Amazon wants to see internal Pentagon documents in JEDI case

Amazon insists it was treated unfairly in the bidding process

Amazon has urged the US Court of Federal Claims to tell the government to hand over internal Pentagon documents related to the JEDI cloud-services contract.

According to Bloomberg, Amazon wants the government to release documents pertaining to Defense Secretary Mark Esper's decision in September 2019 to recuse himself from making decisions on the cloud contract.

The purpose behind Amazon's latest move in the court is to strengthen its challenge against the US Department of Defense's decision to award the $10 billion cloud contract to Microsoft.

Work on the project halted earlier this month after Judge Patricia Campbell-Smith ordered the Pentagon to stop Microsoft from starting work on the project until Amazon's legal challenge has been resolved.

As per court documents, Amazon also urged the Court of Federal Claims to force the government to hand over documents providing details of the role played by Stacy Cummings, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, in the JEDI contract process.

Cummings worked on JEDI-related meetings involving Esper, according to the court filing, and also communicated with the bid selection team members. She recused herself from working on the project contract process in September 2019.

In November, Amazon filed a lawsuit in the Court of Federal Claims challenging the DoD's decision to award the contract to Microsoft. The company was considered the front-runner to win the contract, before the DoD announced in October that it was awarding the JEDI project to Microsoft.

Amazon protested the decision, saying it was unfairly treated in the bidding process (ironically, Oracle said that the bidding process was biased towards Amazon last summer). It also accused President Donald Trump of influencing the contract process because of his dispute with Jeff Bezos, the owner of both Amazon and The Washington Post.

In August, President Trump had said that his administration was reviewing Amazon's bid for the contract following complaints that JEDI contract specifications favoured Amazon.

A speechwriter for former Defence Secretary Jim Mattis also claimed in a recent book that Donald Trump had instructed Mattis to "screw Amazon" out of the contract.

Earlier this month, Amazon asked the Court to give permission to gather testimony from Donald Trump, Esper and Mattis.

In a previous filing, government lawyers had argued in the court that Amazon was 'not entitled' to all documents relating to the recusals of Esper and Cummings.

In a similar case, Donald Trump's Justice Department filed its amicus brief in the Supreme Court last week, expressing support for Oracle in its legal fight against Google in a Java copyright protection case.

Last year, the Supreme Court agreed to reconsider an earlier decision by the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that could have left the search giant with multi-billion dollar fines.

Last month, Google asked the Supreme Court to overturn the Federal Circuit judgement, which ruled that it had infringed Oracle's copyrights by using JAVA APIs in its Android OS.

The Hill reported that just hours before DoJ filed its brief in the Court, Oracle chairman Larry Ellison hosted a fundraiser for President Trump at his golf course in California.

About 300 Oracle employees stopped work this week to protest Ellison's support of Trump. The employees argued that Ellison's public support for Donald Trump violated Oracle's diversity, inclusion and ethics policies.