What Jeff Bezos’ Pro-Trump Turn Means for Amazon Studios

When you think of Prime Video, the streaming service that comes included with an Amazon Prime subscription, you likely think of one of its broadly appealing original series, like Bosch, The Rings of Power, or Fallout, which was the most viewed steaming title of 2024 (at least according to Amazon’s internal numbers). You might even think of some lower-budget titles from its early years, like Paterson, Manchester by the Sea, or Transparent. You probably don’t think of grueling warehouse conditions, union-busting management, environmental waste, the destruction of the publishing industry and retail in general, or any of the other infamies that Amazon has accumulated over the years. 

In supposedly liberal Hollywood, Prime Video and Amazon Studios have largely been treated as independent from the broader corporation they belong to, with founder and executive chairman Jeff Bezos being a welcome presence at the Academy Awards. The company’s $8.5 billion purchase of MGM and its catalog (including the entire James Bond and Rocky series) — which led to its renaming as Amazon MGM Studios — as well as its ownership of the sprawling, historic Culver Studios have established its image as a studio in its own right, unencumbered by the needs and actions of Amazon the corporation.

Recently, Bezos has shown in no uncertain terms his willingness to intervene directly in his purportedly independent properties when he feels they might threaten Amazon’s interests. This should greatly complicate the idea that the original stories we see on Prime Video can be considered separate from Amazon’s agenda as a company. 

On Friday, October 25, 11 days before the U.S. presidential election, the editorial board of the Washington Post learned that the paper would not run their prepared endorsement of Kamala Harris and would no longer provide endorsements in future elections. The decision was announced by publisher Will Lewis, but the paper’s union declared that “the decision not to publish was made by The Post’s owner, Jeff Bezos,” who had seen an advance copy of the Harris endorsement earlier that month. Within 24 hours, around 2,000 readers canceled their subscriptions, with the paper’s former editor Marty Baron describing the decision as “disturbing spinelessness.” This clearly didn’t bother Bezos, who was one of the first to congratulate Donald Trump on his election night victory, describing it in gushing terms as an “extraordinary political comeback.” (Between the killing of the endorsement and election day, the paper lost 3,000 subscriptions, about 12% of its total digital subscriber base). A few weeks later, the Post held its 2024 Global Women’s Summit, with Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway and daughter-in-law Lara Trump as featured speakers. On December 12, it was reported that Bezos, through Amazon, would donate $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund,and that the ceremony would be streamed on Prime Video. 

A number of theories have been floated as to why Bezos would risk his reputation and that of the 137-year-old paper he owns over a presidential endorsement. It could be that, given Trump’s reputation for vindictiveness, Bezos wanted to protect the billions of dollars his company holds in government contracts, including $10 billion with the Nation Security Agency. It could be that he’s angling for an exemption for his company should Trump succeed in implementing the steep tariffs he plans to impose on goods from Canada, Mexico, and China. It could be that he’s hoping Trump’s Federal Trade Commission will throw out the antitrust suit begun under Biden. It could be, as the Wall Street Journal has reported, that Bezos has a longstanding rivalry with Elon Musk and fears that Musk’s space company SpaceX will now fully edge out Bezos’ Blue Origin in its bid for federal contracts. 

Each theory is entirely plausible. Each is probably in some way true. And each has absolutely nothing to do with the interests of the Washington Post, its staff, and its readers. 

In a monopoly, nothing is ever quite what it seems. You think you are dealing with one entity on clearly defined terms, but each has an invisible string on its back connected to the larger corporation. This is just as true of Amazon MGM Studios and Prime Video as it is of the Washington Post. Bear in mind that Prime Video head Mike Hopkins is not an independent executive. He reports to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, who has no experience in film or entertainment, but rather has been a part of Amazon as both marketing manager and head of Amazon Web Services since 1997. 

All of this suggests that we can expect Amazon Originals in the next four years to support the company’s wish to maintain cordial relations with Trump 2.0. This doesn’t necessarily mean that we’ll see a new slate of pro-MAGA content (although the company did acquire the streaming rights to Sound of Freedom, the surprise hit that Rolling Stone called a “QAnon-tinged thriller.” Earlier this month, it was announced that Amazon would fast track the release of a $40 million documentary about Melania Trump, executive produced by the first lady herself). But we will likely get a much greater volume of stories that can’t possibly be construed as a challenge or a criticism. It’s unclear where Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice, which faced extensive difficulty receiving US distribution, will receive its streaming home, but probably not on Amazon. 

During the first Trump administration, when “resistance” was the word of the day, Amazon produced films like All In: The Fight for Democracy, What the Constitution Means to Me, and Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, perhaps the most biting and controversial of anti-MAGA satires. They afterward produced Barry Jenkins’ The Underground Railroad and Steve McQueen’s Small Axe. A look at its slate of upcoming films and series shows a greater focus on reality shows like Beast Games and Last One Laughing; new seasons of the fantasy series Wheel of Time and the spy thriller Reacher; films like the sports drama Unstoppable and wedding comedy You’re Cordially Invited. And this does not even mention the company’s failure to spin its ownership of the 007 franchise into a new slate of modern-day “content.” Amazon Studio’s biggest news in the last year was not about a resonant film or series but rather its procurement of streaming rights for Thursday Night Football and the NBA.

While this does reflect the trend in which the streaming business as a whole seems to be moving — broad-based content, sports — it also directly serves the Trump-friendly stance in which Bezos has positioned his company. Amazon Studios might still come out with one or two original productions that gets it seats at awards ceremonies, but we should mainly expect a kind of censorship-by-exclusion that takes its direction from Amazon’s need to sell Prime memberships and government contracts, not the needs of its viewers or the creative impulses of its storytellers. They will ultimately find themselves restrained, only able to tell stories designed to be as inoffensive and unchallenging as possible. You might even call them “apolitical.” But nothing would be further from the truth.