Republican Colorado Rep. Ken Buck is calling out the Biden administration’s invitation for Amazon to sponsor National Small Business Week.
First proclaimed during the Kennedy administration, National Small Business Week was intended to “recogniz[e] the contribution of small business to our prosperous society.” According to the Small Business Administration, a small business can earn up to $40 million per year, and can employ up to 1,500 people. Other hosts of national Small Business Week include tech giants like Meta, Google, and Microsoft, and financial services firms like Visa, Square, and Chase.
“This decision is misguided and incomprehensible given Amazon’s history of growing its monopoly power by destroying competing, smaller businesses,” Buck wrote Friday to President Joe Biden and Small Business Administrator Isabella Guzman, in a letter obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller. “Amazon is willing to forfeit making a profit on a product if it means becoming its sole online seller.”
Read the letter here:
KB Letter to SBA and WH_Amazon by Michael Ginsberg on Scribd
A staunch critic of Amazon, Buck introduced legislation in the 117th Congress that would break up the company, as well as other tech giants like Apple, Google and Facebook. Amazon and Google reportedly urged small businesses that use their platforms to oppose Buck’s bills, introduced alongside Democratic Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline. The bills did not become law. (RELATED: House Republicans Launch ‘Freedom From Big Tech Caucus’)
Regulators and competitors have repeatedly accused the IT and retail giant of violating monopoly and other antitrust rules. The Washington, D.C., attorney general filed a lawsuit against Amazon in 2021, claiming that it sets prices illegally to drive out competition. Buck’s letter asserts that Amazon “utilizes pricing bots to lower its price by as much as 30% to price-out competitors and push them out of the market.” The social media site Parler also sued in 2021, alleging that Amazon violated antitrust laws and breached its contractual obligations by banning Parler from Amazon servers.
“Considering Amazon’s demonstrable disdain for competition, the idea that it supports small businesses is laughable. I hope you will reconsider your endorsement of Amazon’s thinly veiled theater of supporting small ventures,” Buck concludes.