Plus Pages

Friday, February 8, 2019

Amazon's Bezos Accuses National Enquirer Publisher of Blackmail


Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos dropped bombshell allegations against the National Enquirer on Thursday — accusing its publisher David Pecker of trying to blackmail him with nude selfies, reports The NYPost.

In a post on the website Medium, the billionaire alleges the Enquirer’s parent company, American Media Inc., threatened to publish a nude photo of him and other lewd images they’d obtained if he did not stop investigating the tabloid’s recent exposure of his affair and publicly declare that its reporting on it had not been “politically motivated.”

“These communications cement AMI’s long-earned reputation for weaponizing journalistic privileges, hiding behind important protections, and ignoring the tenets and purpose of true journalism,” Bezos wrote in the lengthy missive.

“Of course I don’t want personal photos published, but I also won’t participate in their well-known practice of blackmail, political favors, political attacks, and corruption. I prefer to stand up, roll this log over, and see what crawls out.”

The extraordinary public entreaty comes two days after the Washington Post, which Bezos owns, published a story exploring whether the Enquirer’s recent exposé on his affair with also-married TV anchor Lauren Sanchez — and subsequent split from his wife of 25 years — was a “political hit job.”

Sanchez, Bezos
The magazine’s January scoop included pages of saucy texts and descriptions of racy photos exchanged between the illicit couple — and forced Bezos to publicly announce his divorce before the issue hit newsstands.

In the Washington Post report, Bezos’ “longtime private security consultant” Gavin de Becker said he has been looking into how the magazine got a hold of the private correspondence and has concluded that it was a “politically motivated” leak aimed at shaming the Post and Amazon owner.

AMI — which is run by David Pecker, a longtime pal of President Trump — has admitted to buying the rights to potentially embarrassing stories about the commander in chief in an effort to keep them from seeing the light of day.

And de Becker told the paper that he was exploring whether Sanchez’s brother Michael — an enthusiastic Trump supporter who the gumshoe says is an associate of presidential pals Roger Stone and Carter Page — was behind the leak.

Sanchez, Stone and Page all denied any involvement to the paper.

No comments:

Post a Comment