--- title: "Bill Gates Accuses Elon Musk of “Killing the World’s Poorest Children”" description: "Bill Gates has accused Elon Musk of \"killing the world's poorest children\" by cutting crucial foreign aid programs." date: "2025-05-08" modified: "2025-05-08" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/bill-gates-elon-musk-killing-children" categories: - "Elon Musk" - "Future Society" - "The Industrialists" tags: - "Bill Gates" - "doge" - "elon musk" - "trump" --- # Bill Gates Accuses Elon Musk of “Killing the World’s Poorest Children” ![Bill Gates has accused Elon Musk of "killing the world's poorest children" by cutting crucial foreign aid programs.]() *\Image: Tom Weller / VOIGT / Getty / Futurism\* In an [ongoing battle]() for which capitalist overlord can claim the moral high ground, Microsoft founder and the world's sixth richest man, Bill Gates, has accused Elon Musk of "killing the world's poorest children" by [gutting]() the US Agency for International Development (USAID). "The picture of the world's richest man killing the world's poorest children is not a pretty one," Gates [told the ]()[*Financial Times*](). Musk, through his so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), all but shuttered USAID in February by [freezing its grants]() used for foreign assistance and [slashing its workforce](), once 10,000 strong, to less than 300 employees. Gates said that the abruptness of the cuts meant that troves of food and medicines are now [rotting in warehouses](). In April, the *New York Times* [reported]() that Musk's USAID cuts forced hundreds of [soup kitchens in Sudan to shut down](). Gates also slammed Musk for having no understanding of USAID or the work it did, citing how Musk cancelled grants because he [wrongly believed]() that the agency was supplying condoms to Hamas in Gaza, Palestine — when in reality, those grants were for a hospital in Gaza Province, Mozambique, to prevent women transmitting HIV to their babies. "I'd love for him to go in and meet the children that have now been infected with HIV because he cut that money," Gates told the *FT*. In a separate [interview with the *New York Times*](), Gates called the USAID cuts "stunning" and chided Musk for his [lack of charitable giving](). "Well, he's the one who cut the USAID budget. He put it in the wood chipper, because he didn't go to a party that weekend," Gates told the *NYT*. When the interviewer raised Musk's commitment to the Giving Pledge, Gates noted that the pledge to give away most of your fortune doesn't have to be fulfilled while you're still alive — it can be done after you're dead, too. "So who knows? \[Musk\] could go on to be a great philanthropist," he said. "In the meantime, the world's richest man has been involved in the deaths of the world's poorest children." Grimly, Gates offered an estimate of just how many children's lives were being endangered due to the cuts to foreign aid. "On childhood deaths, which over the next few years should have gone from five million to four million — now, unless there’s a big reversal, we’ll probably go from five million to six million," Gates told the *NYT*. Gates' comments come as he announces his plan to close down the Gates Foundation by 2045, which is decades ahead of schedule. His intent, in the meantime, is to accelerate his philanthropic giving. As the *FT* notes, critics have accused Gates of using his charitable initiatives [as a tax shield](). USAID isn't above criticism, either. For all the very real aid it provides, it's also [an extension of aggressive US foreign policy](), furthering imperial interests under a benevolent guise and going as far as in some cases to [foment regime change](). Of course, that's not why Musk or the Trump administration is gutting the agency. There's no coherent and principled anti-imperialist thinking informing Musk, who [once declared]() that the US would "coup whoever we want." Most of his logic, from what he's shared with the public, [amounts to brainless conspiracies](), such as [believing]() that USAID has been constructing a "Truman Show"-style false reality around all of humanity, or [that it was]() a "viper's nest of radical left Marxists who hate America." His right-wing counterparts, meanwhile, believe that USAID went "[woke]()." Musk himself [once claimed]() that USAID was "funding DEI abroad." In short, it's clear that Musk doesn't have the best interests in mind of the children and everyone else who once depended on foreign aid to survive. **More on DOGE cuts:** *[Trump Admin Cancels Programs to Protect Children From Toxic Chemicals]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()