In 2018, President Donald Trump directed then-Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis to “screw Amazon” in the company’s attempt to bid on a $10 billion tech contract with the Pentagon, according to an upcoming book about Mattis.
Anyone surprised? Nope I didn’t think so.
Amazon is going to have a field day in court over this.
… President Donald Trump directed then-Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis to “screw Amazon”…
When you’re a star, they let you do anything.
This could make the KC-X shitshow look like a friends-of-the-library society meeting by comparison.
So how many laws did this break, anybody know?
Could be a number. Depends on the Oracle-IBM-Microsoft potential links.
Oracle dude is a major Trump donor, he was pissed off and bitching to trump earlier this year about the contract terms. With a Microsoft win, he’ll be in line for a potential sub-contract.
Esper’s son was hired just this past February by IBM as a “digital strategy consultant”… Esper himself only recused on Tuesday (which means that everything was already decided and packaged up, he just didn’t sign it, but had someone else do that). IBM would also like a sub-contract.
Could be nothing there to see, could be a lot. I expect Amazon will be asking those questions.
How many laws do you have?
I think this is more likely to be something with there, there - over the certipath story. But it could be both are big, or big duds. It is interesting, however, of the flood of stories of potential financial corruption/dealings slipping out this weekend.
eta - went to find/add this:
Prime move, Donnie…
Just Prime…
Well, Amazon’s challenge won’t be a dud, simply off of the available evidence that’s been laid out publicly well before the award. Trump’s attempts to influence it are publicly known, therefore it’s a pretty straight-forward case to make to a judge that that constitutes undue influence on the officials in charge of making the selection.
Whether there are other machinations behind the scenes would just be the icing on the cake.
Trump really is the dumbest crook, ever. He could have pulled this off in secret in any number of ways.
Talk about screwed…
So why didn’t Mattis write about this in his book? What kind of leadership involves sweeping corruption under the rug? It seems Snodgrass’s book would be the one to buy. Not for salacious gossip, but actual facts that we deserve to know.
If anyone is interested, here’s the regulations defining how the Government acquires goods and services.
The 2019 edition of the FAR - Federal Acquisition Regulations - has 2010 pages.
Failure to follow the FAR without a strong justification can also place a contract award in jeopardy if the failure to follow the FAR is seen as biasing the award or favoring certain bidders.
For anyone that’s interested-
Discovery would be very, very interesting. Can Trump (reasonably) claim executive privilege in a civil case?
Thank you. That is very nice of you.
It seems to me it is a pretty clear abuse of power as well.
Quick look at him:
Bus Snodgrass is probably the best naval aviator of his generation – a real “top gun,” as it were. He is not publishing this book without at least tacit approval from Mattis.
Who knows what will go down… Luckily for Amazon, he’s been quite public and open about his disdain, so this really may not be that hard for a judge to find in their favor.
I used to be involved with evaluating contractor technical proposals on occasion, so I knew where to find this. The file gives you a feeling for how well defined many elements of federal contracting normally are - to try and prevent bias or the perception of bias (by laying everything out in detail up-front) while also trying to define how to obtain the best value for the Government.
Ah, so how much did Microsoft pay you for this award (and nice try to try to hide by claiming you “used to be” in the business)?