Bill Gates is set to testify before the US Congress as part of the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking investigation.
It comes as the 70-year-old billionaire tech mogul made a tearful apology over his links with the disgraced pedophile.
Gates has been summoned to Washington DC to answer questions from the House Oversight Committee as part of the Epstein investigation.
A spokesperson for the Microsoft co-founder said he “welcomes this opportunity”.
“Although he never witnessed or participated in any of Epstein’s illegal conduct, he looks forward to answering all of the committee’s questions in support of its important work,” he said in a statement.
There are increasing calls for high-profile figures named in the Epstein files to testify about any information they have about his crimes.
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Bill and Hillary Clinton are among the big names who have given evidence so far.
The bombshell files released by the Justice Department included email exchanges between Gates and Epstein.
The series of documents also included photos of Gates posing with women whose faces have been removed.
In his first interview since the files were released, Gates admitted that it was “stupid” of him to spend time with a convicted sex offender.
He said: “I regret every minute I spent with her and I apologize that I did it.”
Gates first met Epstein in 2011 after the sex trafficker was jailed and corresponded with him several times in the years that followed.
The pair remained in touch over a long period of about three years, where they reportedly discussed expanding the Microsoft chief’s philanthropic efforts.
Gates has admitted to having affairs during his marriage to his ex-wife Melinda, who filed for divorce in 2021 after 27 years of marriage.
He has previously said that his cases do not involve any of Epstein’s victims.
But it was claimed that the disgraced financier had traced his assets.
In a 2013 email to a top Gates adviser, Epstein named two women whom he claimed the tech giant allegedly slept with while they were married.
The pedophile claimed the two women risked “becoming overnight sensations”.
Epstein claimed in other emails Gates had a sexually transmitted disease After sleeping with “Russian girls”.
Gates has denied the claims and described the emails as “false”.
According to a Wall Street Journal report, Epstein had previously threatened Gates over his relationship with Russian bridge player Mila Antonova.
The convicted sex trafficker met Antonova while looking for financial support for Bridge Academy – and later paid for her to enroll in the software coding school.
Gates met Antonova during a 2010 bridge tournament they were playing in, three years before she met Epstein.
This comes after his ex-wife Melinda Gates broke her silence on the scandal.
She said the allegations reminded her of a “very, very painful” time in her marriage to the tech tycoon, adding that questions “need to be answered” as the scandal grows.
Gates’ hearing is scheduled for June 10.
Epstein was arrested on federal sex trafficking charges in 2019 and was found dead in his prison cell in August that year.
