A long-simmering feud between Donald Trump and Jeff Bezos took a bizarre turn after the multibillionaire accused allies of the president of brazenly trying to extort him.
In a surprising move that lit up social media feeds worldwide, the Amazon.com Inc. founder and chief executive officer published a blog post on Thursday, alleging that the publisher of the National Enquirer tried to blackmail him with embarrassing photos of Bezos and a woman who wasn’t his wife -- including sexually charged selfies.
The usually media-shy executive also published explicit email 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. CEO David Pecker -- has worked before on behalf of the president. Pecker, Bezos said in his post, “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.”
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.”
Growing Wealth
American Media said in a statement Friday that it believes it acted lawfully in reporting the story of Bezos and his extramarital affair, but that it will investigate claims by the CEO 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.”
Representatives for the White House didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Ironically, becoming a Trump nemesis doesn’t 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.