Trump’s alleged pressure on Jeff Bezos resurfaces amid Washington Post editorial changes

Alleged pressure from former President Trump on Jeff Bezos over the Washington Post's independence.

Former President Donald Trump’s alleged pressure on Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is drawing renewed attention following recent editorial decisions by the Washington Post, which Bezos owns. 

According to The National Interest, Trump had previously voiced frustration with Bezos’s ownership of the newspaper, publicly criticizing its coverage and accusing the Post of avoiding "internet taxes."

In 2018, Vanity Fair reported that Trump was “obsessed” with retaliating against Bezos, stating, “Amazon is getting away with murder, taxwise,” and referring to the Washington Post as Bezos’s “toy.” This tension reportedly escalated when Trump intervened in a $10 billion Pentagon cloud contract that Amazon was pursuing. According to a former speechwriter for Defense Secretary James Mattis, Trump directed Mattis to "screw Amazon," a move that negatively impacted Bezos's business interests.

Recently, columnist Jonathan Chait of The National Interest connected Trump’s past attempts to influence Bezos to the Post’s recent decision to halt its planned endorsement of Kamala Harris. Chait acknowledges that the paper’s decision to stop endorsing national candidates could be a journalistic strategy to reduce perceived bias. However, he suggests that the timing, coming just before a major election, raises questions about potential outside influence. Chait argues that the historical context of Trump’s previous attempts to interfere with Bezos’s media and business interests cannot be ignored.

These editorial changes at the Post have led to increased scrutiny, with some speculating that Trump’s past influence could still be playing a role in the newspaper’s decisions.