Amazon seeks internal Pentagon documents in JEDI contract case

Bloomberg

Amazon.com Inc has asked a court to force the government to hand over documents related to Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s decision to recuse himself from making decisions on a $10 billion cloud-services contract.
In a court filing made public on, Amazon seeks a trove of documents to bolster its challenge of the Pentagon’s Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud contract that was awarded to Microsoft Corp in October.
Amazon Web Services, Amazon’s cloud unit, is also asking the US Court of Federal Claims to require the government to turn over materials that shed light on the role that Stacy Cummings, a deputy assistant secretary of defense, played in the procurement.
Cummings communicated with the team evaluating JEDI bids and worked on preparations for JEDI-related meetings involving Esper, the lawsuit said. She recused herself from working on the procurement in September 2019, according to the lawsuit.
In a previous filing, government lawyers argued that Amazon is “not entitled” to all materials relating to the recusals of Cummings and Esper. They added that Cummings had a conflict with Microsoft, that “did not impact the procurement.”
Other files Amazon seeks include “informal notes” between the bid selection team members, JEDI-related content on digital channels and procurement documents that were presented to Esper and Deputy Secretary David Norquist. Representatives for the Defense Department and Microsoft didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Amazon filed a lawsuit in November in the US Court of Federal Claims alleging that the Defense Department failed to fairly judge its bid because President Donald Trump viewed Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos as his “political enemy.”
Amazon asked the court earlier this month to allow it to question Trump, Esper, former Defense Secretary James Mattis.

, and Dana Deasy, the Pentagon’s chief information officer.