Amazon denied on Tuesday (April 29) media reports about the e-commerce giant planning to display President Trump’s tariff costs on product pages. The White House previously criticized the tariff labels as “politically motivated hostile actions.”
A spokesperson for Amazon told Fox Business News in a statement, “The team responsible for our ultra-low-price Amazon Haul store had considered listing the import costs for certain products. However, this idea was never approved and will not be implemented.”
Earlier, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about the reports in a joint press conference with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Punchbowl News had reported that Amazon would display on its website, next to the price of each product listed for consumers, how much of it is due to Trump’s tariff policies.
“This is politically motivated hostile behavior by Amazon. As the Biden administration pushes the inflation rate to the highest in 40 years, why isn’t Amazon doing this?” Leavitt said. She then referenced a 2021 Reuters article titled “Amazon cooperates with Chinese (CCP) propaganda department,” which revealed that Amazon had complied with CCP requests to ban customer ratings and reviews on its China platform.
“I want to add that this is not surprising, because ‘Amazon collaborates with Chinese (CCP) propaganda agencies,'” Leavitt said. “This is also another reason why we encourage Americans to buy American goods and promote reshoring of the supply chain to strengthen domestic manufacturing.”
When asked if Amazon founder Jeff Bezos still supports Trump, Leavitt said, “I won’t discuss the relationship between the president and Jeff Bezos, but I can tell you that Amazon’s actions are politically hostile.”
Sources confirmed to Fox News that Trump called Bezos on Tuesday morning to express his dissatisfaction with Amazon possibly marking tariff costs on the website.
However, President Trump revealed in interviews with multiple media outlets in recent months, including OutKick, that his relationship with Bezos seemed to have improved during his second term.
“He’s a good guy,” Trump said. “I didn’t really know him in the first term. It’s really different now compared to then.”
Bezos also owns The Washington Post, and in February this year, he announced that the paper would adjust its editorial content, which Trump praised.
In an interview with The Atlantic Monthly published on Monday, Trump also mentioned Bezos, saying, “He’s been great, he’s had a good decade.”
It was pointed out by sources that Amazon’s initial consideration of marking import costs was unrelated to the White House’s overall tariff policy but tied to the termination of the “de minimis” exemption for goods from mainland China and Hong Kong.
In recent years, Chinese companies like the e-commerce platform Temu and fast-fashion brand Shein have taken advantage of this tax exemption by selling a large number of “small packages” priced below $800 to the United States duty-free. Currently, these companies face tariffs as high as 120%.
Amazon launched its Haul service last year, allowing goods to be shipped directly from sellers (including from China) in response to Temu’s rapid ascent.
Treasury Secretary Bessent pointed out during a briefing that only labeling costs related to Trump’s policies without disclosing other government policies (such as regulations) that impose costs on consumers would be unfair.
“The major hidden consumption tax is the cost of regulation or deregulation, and we are currently undergoing deregulation reforms to alleviate this pressure,” Bessent said. “From a household income perspective, we anticipate that real purchasing power has increased in the first 100 days and will further improve.”