Jeff Bezos Just Accused the National Enquirer’s Parent Company of Threatening Him With Dick Pics

“If in my position I can’t stand up to this kind of extortion, how many people can?”

AP Photo/Cliff Owen

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Jeff Bezos, the billionaire CEO of Amazon and owner of the Washington Post, just accused the National Enquirer’s parent company, AMI, of blackmailing him with personal photos—a.k.a dick pics—in a Medium post on Thursday. According to Bezos, the National Enquirer told him, via the attorney of an investigator Bezos hired, it would publish the photos unless he stopped investigating how they obtained text messages sent from Bezos to his mistress. The National Enquirer published those photos weeks ago. Bezos says AMI lawyers also demanded he tell the press that he has “no knowledge or basis for suggesting that AMI’s coverage was politically motivated or influenced by political forces.”

The National Enquirer, which is run by Trump-supporter David Pecker, has been linked to the president for its controversial role in preventing embarrassing stories of Trump from going public through so-called “catch-and-kill” operations. 

In his blog post, Bezos writes, “If in my position I can’t stand up to this kind of extortion, how many people can?” So, he published the alleged emails from National Enquirer executives with the blackmail instructions.

Here’s an email, allegedly from Dylan Howard, the chief content officer at AMI:

From: Howard, Dylan [dhoward@amilink.com] (Chief Content Officer, AMI)
 
Sent: Tuesday, February 5, 2019 3:33 PM
 
To: Martin Singer (litigation counsel for Mr. de Becker)
 
Subject:. Jeff Bezos & Ms. Lauren Sanchez Photos

CONFIDENTIAL & NOT FOR DISTRIBIUTION

Marty:

I am leaving the office for the night. I will be available on my cell — 917 XXX-XXXX.

However, in the interests of expediating this situation, and with The Washington Post poised to publish unsubstantiated rumors of The National Enquirer’s initial report, I wanted to describe to you the photos obtained during our newsgathering.

In addition to the “below the belt selfie — otherwise colloquially known as a ‘d*ck pick’” — The Enquirer obtained a further nine images. These include:

· Mr. Bezos face selfie at what appears to be a business meeting.

· Ms. Sanchez response — a photograph of her smoking a cigar in what appears to be a simulated oral sex scene.

· A shirtless Mr. Bezos holding his phone in his left hand — while wearing his wedding ring. He’s wearing either tight black cargo pants or shorts — and his semi-erect manhood is penetrating the zipper of said garment.

· A full-length body selfie of Mr. Bezos wearing just a pair of tight black boxer-briefs or trunks, with his phone in his left hand — while wearing his wedding ring.

· A selfie of Mr. Bezos fully clothed.

· A full-length scantily-clad body shot with short trunks.

· A naked selfie in a bathroom — while wearing his wedding ring. Mr. Bezos is wearing nothing but a white towel — and the top of his pubic region can be seen.

· Ms. Sanchez wearing a plunging red neckline dress revealing her cleavage and a glimpse of her nether region.

· Ms. Sanchez wearing a two-piece red bikini with gold detail dress revealing her cleavage.

It would give no editor pleasure to send this email. I hope common sense can prevail — and quickly.

Dylan.

Read Bezos’ entire blog post here

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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