House Judiciary Committee ranking member Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) on Thursday formally demanded Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos provide all communication related to recent instances of alleged censorship of conservative viewpoints, according to a letter first obtained by Breitbart News.
The letter from Jordan and Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO), ranking member on the Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on antitrust, commercial, and administrative law, cites several instances within the last year that exhibit “a pattern” by Amazon “of curtailing, censoring, and removing from its platforms content that espouses conservative viewpoints.”
Read the letter below:
“There are a number of examples of Amazon exerting editorial control over the content on its various platforms in a manner that is biased against conservatives and conservative viewpoints,” the letter states. “These editorial decisions give the appearance of a coordinated effort to cancel conservative speech on Amazon’s platforms.”
The letter references one such instance from June 2020 in which author Abigail Shrier claimed the e-commerce giant blocked advertising for her book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters on grounds the company prohibits questioning gender identity.
It also references Amazon in January 2021 banning the social media platform Parler from its web hosting service Amazon Web Services, claiming Parler could not “effectively identify and remove content that encourages or incites violence against others.”
Jordan and Buck requested Bezos provide “all documents and communication” to the Judiciary Committee related to seven different instances in total of alleged conservative censorship by 5:00 p.m. on March 25.
Judiciary Committee chair Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) and Antitrust Subcommittee chair Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI), both of whom are copied on the letter, refused to sign it despite Nadler’s claim that the ongoing Judiciary Committee antitrust investigations are bipartisan.
Breitbart News has submitted inquiries to both Nadler’s and Cicilline’s offices on the matter.
Write to Ashley Oliver at aoliver@breitbart.com.