The Foundation called it priorities — the timing tells a different story
Bill Gates was scheduled to deliver the keynote address at India’s AI Impact Summit on Thursday. He did not. Hours before he was due on stage in New Delhi, the Gates Foundation announced his withdrawal — offering an explanation about keeping focus on the summit’s priorities while declining to address the more obvious question hanging over the decision.
The cancellation came as scrutiny over Gates’ past relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein intensified following the release of emails by the U.S. Department of Justice. Those emails revealed communications between Epstein and Gates Foundation staff, adding new detail to a connection that Gates has long characterized as limited and mistaken.
What the Foundation said — and what it didn’t
The Gates Foundation’s stated reason for the withdrawal was that Gates’ absence would allow the summit to stay focused on its core priorities. That explanation arrived just days after the foundation had publicly dismissed rumors of a cancellation and confirmed he was on track to attend. The reversal, and the gap between those two positions, drew immediate attention.
A foundation representative did not respond to questions about whether the withdrawal was directly connected to the Epstein scrutiny. The foundation’s chief strategy officer stepped in to deliver remarks in Gates’ place.
Gates has previously acknowledged that meeting Epstein was a mistake and has said the interactions were confined to philanthropy-related discussions. The DOJ email release has renewed pressure on that account and placed the relationship back in prominent public conversation at a moment Gates was scheduled to appear on a global stage.
A summit already dealing with setbacks
Gates’ exit landed on an event that had already absorbed a difficult opening stretch. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had cancelled his appearance earlier in the week, removing another marquee name from a summit billed as the first major AI forum in the Global South. Organizers had also been managing complaints about logistical problems including traffic chaos and what reports described as a robot row — a dispute over the use of robotic displays at the event.
Despite the high-profile withdrawals and organizational friction, the six-day summit produced more than $200 billion in investment pledges for AI infrastructure in India — a significant outcome for a country that has been actively positioning itself as a leading voice in global AI governance.
Other major tech figures including Google’s Sundar Pichai, OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Anthropic’s Dario Amodei were among the attendees on the confirmed list for the event.
Why the Epstein emails matter now
The DOJ email release last month placed Epstein’s communications with the Gates Foundation into the public record in a way that previous reporting had not. The emails do not appear to have produced new legal exposure for Gates, but they have renewed questions about the nature and extent of a relationship that Gates has consistently sought to minimize.
The timing of the India cancellation — coming weeks after that release and during a period of fresh media scrutiny — makes the foundation’s stated reason for the withdrawal difficult to accept entirely at face value, even if the full picture remains unclear. No direct link between the cancellation and the Epstein scrutiny has been confirmed by the foundation.
What it means for Gates’ public profile
Gates remains one of the most prominent philanthropists and technology figures in the world, and the Gates Foundation continues to operate significant global health and development programs. But the Epstein association has been a recurring reputational challenge since it first became public, and each new document release or media cycle returns it to the foreground.
Pulling out of a flagship international AI summit hours before a keynote — and doing so without a clear explanation — is the kind of decision that tends to generate more questions than it answers. Whether those questions get addressed directly remains, for now, an open one.
