As Melinda French Gates leaves the Gates Foundation, many hope she’ll double down on gender equity

Melinda French Gates is already one of the biggest philanthropic supporters of gender equity in the United States. Now, her grantees hope she now poised to put another $12.5 billion toward intractable problems like closing the gender pay gap and increasing women’s political participation. The additional funds come as French Gates announced Monday that she was stepping down as co-chair of the Gates Foundation, which she founded together with her ex-husband Bill Gates more than 20 years ago. Gates will provide the $12.5 billion as part of an agreement made when they divorced in 2021.