Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and CEO Andy Jassy have no choice but to testify before the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in the agency’s ongoing investigation after a ruling on Wednesday (Sept. 22) didn’t go their way.
Bezos and Jassy had attempted to get out of facing regulators, but FTC officials said Amazon missed the legal threshold to quash the civil subpoenas, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported.
According to FTC Commissioner Christine Wilson’s order, “Amazon provides no reason why the Commission must accept anything less than all the relevant testimony it can obtain from these two witnesses.”
See also: Amazon Petitions FTC to Back Down on ‘Unduly Burdensome’ Subpoenas
The FTC launched an investigation in March 2021 to determine if Amazon misled people into subscribing to Amazon Prime. Bezos and Jassy had argued their testimonies weren’t needed since they didn’t have deep details about Prime’s sign-up and cancellation processes, which is the center of the FTC’s probe.
The investigation now includes Amazon’s other subscription services Audible, Amazon Music, Kindle Unlimited and Subscribe & Save, according to the Journal.
Amazon filed an omnibus petition in August to quash or limit civil investigative demands after at least 19 were served individual subpoenas, PYMNTS reported at the time. The petition stated that having to brief Bezos and Jassy to testify on “granular” details would be a “tremendous burden on them.”
Read more: iRobot Says It Is Cooperating With FTC Review of Amazon Deal
An Amazon spokesperson told the Journal that it wasn’t surprised that the FTC “largely declined to rule against itself.”
While the retail and tech giant said it has been cooperating with the FTC’s investigation, it is still looking at options because the most recent subpoenas are “overly broad and needlessly burdensome,” the spokesperson told the Journal.
PYMNTS has reached out to Amazon for comment.
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