The White House isn’t too happy with Amazon right now. There were reports floating around that the company might start showing how much the tariffs are adding to the cost of stuff people buy on their site.
Basically, the extra fees from the Trump administration’s tariff policies could get listed right next to product prices, and that didn’t sit well with the folks in D.C.
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The White House calls Amazon’s move political and hostile
Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, made it clear. She’d just chatted with the president and said the move would be political and kind of aggressive.
She said: “I just got off the phone with the president about this, about Amazon’s announcement. This is a hostile and political act by Amazon.”
The administration links Amazon to past controversies
To add to that, Leavitt actually held up an old Reuters report from 2021 that said: “Amazon partnered with China propaganda arm.”
The message was pretty clear. They’re not exactly thrilled with how Amazon’s handled things in the past either.
Jeff Bezos’s ties to Trump and the Washington Post controversy
Back in the day, Bezos had donated a million bucks to Trump’s inauguration, and he even showed up to the event.
But before the most recent election, he announced that The Washington Post (which he owns) wouldn’t be endorsing anyone — not Trump, not Kamala Harris. That sparked a lot of pushback.
Bezos tried to explain it, saying endorsements don’t really “tip the scales” in elections and that he was just trying to do what he thought was right.
Some of the paper’s writers weren’t buying it, though. They all signed this joint statement saying that not endorsing anyone went against the values they believed the paper should stand for.
Then in February, Bezos shifted the focus of the opinion section, saying it would support “personal liberties and free markets.”
Trump softens stance on Bezos and Zuckerberg
Fast forward a bit. This week, Trump actually seemed to be on better terms with Bezos.
He said both Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg “have been great” and that they’ve shown him “a higher level of respect.”
Tariffs remain central to Trump’s economic policy
Tariffs have always been a big piece of Trump’s economic plans. He’s slapped tariffs on a bunch of countries, though over time, he’s eased up on some.
That said, things with China got pretty intense. The back-and-forth led to some goods getting taxed at super high rates. We’re talking up to 245%.
The financial burden of tariffs falls on consumers
What that means is companies in the U.S. that bring stuff in from China now have to pay a lot more just to keep selling those products.
And, of course, those costs usually get passed along to regular people — customers.
If Amazon had gone ahead with showing exactly how much tariffs were adding to prices, it probably would’ve made it pretty obvious to shoppers that those price hikes were all because of tariffs.
Amazon denies plans to display tariff costs
Amazon, for their part, told The Washington Post that they never seriously thought about putting tariff info next to product prices.
They said, “this was never approved and is not going to happen.”
Trump seemed pleased with how it played out. He said Bezos had “done the right thing,” fixed the issue fast, and called him a “good guy.”