Melinda French Gates is a philanthropist, businesswoman and longtime advocate for gender equality. Gates joins The Post’s Leigh Ann Caldwell to share her efforts to help more women run for public office in the United States, how she sees the structural barriers holding women back and her approach to philanthropy.
Melinda French Gates joins Washington Post Live on Thursday, July 27. (Video: The Washington Post)
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“I’m working with many, many partners in the field and we’re looking at what research is needed to show why women don’t have parity in certain sectors. We’re looking at barriers that hold and push women down, like our broken caregiving system in the United States. Or the harassment that happens of women in the workforce. And then we’re looking at what key industries do you really need to get closer to parity, so you tip society. And I believe those industries are politics … finance … tech … and its media … When we get women closer to parity in those industries you will tip society.” - Melinda French Gates (Video: Washington Post Live)
“The people who are in our party need to represent society. To me, it makes zero sense that today there are 16 million Black women in the United States and there’s not a single Black female senator. Not one … Our halls of Congress are supposed to look like our democracy.” - Melinda French Gates (Video: Washington Post Live)
“At the state legislature level, they make a lot of policy that affect people in their state and you feel it really substantially in your state. They control, at the state legislature, $2 trillion of resources, so you want them looking like society. There are also 7,000 seats at the state legislative level, that’s important because it’s a great place that is a wonderful training ground for people to then go on to higher office. In fact, you see many people who are in Congress today actually came through their state legislatures. For me, that’s a great place to focus because there are so many seats and opportunities to affect change and create policy.” - Melinda French Gates (Video: Washington Post Live)
“I want to see in this election, central to the election, two things on the agenda: 1) Caregiving. Our caregiving system is absolutely broken in this country. It was starkly in our faces during COVID and now women are saying they’re opting out of the workforce because they either can’t find good care for their children or it’s too expensive. I want to see us fix this broken caregiving system … And then also, I want us to address adolescent mental health. We have a crisis in this country, it was building before COVID came along, COVID exacerbated it. But you can’t talk to a family that hasn’t had some end of the spectrum of some form of mental health crisis … Those are two key issues that I’m looking at in this election.” - Melinda French Gates (Video: Washington Post Live)
“I think we can look back in history for a perfect example here and that is the founders of the Constitution. They wrote some incredible laws in place that govern our country today. However, women didn’t get to vote. Black people definitely weren’t counted. And look how long it took for us to get the vote for those two groups. And now, look at the bias we still have in society, particularly around women and people of color. So, with AI, if you don’t have women with a seat at the table creating AI, helping with the rules, helping with the regulations; if you don’t have people of color, you’re automatically biasing it towards one part of society … I want to make sure that AI is made for all of us.” - Melinda French Gates (Video: Washington Post Live)
Melinda French Gates
Founder, Pivotal Ventures
Co-Chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
