A long-simmering feud between US President Donald Trump and Amazon.com Inc chief executive officer Jeff Bezos took a bizarre turn after the multibillionaire accused allies of the US president of brazenly trying to extort him.
In a surprising move that lit up social media feeds worldwide, Bezos published a blog post on Thursday last week, alleging that the publisher of the National Enquirer tried to blackmail him with embarrassing photographs of him and a woman who was not his wife — including sexually charged selfies.
The usually media-shy executive also published explicit e-mail exchanges and descriptions of the photos, saying he would rather be embarrassed than extorted.
He also pointed to reports that the Enquirer’s publisher — American Media Inc chief executive officer David Pecker — has worked on behalf of the US president.
Pecker “recently entered into an immunity deal with the Department of Justice related to their role in the so-called ‘catch and kill’ process on behalf of President Trump and his election campaign,” Bezos said in his post.
Trump in turn has frequently criticized Bezos and his newspaper, the Washington Post, for everything from taxes and shipping fees to printing “fake news.”
On Twitter last month, Trump called the tech executive “Jeff Bozo.”
“It’s unavoidable that certain powerful people who experience Washington Post news coverage will wrongly conclude I am their enemy,” Bezos said in his post. “President Trump is one of those people, obvious by his many tweets.”
American Media said in a statement on Friday that it believes it acted lawfully in reporting the story of Bezos and his extramarital affair, but that it would investigate claims by the chief executive officer of extortion and blackmail.
“American Media believes fervently that it acted lawfully in the reporting of the story of Mr Bezos,” the company said. “Further, at the time of the recent allegations made by Mr Bezos, it was in good faith negotiations to resolve all matters with him.”
“Nonetheless, in light of the nature of the allegations published by Mr Bezos, the board has convened and determined that it should promptly and thoroughly investigate the claims. Upon completion of that investigation, the board will take whatever appropriate action is necessary,” it added.
Asked if the US president was aware of Bezos’ accusations, White House spokesman Hogan Gidley told reporters: “I’m not sure if he’s aware of it, and we’re not going to get into a conversation about something between Jeff Bezos and a tabloid.”
Asked when Trump last spoke with Pecker, Gidley said: “I’m not aware of it.”
Ironically, becoming a Trump nemesis does not seem to have hurt the Amazon founder’s fortunes. Since Trump’s election, no one has made more money than Bezos, who became the world’s richest person thanks to a gold rush of e-commerce, Web advertising and cloud computing.
Bezos’ wealth is valued at US$133.9 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Trump has threatened Amazon with antitrust prosecution, but nothing has materialized. The US president also pushed the US Postal Service to charge the e-commerce giant more for package delivery, based on his belief that Amazon has a sweetheart deal.
That led only to a US Department of the Treasury report proposing that the post office increase rates.
The report did not provide explicit instructions on how much more the Postal Service should charge.
However, it has not been smooth sailing for Bezos. Last month, he and his wife of 25 years, MacKenzie, announced plans to divorce. Within hours, the Enquirer published an expose on Bezos’ relationship with former TV anchor Lauren Sanchez.
The supermarket tabloid’s story included racy texts exchanged with Sanchez, calling her Bezos’ mistress.
Bezos, 55, hired investigators to find out how the texts were obtained and whether the story was politically motivated.
The executive also said the Post’s coverage of Jamal Khashoggi’s murder — a columnist for the newspaper who was killed in Istanbul last year — “is undoubtedly unpopular in certain circles.”
Bezos’ investigators were not tied to the Washington Post, but he acknowledged that owning the newspaper is a “complexifier.”
When Bezos aired a Super Bowl ad promoting the newspaper on Sunday, one of Trump’s sons, Donald Trump Jr, called it an attempt for “undeserved credibility.”
“How about report the news and not their leftist BS for a change,” he tweeted.
Bezos has portrayed himself as a champion of journalism, but his clash with the Enquirer might put him on some shaky ground.
In his exchange with a representative for American Media, he argued that the Enquirer was not allowed to publish the compromising images because they belonged to him and are protected by copyright laws.
American Media responded that it was allowed to publish the photos out of a public interest, since “millions of Americans have a vested interest in the success of Amazon.”
Gawker made a similar argument when it published a sex tape featuring professional wrestler Hulk Hogan. The Web site lost its case and ultimately filed for bankruptcy.
In Bezos’ case, the question is not clear-cut, said Mary Ellen Roy, a lawyer at Phelps Dunbar LLP in New Orleans specializing in First Amendment issues.
Any images taken in public are fair game, she said.
However, if the photos were captured in a private room, they will have to be proven newsworthy.
“Mr Bezos is a businessman and not a political figure — it’s not necessarily newsworthy that he has a mistress,” Roy said.
In the Hulk Hogan case, the legal fight against Gawker was financed by billionaire Peter Thiel. He was outed as gay by a Gawker Web site in 2007 and told the New York Times that he believed it was worth “fighting back” against the business.
The Bezos-Enquirer tussle might be another instance where the legal questions are eclipsed by a broader battle.
“Let’s face it,” said Corynne McSherry, legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco. “Here we have another place where a copyright dispute is serving as a proxy for the real fight.”
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