Did Bill Gates say that Ukraine stole billions of dollars in American aid?

In March 2025, a fragment of an interview that an entrepreneur and philanthropist gave to the NBC television channel spread in the Russian-language segment of social networks. In it, Gates allegedly accused Kyiv of stealing American billions. We have verified the authenticity of this video. 

In the 26-second video, the TV presenter asks (quoted in Russian subtitles): “Knowing Elon [Musk] as you know him, are you comfortable with the amount of power he has now?” To this Bill Gates responds: “Yes, I admire what he has done for private business. You know SpaceX and Tesla are amazing companies. Musk has the necessary drive, the necessary rage to deal with the theft of American billions in Ukraine. You know, from somewhere these mansions appeared for the Ukrainian generals.”

On Telegram, this video was shared by channels such as “Russia now"(192,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Rhymes and news"(111,000), "Z-News | Army"(84,000), "Cat Kostyan" (83,000) and "A penny saves the ruble"(21,000).

Since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion, the United States has provided Ukraine with significant military and financial support. In February 2025, US President Donald Trump appreciated it is $350 billion, but independent researchers talk about smaller amounts. By data Kiel Institute of World Economy (IfW), by the end of 2024, American aid to Kyiv amounted to €114 billion (about $123.5 billion at the exchange rate at the time of writing the analysis). President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky in interview The Associated Press stated in early February that the country received military support from the United States in the amount of not $177 billion or $200 billion, but about $75 billion. In turn, the US government working group coordinating assistance to Ukraine assertsthat Washington has committed to provide support in the amount of $183 billion, of which less than half has been transferred - $83 billion. This amount includes assistance both from the Pentagon and within the framework of humanitarian programs.

Although news of Gates' alleged statement about stealing US aid for Ukraine spread in mid-March, interview The entrepreneur gave NBC another message on February 4. In a conversation with Today show host Savannah Guthrie, he talked about his memoir book, answered questions about working at Microsoft, his personal life and relationship with Trump, and also shared his opinion about Musk. In less than nine minutes of conversation, the topic of Ukraine was not touched upon. The viral video closely matches an NBC News video made from the same interview and published on YouTube in the format Shorts.

However, there are also differences. Thus, the font and brightness of the text of the English subtitles are different, and the upper subtitles in the viral video are completely absent. At the same time, in the upper right corner there is a different date: March 10 instead of February 4, when the interview was aired.

However, these are minor things compared to the main difference. In the original video, at 17 seconds, Gates, having said kind words about SpaceX and Tesla, notes: “You know, I think in the case of USAID he does not appreciate the phenomenal work that is being done (apparently referring to the upcoming closure of the US Agency for International Development, which Musk announced February 3. — Approx. ed.). This is not partisan work, this is food, this is... I give billions of dollars for the same things that USAID does. I go into a topic, study it, hire scientists, and I think if he really knew about this activity, he wouldn’t tell 10,000 people not to come to work.” In the viral video, instead of this quote, words are heard about the theft of American billions by Ukraine, and Gates’ face is not shown even once during the entire time. Instead, we see a portrait of Musk, an image of dollars, and also a photo of a certain villa (at the moment when it comes to Ukrainian generals). 

Pictured villa, as a reverse Google image search reveals, is located in the Hollywood Hills area of ​​Los Angeles. According to data from open sources, her last time purchased in August 2021 for $23 million and has not been offered for sale since. This contradicts the conclusion drawn in the viral video using the image as an example: allegedly, Ukrainian generals used American aid, which began arriving in 2022, for personal enrichment. In January 2025, when Los Angeles was engulfed in fires, Russian media distributed information that eight mansions of Ukrainian military leaders were destroyed in the fire. In fact, the news turned out to be fake.

“Verified” studied that part of the audio track that is not in the original video from NBC News, using the service DeepFake—o-meter, which serves to identify AI content. The results of the analysis showed that Gates' voice was highly likely generated by a neural network.

The earliest publication of a falsified excerpt from an interview with Gates, which Verified was able to detect, appeared on March 12, 2025 at 15:58 Moscow time, when it was posted by the pro-Kremlin Telegram channel “Kryminforum" He has repeatedly appeared in “Verified” analyzes as original source disinformation about Ukraine.

Thus, Bill Gates did not accuse Ukraine of stealing billions of dollars in American aid. The only evidence for the alleged claim is an AI-edited excerpt from an interview the billionaire gave several weeks earlier.

Cover photo: screenshot YouTube

Fake

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on topic:

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2. Is it true that eight mansions of Ukrainian generals burned down in Los Angeles?
3. Is it true that a Ukrainian volunteer spent $1 million raised to buy drones on a villa in Spain?
4. Is the audio recording of Trump Jr. telling the truth that the US should have supplied weapons to Russia, not Ukraine?