House lawmakers investigating the market dominance of Big Tech are asking Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to testify to address possible misleading statements by the company\u2026<\/b>
\nHouse lawmakers investigating the market dominance of Big Tech are asking Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to testify to address possible misleading statements by the company on its competition practices.
In a letter to Bezos on Friday, leaders of the House Judiciary Committee from both parties are holding out the threat of a subpoena if he doesn\u2019t agree voluntarily to appear.
Amazon used sensitive information about sellers on its marketplace, their products and transactions to develop its own competing products, according to a recent Wall Street Journal report. An Amazon executive denied such a practice in statements at a committee hearing last July, saying the company has a formal policy against it.
If the news report is accurate, Amazon\u2019s statements to the committee \u201cappear to be misleading, and possibly criminally false\u201d or constituting perjury, said the letter to Bezos signed by the committee\u2019s chairman, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N. Y., and others. \u201cAlthough we expect that you will testify on a voluntary basis, we reserve the right to resort to compulsory process if necessary.\u201d
Amazon spokesmen had no immediate comment.
The Judiciary antitrust subcommittee led by Rep. David Cicilline, D-R. I., has been conducting a sweeping investigation of Big Tech companies and their impact on competition and consumers, focusing on Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple.
The Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission also are pursuing antitrust probes of the four companies, and state attorneys general from both parties have undertaken investigations of Google and Facebook.
Amazon has drawn unwanted exposure on several fronts in the Trump administration. President Donald Trump has repeatedly lashed out at the e-commerce giant and Bezos. He has accused Amazon of destroying the U. S. Postal Service by swamping it with packages to deliver, at below-market rates charged by the postal service that are deepening its financial woes. USPS is receiving a $10 billion loan under the government\u2019s pandemic rescue package.
Trump has called The Washington Post newspaper, owned by Bezos, \u201cfake news.\u201d The Post has published critical reports about Trump and his business dealings.
Amazon has sued the government over the Pentagon awarding a $10 billion cloud computing contract to rival Microsoft, alleging that Trump\u2019s frequently expressed animus toward the company and Bezos caused the Pentagon to unfairly award the contract. The Pentagon said in March that it is reconsidering the Microsoft contract.
And on Wednesday, the Trump administration\u2019s trade office for the first time added five of Amazon\u2019s overseas operations to its list of \u201cnotorious markets\u201d where pirated goods are sold. Amazon dismissed the move as part of the administration\u2019s \u201cpersonal vendetta\u201d against it.<\/p>\n