Warren Buffett warns Gates Foundation there is no guarantee his support of the charity will continue once he’s gone: ‘No money coming after my death’
After donating more than $39 billion over the span of 15 years, Warren Buffett warned his support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation may end with him.
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, the 93-year-old philanthropist said his will did not foresee further explicit pledges of charity to the organization once he was gone. Up until now there was no concrete indication one way or the other what might happen with his fortune in the event of his passing.
“The Gates Foundation has no money coming after my death,” said Buffett, whose longtime business partner at Berkshire Hathaway, Charlie Munger, passed away at the age of 99 late last year.
Buffett explained that all of his remaining wealth—currently worth around $127 billion—that he has not given away by then will be bequeathed to a charitable trust overseen by his three children: Howard, Susie, and Peter.
While this does not, in and of itself, preclude the eventuality of future donations to the Gates Foundation, Buffett said they will have to decide unanimously how his billions will be spent once he’s gone.
“I feel very, very good about the values of my three children,” he told the Journal, “and I have 100% trust in how they will carry things out.”
Buffett, whose will becomes public upon his death, first sketched out a plan for what would become of his wealth in November, naming the three as executors and trustees.
“They were not fully prepared for this awesome responsibility in 2006, but they are now,” he said at the time.
Speaking to the paper, his daughter and two sons said they had not yet made concrete plans for how the money would be spent, not only because it depended on tax laws and developments in society but also because it was premature.
“I can imagine it will be probably some continuation of what we’ve been doing,” Susie Buffett said.
The Gates Foundation did not respond to a request from Fortune for a statement.
Second recent blow to the Gates Foundation
Run by CEO Mark Suzman, the charity has disbursed grants totaling almost $78 billion since it was founded. Among its causes—combating poverty around the world and eradicating malaria, a disease that claims over 600,000 lives every year.
One of the foundation’s most generous supporters, Buffett has made donations since 2006, when he joined as trustee. Buffett stepped down in 2021, the same year in which Melinda French Gates announced her intention to divorce the Microsoft cofounder.
On Friday, Berkshire Hathaway said in a statement the Omaha native would donate a further 9.9 million shares of its class B stock worth a total of $4 billion to the foundation effective immediately.
The news is the second recent blow to Suzman and the foundation, after Melinda French Gates resigned in May in order to devote herself to the fight against the rollback of women’s rights in the U.S. and around the world.
“Warren Buffett has been exceedingly generous to the Gates Foundation through more than 18 years of contributions and advice,” Suzman told the Journal. “He has played an invaluable role in championing and shaping the foundation’s work to create a world where every person can live a healthy, productive life.”
