MacKenzie Scott, the ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, gave a record-breaking $275 million donation to abortion provider Planned Parenthood.
Scott’s $275 million donation is part of her pledge to donate the majority of her wealth. Scott walked away with a 4 percent stock interest in Amazon after her divorce from Bezos. Scott’s donation is the largest in Planned Parenthood’s history.
The multimillion-dollar donation comes as legal scholars anticipate Roe v. Wade may be overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court this term.
In their statement recognizing Scott’s donation, Planned Parenthood said 2021 “ was the worst year for abortion rights since Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973.”
While conservative states like Texas and Mississippi have recently passed laws restricting access to abortions, the liberal state of California just passed a law making abortion free for those who want one.
Planned Parenthood president and CEO Alexis McGill Johnson said Scott’s donation will help black women, who “will be most hurt by the loss of abortion access in the South and Midwest.”
“This funding will support our efforts to advance health equity by eliminating racial and structural barriers for our patients in the communities where Planned Parenthood works,” Johnson said, adding:
By starting with the Black health experience in partnership with local communities, we see this as an opportunity to not only improve health outcomes for Black patients, but to transform how all patients, especially those of color and those in rural and low income communities, experience our health care, education, and organizing efforts.
Scott announced she had donated over $3.8 billion to 465 different non-profit organizations, including Planned Parenthood, since last June. “Our team’s focus over these last nine months has included some new areas, but as always our aim has been to support the needs of underrepresented people from groups of all kinds,” Scott wrote in a blog post on Wednesday.
Forbes magazine reported that Scott was worth about $49 million as of Wednesday.