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Paul Pelosi, the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), bought buy options from Amazon just six weeks before the Pentagon announced it was canceling a multibillion-dollar contract with Microsoft and started a new one that opened the door for Amazon’s participation. .
Pentagon Biden abruptly announced Tuesday that it was canceling its multi-billion JEDI cloud services contract with Microsoft and starting a new one that Amazon could compete for.
Amazon was favored to win the JEDI contract after the idea of a single cloud infrastructure was first conceived in 2017, but it was ultimately awarded to Microsoft in 2019. Amazon sued, arguing that they had lost due to President Donald Trump’s personal aversion to Amazon. CEO Jeff Bezos. A report by the Pentagon Inspector General found that Trump did not interfere with the contract.
The Pentagon has declared that the new contract, “Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability” or JWCC, will be “multi-vendor” and “multi-cloud” and has explicitly named Microsoft and Amazon as the two main candidates:
The Department intends to solicit proposals from a limited number of sources, namely Microsoft Corporation (Microsoft) and Amazon Web Services (AWS), as available market research indicates that these two vendors are the only vendors of cloud services (CSP) able to meet the requirements of the department. However, as noted in its pre-solicitation notice, the Department will immediately engage with industry and continue to conduct market research to determine if other US-based hyperscale CSPs can also meet DoD requirements. If so, these ministries will also negotiate with these companies.
In a conference call with reporters following the ruling, Acting Pentagon Chief Information Officer John Sherman said while this is not guaranteed, Amazon and Microsoft would “likely” be awarded part of the new contract.
After the announcement – which coincided with the first day of new Amazon CEO Andy Jassy – Amazon stock prices closed at a record high of $ 3,675.74, breaking its previous closing high of 3. $ 531.45 as of September 2, 2020, according to MarketWatch. This is the company’s best one-day percentage gain since November 4, 2020, the day after President Joe Biden was elected, according to the report.
An Amazon spokesperson praised the decision in a statement, “We understand and agree with the DoD’s decision. Unfortunately, the award of the contract was not based on the merits of the proposals and was rather the result of outside influence that has no place in public procurement.
“We believe this is clearly positive for Amazon and potentially negative for third-party data centers,” analysts Raymond James wrote in a note on the Pentagon decision, according to MarketWatch. “We believe the move to Amazon further strengthens its position as a leading cloud provider, especially with government agencies. “
Just over a month ago, on May 21, Paul Pelosi bought call options worth between $ 500,001 and $ 1 million. That day, he also bought Apple call options valued between $ 100,000 and $ 250,000. The transactions were disclosed in the Speaker’s latest financial disclosure report filed on July 2.
Breitbart News examined Pelosi’s financial disclosure reports dating back to 2009 and found that the speaker’s husband had already purchased Amazon call options around milestones related to the JEDI program in the past.
The Pentagon, led by then Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, and Assistant Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan first embarked on a search in mid-2017 to find a cloud solution that would allow the Department to Defense to access and share data faster.
The Pentagon released its latest Request for Proposals (RFP) for the JEDI program on July 26, 2018. Pelosi’s first purchase of Amazon call options came the next day, July 27, 2018. It would buy more than purchase options. again on October 12, 2018, valued at $ 6,000,000.
Then, on July 12, 2019, a federal judge paved the way for the Pentagon’s contract award to Microsoft or Amazon the following month. Oracle America had sued the Pentagon after being excluded from the tender for the contract, but the judge rejected its demands and gave the green light for the contract to be awarded in late August. Amazon lawyers had defended the contract in this case.
Pelosi’s next call options purchase valued at up to $ 1,000,000 came 10 days later.
Four days later, Trump intervened and said he would examine whether the JEDI contract was biased in favor of Amazon. The Pentagon awarded the contract to Microsoft several months later, in October 2019. Amazon filed a lawsuit, arguing that the Trump administration had interfered with the process and obtained a restraining order to prevent Microsoft from starting work on the project.
Pelosi’s next purchase came weeks after a wave of positive developments for Amazon. On April 28, 2021, Amazon denied a motion to dismiss. Days later, Assistant Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks said on April 30, 2021 that the Pentagon was reviewing the JEDI contract. On May 21, 2021, Pelosi purchased more Amazon call options valued at up to $ 1,000,000.
The Pentagon’s decision – which was sudden, but not unexpected – ended the legal wrangling between the Pentagon and Amazon.
Breitbart News contacted the spokesperson for the speaker but did not receive a response by post.
Separately, Fox Business reported the purchase of call options from Amazon, as well as a purchase of call options from Apple and the exercise of call options from Alphabet, a week only before the House Judiciary Committee passed antitrust legislation that would target Google, Amazon, Apple, and Facebook.
Pelosi spokesperson told Fox Business, “The speaker has no involvement or prior knowledge of these transactions,” adding, “The speaker does not own any shares.
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