MacKenzie Scott, the ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has donated around $1.7 billion of her fortune to charitable groups.
Scott, who now goes by her maiden name instead of Bezos, announced the donations in a Tuesday post on the blogging website Medium. Scott pointed out that after receiving an enormous amount of wealth during her divorce, she had promised to donate the majority “back to the society that helped generate it.”
“Like many, I watched the first half of 2020 with a mixture of heartbreak and horror. Life will never stop finding fresh ways to expose inequities in our systems; or waking us up to the fact that a civilization this imbalanced is not only unjust, but also unstable. What fills me with hope is the thought of what will come if each of us reflects on what we can offer,” she said.
In the post, she included a breakdown of the categories of organizations to which her funds have gone: $586.7 million to groups supporting racial equity; $399.5 million toward economic mobility; $133 million to gender equity; $128.3 million to public health; $46 million to LGBT equity; $55 million to “empathy and bridging divides”; $72 million to “functional democracy”; $130 million to global development; and $125 million to combat climate change.
“On this list, 91% of the racial equity organizations are run by leaders of color, 100% of the LGBTQ+ equity organizations are run by LGBTQ+ leaders, and 83% of the gender equity organizations are run by women, bringing lived experience to solutions for imbalanced social systems,” she added.
Scott also included the names of more than 100 groups, organizations, and institutions she has contributed to, including the George W. Bush Presidential Center, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, the Obama Foundation, the Trevor Project, Crisis Text Line, and Howard University.
“I recommend these organizations to anyone similarly excited by the idea of empowering leaders well-positioned to accelerate progress. Every one of them is tackling complex challenges that will require sustained effort over many years, while simultaneously addressing consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic,” she said.
After 25 years of marriage, Jeff Bezos announced the couple’s divorce in January 2019. The two have four children, and Bezos said at the time that despite the divorce, he and Scott would continue to pursue “ventures and adventures” together.
Scott is listed by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index as being worth more than $59 billion. She had first pledged to donate more than half of her wealth to charity last May.
“No drive has more positive ripple effects than the desire to be of service,” Scott wrote in a letter at the time. “We each come by the gifts we have to offer by an infinite series of influences and lucky breaks we can never fully understand. In addition to whatever assets life has nurtured in me, I have a disproportionate amount of money to share.”
