In 2016, Jeff Bezos offered to strap Donald Trump, then a presidential hopeful, to a rocket and blast him into orbit. “I have a rocket company,” he joked at Vanity Fair’s New Establishment Summit, referring to Blue Origin. “So the capability is there.” Likewise, the president has made no secret of his dislike for Bezos’s company, one of his favorite Twitter punching bags, which he claimed in August was “doing great damage to tax paying retailers.” So, with Congress tied in knots over Facebook’s latest user-data fiasco—C.E.O. Mark Zuckerberg has agreed to testify in the wake of news that data from tens of millions of users was pilfered by Cambridge Analytica—Trump has opted instead to focus his fire on Amazon.
Per a new report from Axios, the president couldn’t care less about Zuckerberg, but is beside himself over free one-day shipping. “He’s obsessed with Amazon,” a source said. “Obsessed.” And while it’s true that legislators have floated legitimate reasons to go after the e-commerce giant—lawmakers like Cory Booker and Ro Khanna pointed out last year, after Amazon bought Whole Foods in a $13.7 billion deal, that Amazon could spearhead the creeping Silicon Valley trend toward gigantism and consolidation—Trump’s grudge is, predictably, half-baked. His enmity toward the company is apparently based on conversations with his business and real-estate friends, who tell him Amazon is wreaking havoc on their businesses and jeopardizing brick-and-mortar stores.
He’s similarly obsessed with the idea that Amazon is taking advantage of the U.S. Postal Service—“Why is the United States Post Office, which is losing many billions of dollars a year, while charging Amazon and others so little to deliver their packages, making Amazon richer and the Post Office dumber and poorer? Should be charging MUCH MORE!” he tweeted in December—and has reportedly continued to belabor the point behind the scenes. Amazon has actually spurred some cities to add U.S.P.S. delivery on Sundays to keep up with demand, but Trump apparently employs selective hearing where the issue is concerned: “It’s been explained to him in multiple meetings that his perception is inaccurate and that the post office actually makes a ton of money from Amazon,” one source told Axios.
Though he’d love nothing more than to bring the axe down on Bezos, Trump is reportedly stuck on the method—“He’s wondered aloud if there may be any way to go after Amazon with antitrust or competition law,” a source said. If he does follow through and punish Amazon in some way, it would likely be an incredibly unpopular move. Bezos has managed to engrain Amazon so thoroughly into the lives of the people who use it that many can’t imagine living without the affordability and convenience it represents. At the same time, he’s dumped money into lobbying efforts in Washington, which could have tangible effects on lawmakers’ willingness to target the e-commerce behemoth. For now, it seems the more likely result of Trump’s grudge is a hit to Amazon’s stock, which plunged nearly 6 percent on Wednesday morning.
