Elon Musk has taken aim at the $26 billion in charity donations made by MacKenzie Scott, Jeff Bezos‘ ex-wife. Married in 1993, the former couple finalized their divorce in 2019 after 25 years. Since then, Scott has committed to giving away most of her fortune “until the safe is empty” to support social progress.
Elon Musk said this about Jeff Bezos’ ex-wife, Mackenzie Scott’s donations
Elon Musk has sparked controversy by claiming that MacKenzie Scott’s record-breaking, multibillion-dollar charity drive is damaging society rather than helping it.
The dispute emerged after disclosures that Scott’s charitable contributions have exceeded $26.3 billion, positioning her as one of the most significant individual benefactors in history. Since her 2019 divorce from Jeff Bezos, she has committed the majority of her Amazon-derived wealth to philanthropy aimed at bettering society.
Musk, however, criticized the donations and suggested that they are counterproductive. Responding on X (formerly Twitter), he wrote: “Sadly yes.” He was replying to a user who posted: “Unfortunately, she’s spending it making the world a worse place.”
That said, this isn’t Musk’s first swipe. In March 2024, he called out Scott with an X post. It read: “Super rich ex-wives who hate their former spouse should be listed among ‘Reasons that Western Civilization died.'” The tech mogul later removed the post, suggesting her giving was motivated by animosity toward Bezos, but it had already been saved and widely covered.
In May 2022, Musk claimed that Scott was donating to political action committees (PACs) posing as charities and that “a lot of others are getting caught in the crossfire”. Most recently, Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan called her donations “bad” for lacking oversight, to which the Tesla CEO replied, “Yup”.
Through her organization Yield Giving, MacKenzie Scott has given away roughly $26.2 billion. In 2023 alone, she accounted for nearly one-third of all U.S. megagifts, contributing $7 billion of the $19.2 billion in major donations. Scott’s contributions have reached around 2,700 nonprofits, from Howard University to climate-focused organizations. She selects recipients using a low-profile approach she calls “quiet research,” focusing on groups serving overlooked communities.
