Mr. Bezos is going to Washington, it seems — the latest in an ever-lengthening line of Silicon Valley luminaries to speak out against President Trump’s executive order to effectively ban all travel by foreign nationals from Muslim-majority countries.
Marc Zuckerberg posted extensively to Facebook about his and his wife’s family histories as immigrant refugees to the United States. Google co-founder Sergey Brin was spotted at a Bay Area airport protest over the weekend. Jeff Bezos is using the resources of the Amazon empire a bit differently — according to reports, Amazon has reportedly reached out to Congressional officials to explore how the ban might be brought down legislatively.
Bezos also noted in a statement to employees yesterday that Amazon has prepared a declaration of support for a suit filed Monday against the order by the Washington State Attorney General.
“We are working on other legal options, as well. To our employees in the U.S. and around the world who may be directly affected by this order, I want you to know that the full extent of Amazon’s resources are behind you,” Mr. Bezos added.
The statement and proposed actions by Amazon endorsed by their normally fairly quiet CEO follow a weekend message from Amazon’s Vice President of HR Beth Galetti that told Amazon employees who work or live in this country to refrain from international travel if they might be prevented from reentering because of the new restrictions.
The choir of disapproval of the ban has echoed loudly from within tech. Microsoft has officially called the executive order “misguided and a fundamental step backwards.” Monday morning, Google announced a $4 million fund to help those affected by Trump’s immigration order.
But the White House is thus far standing firm.
“A majority of Americans agree with the president,” spokesman Sean Spicer said during his daily briefing Monday. “They recognize that the steps that he’s taken were to keep this country safe and to make sure that we didn’t look back and say, ‘I wish we had done the following.’ ”
And as both sides are rather intractable, the court cases are spinning up. Washington State’s AG Bob Ferguson has argued the order is unconstitutional and illegal and has sought a temporary restraining order to stop the order’s implementation. Ferguson was one of 16 state attorneys general who have come out against the travel ban as “unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful” in a statement.
In Amazon’s supporting document to the Washington attorney general’s suit, Amazon noted 49 employees affected by the executive order — as well as 10 dependents. Additionally, the company noted that it has extended employment offers to seven candidates who were born in Iran but who currently reside elsewhere who will now need new placements.
Whether the law suits, the effects on hiring, the great tech revolt, Congressional action, or mass protests will have any influence over the Trump administration’s course of action?
As of today, that still seems very much an open question.
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