Jeff Bezos’ decision to block The Washington Post’s planned endorsement of Kamala Harris reveals a striking calculation by one of America’s most powerful oligarchs in a pivotal moment for democracy.
The Post’s own reporting confirms Bezos personally made the call to withhold the endorsement, breaking with decades of presidential election tradition dating back to 1976. This wasn’t an editorial decision—it came straight from the owner’s suite in Seattle, or Miami, or wherever Amazon’s headquarters are now.
The timing proves especially telling. Post staff had already drafted the Harris endorsement when Bezos intervened, according to multiple Post sources. The paper’s editor-at-large, Robert Kagan, immediately resigned in protest, while approximately 2,000 subscribers canceled within 24 hours of the announcement. The timidity of their official explanation did not help things. A similar situation just occurred with the Los Angeles Times, though that situation is arguably even messier. But both cases smack of the preservation of relationships beneficial to their billionaire owners.
Nika Soon-Shiong, the Times’ billionaire owner’s daughter, implied on social media that the decision had more to do with the Biden-Harris government’s current policies on Israel and Gaza.
“This is not a vote for Donald Trump. This is a refusal to ENDORSE a candidate that is overseeing a war on children,” she wrote. “I trust the Editorial Board’s judgment. For me, genocide is the line in the sand.”
The problem, of course, is that it was inevitably discovered that her father, Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, squashed the Harris endorsement. But more than that, while her advocacy for the Palestinian cause is highly commendable, there is massive disenfranchisement and suffering for people here in the United States, and what does Soon-Shiong or his daughter have to say about the Masalit massacres in Sudan? I would argue our domestic policy should come before our foreign policy, as the former has always informed the latter.
My point isn’t that the Palestinian cause isn’t worthy (because it is), but to isolate the conflict as the immediate, the be-all and end-all cause of the paper’s decision not to endorse Harris throws the bodies of Black, brown, Indigenous, and poor people, along with immigrants, in the dumpster—here, in America, a country in trouble at the moment. It is not a binary situation and so many of us are in dire need; we can manage more than one issue simultaneously.
Equally important to consider is if Patrick Soon-Shiong’s relationship with Trump has anything to do with his decision. How about a potential desire to push past FDA regulations for the testing of new drugs?
As far as Bezos goes, former Post executive editor Martin Baron didn’t mince words about what this monumental decision represents: “This is cowardice, with democracy as its casualty,” he said. “[Trump] will see this as an invitation to further intimidate owner Jeff Bezos (and others).”
The context matters enormously. During Trump’s presidency, Amazon sued after losing a $10 billion Pentagon cloud computing contract, explicitly claiming Trump had used “improper pressure … to harm his perceived political enemy,” per Bezos.
While Post CEO Will Lewis attempted to frame this as “returning to our roots,” the paper’s own newsroom pushed back hard through their union: “We are deeply concerned that The Washington Post—an American news institution in the nation’s capital—would make a decision to no longer endorse presidential candidates, especially a mere 11 days ahead of an immensely consequential election.”
For Bezos, who also owns Amazon and Blue Origin, the stakes transcend normal business concerns, as the scales weighing the unabated growth of his companies hang in the balance. Federal regulations, antitrust actions, and government contracts worth billions are at stake for him. His papers’ capitulation to essentially placate Trump, since there is no other way to view it, signals a dangerous reality concerning how big business may work in our tittering democracy. Simply put, many of America’s oligarchs, especially those depending on government relationships and softness in regulation, appear to be choosing self-preservation over democratic principles.
The Post’s non-endorsement doesn’t just break with tradition—it breaks faith with its readers and its mission. The Post’s slogan is “Democracy Dies In the Dark.” When billionaire owners flip off the lights from their ivory towers and silence their newsrooms on democracy’s defining question, they tell us exactly where their priorities lie.
This moment reflects a larger pattern of billionaire self-preservation in American politics. While some ultra-wealthy individuals have publicly backed Harris, the specter of increased regulation and higher taxes—including Harris’ proposed “billionaire minimum tax”—appears to be driving others toward Trump’s anti-regulatory agenda.
For Bezos, who navigated a contentious relationship with Trump that included targeted actions against Amazon’s government contracts, the choice to step in and suddenly block his paper’s endorsements signals something more fundamental and Maslowian: a calculation that staying neutral, even in the face of democratic peril, better serves his long-term interests than taking a clear stand. For one, he needs a functioning government even to have a contract with, even one administered by a past adversary. Secondly, he knows people aren’t going to stop buying from Amazon. Lastly, and most importantly, even in the fall of American democracy, a wealthy white man is going to be a-okay.
Published: Oct 26, 2024 09:14 am