this person that you
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  had the affair with is at Milla Antonova? Answer yes,
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  question and you said you directed your staff not to
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  reimburse mister Epstein for payments he was requesting. They were
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  you said, reimbursements for expenses he was covering for miss Antonova.
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  Is that right? Answer? That's what he represented. Question Why
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  would he want you to reimburse him for that? Answer?
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  You know, I viewed it as a tactic to re
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  engage with me. I'd never ask him to do anything
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  with respect to a person worth discussing, So I was
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  rather surprised. That was the first time I knew explicitly
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  that he'd become aware of that affair. Question. So you
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  did not know until I'm sorry, this was in twenty
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  fourteen that we're discussing now. Answer, yeah, late twenty fourteen,
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  maybe early twenty fifteen, where he's seeking reimbursement. Question, So
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  you did not know until late twenty fourteen or early
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  twenty fifteen that Jeffrey Epstein was aware of any of
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  your affairs or just this affair. Answer in the termination
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  or exit discussion relative to doctor Nikolch, which is as
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  early as I think spring of twenty thirteen, mister Epstein
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  made some bail references that made me wonder whether he
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  had become aware, which, you know, the only way I
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  can imagine that would have been happening was through doctor
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  Nicolch of either one or two affairs that I'd had
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  that doctor Nikolicch was aware of, but until the specific
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  reimbursement requests, it was a veil type of thing that
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  he would say, you know, we should all want to
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  remain friends. Question do you know what exactly the expenses
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  he paid for for miss Antonova were? Answer? I have
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  no idea. You know, he wasn't an honest person, so
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  understanding did he pay those expenses or not? I have
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  no knowledge? Question And we'll talk a little bit more
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  about that a little bit later. So we can go
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  ahead and move along. Mister Emmer, we've had another member joined.
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  Can you please announce yourself for the record, James Walkinshaw,
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  eleven District, Virginia. Now mister spector asking questions. Thank you,
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  mister Gates, and again we'll come back to some of
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  those topics and my apologies. We're probably going to bounce
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  around a little bit. We're going to try to have
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  some sort of you know, semblance of chronology. Here, Emmer,
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  we've had another member joined. Can he please announce himself
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  for the record? Congressman Eric Burlison, Missouri. Question, so we've
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  already begun talking about doctor Nikolch, but for the record,
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  who is doctor Nikolich? Answered doctor Nikolich. He is a
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  person who worked at the Gates Foundation on the diagnostic
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  strategy for a period. Then he left the Gates Foundation
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  and came to work at my private office, which was
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  called the BGC three. It's been renamed to Gates Ventures.
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  It's the same private office. So he worked there. I
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  think his title was Science Advisor from something like twenty
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  ten until one was his last day end of twenty thirteen. Yeah,
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  until the end of twenty thirteen. Question and just very briefly,
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  because we're going to be discussing his employment dispute, but
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  why did you leave his employment at the end of
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  twenty thirteen? Just briefly, did you fire him? Did he resign?
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  What exactly occurred? Answer? Doctor Nikolch when he worked for me,
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  had decided that he wanted to become a venture capitalist,
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  and so he said, hey, you know, working for you,
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  I can just make a salary. I understand about biotech companies,
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  which ones are going to be successful. I think both
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  in terms of impact and making money, that's where I
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  should go. And so more than a year before he left,
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  we talked about that. I said, you know, why don't
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  you stay another year. You can make some up to
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  three investments during the time you're with me, you know,
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  sort of practice venture capital type investment, and we'll share
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  the profit of those investments. So doctor Nikolch, you know,
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  had decided that he was moving on and was going
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  to venture capital. His actual exit was somewhat accelerated by
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  the fact that I share with my wife at the
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  time that he was aware of the affairs that I had,
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  and she and I discussed that I should probably have
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  him leave sooner rather than later. So that was a
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  factor in terms of the timing of his exit question. So,
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  in summary, he was already kind of had, you know,
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  one foot out the door to some degree, but it
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  was accelerated by the disclosure of your affairs to your
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  then wife, Melinda French Gates. Is that right answer? That's right?
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  I mean, I don't know what would have happened if
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  I hadn't given him the opportunity to make the investments,
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  and he was sort of saying that he didn't want
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  to go and do that, and so I think I
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  extended the amount of time he stayed with me by
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  letting him make up to three investments. Question would you
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  say doctor Nikolich was one of your closest advisers? Answer?
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  I have a lot of advisors, but he as my
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  science advisor at Gates Venture. He was a valuable advisor
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  to me. Did you see him as purely professional? Was
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  it purely a professional relationship or was he a friend
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  of yours as well? Answer? That was a professional relationship.
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  I mean where you draw the line there. I was
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  friendly with doctor Nikolch, but I didn't socialize with him.
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  He didn't come to my house. I didn't go to
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  his house. Question When was the last time you communicated
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  with doctor nikolic Answer? Many years ago? Question can you
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  give me an estimate. Was it twenty fourteen when he
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  left employment or was it after that? Answer? There was
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  an MIT advisory committee for some of the work the
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  Foundation was doing with MIT, and he stayed on that
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  committee for I think a year after he left, And
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  that was probably the last direct communication that I had
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  with him in those couple of years where he stayed
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  on the Advisory committee and no communication since then. All right, folks,
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  we're gonna wrap up right here, and in the next
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  episode dealing with the topic, we're gonna pick up where
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  we left off. All the information that goes with this
• 14:39
  episode can be found in the description box.