EXCLUSIVE My big behind-the-scenes look into how Gov. Josh Shapiro has courted Amazon amid the mounting backlash to data centers Complete with internal emails, memos, an “exclusive” offer for help with faster permitting and a NDA no one would explain to me. My latest for @heatmap.news 😌

Hey that's me on the Bigfoot Manifesto talking about the ideological and policy moves that created today's corporate empires — and how we can dismantle them.

There is, as they say, no bingo card I will ever see that would have "Jeff Bezos goes on TV to criticize 'corporate welfare" on it. The man is the human embodiment of tax avoidance, and the company he founded owes its dominance to successfully leveraging the tax system. www.cnbc.com/2026/05/20/c...

1. The data center boom isn’t a neutral response to public need. It’s a speculative race by Amazon, Google, Meta & Microsoft to consolidate control over AI and extend their monopoly power — while shifting huge costs onto the rest of us. Here's ILSR's guide to what we need to do.

Live Nation lost its bid to build a big concert venue here in Portland, Maine last night! Before an overflow crowd, the City Council rejected the project. For more than a year residents have been campaigning to prevent this monopoly from destroying the local music scene. We won!

Amazon's coordinated price fixing—in which it enlists suppliers like Hanes and Skullcandy to act as go-betweens with other retailers—works alongside its powerful AI pricing technologies, which can unilaterally induce rivals' pricing algorithms to raise their prices. Here's how:

1. Boy, Amazon is in a heap of trouble. Evidence made public yesterday by California AG @agrobbonta.oag.ca.gov shows blatant price fixing. And there are so many examples. Here's Amazon scheming with a pet food supplier to get Chewy to raise its prices.

"These allegations point to a novel form of monopoly power: the ability of a dominant platform to use algorithms to lift prices across an entire market. Amazon is doing so...by provoking and shaping the responses of rival algorithms, creating feedback loops that ratchet prices higher."

Every consumer should read this thread. The antitrust investigation into Amazon, likely kneecapped by Team Trump, is more important than we think. Algorithmic price coercion is destroying small (and honest) businesses and robbing us of billions. #amazon #jeffbezos #business #prime #bezos #ftc #sec

Stacy Mitchell has the best command of this subject. She explains how Amazon's ability to match any discount absolutely shreds competitors trying to give you a lower price. To hide these powers from nosy reporters, Amazon shuts off the magic algorithm during holiday shopping season and Prime Day.

wild thread. There are no deals!!

1. Amazon has built powerful pricing algorithms that have learned how to steer prices upward — not just on Amazon, but across the web. I have a new piece on how these algorithms work, and how they help sustain Amazon’s monopoly.

1. New evidence shows Amazon compelling specific sellers to hike their prices on other shopping sites. This is from depositions in the California antitrust case obtained by The Guardian. Expect a lot more to come out at trial. This drives prices up & is why Amazon has an iron grip.

City-owned broadband providers outperform their big ISP competitors on internet speeds, a new study finds.

1. It's great to see @warren.senate.gov pressing Amazon CEO Andy Jassy on the shady tactics Amazon is using to overcharge schools and cities for everyday supplies — including sham contracts with algorithmic-driven dynamic pricing.

Want to help your city and local schools stop buying from Amazon? Watch our recent webinar featuring people who successfully pushed their local governments to buy from local suppliers instead — plus practical tips for how to do it in your town. www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIS3...

1. Tim Muris, who held top roles at the FTC in the 1970s-80s and 2000s, has teamed up with the Competitive Enterprise Institute on a new effort to discredit and bury the Robinson-Patman Act. Muris has a record of inventing history to support his agenda. Here are a few examples.

TODAY at 1:00 ET — join us to hear from leading thinkers on how powerful corporations are using pricing algorithms to fleece shoppers, and what cities, states, and the federal gov't can do about it.

It took New Mexico Democrats all of 25 days to cobble together a law that makes broadband affordable for poor people

Great event on March 3: How powerful corporations — including Amazon, Instacart, and major landlords — are using pricing algorithms to inflate prices and undermine competition. With Doha Mekki, Katie Wells, Ted Tatos, and moderator Geoffrey Fowler. Register here: ilsr.org/article/inde...

"Every time teachers post a classroom wish list on Amazon, they’re essentially voting against their next pay raise." Terrific — and very actionable — post from my colleague @kennedysmith.bsky.social

Today! At noon Eastern. Great speakers: Arizona State Senator Lauren Kuby (@senatorlaurenkuby.bsky.social), Gayle Shanks of Changing Hands Bookstore, Thomas Barr of Local First Arizona, and Kennedy Smith of @ilsr.bsky.social

One key reason to support local businesses? They'll have your back in a community crisis when large corporations stay silent. Some lessons from Minnesota from several of my very smart colleagues: vist.ly/4rdhr @ronmknox.bsky.social @stacyfmitchell.bsky.social

Tomorrow!

Walmart is using its power over suppliers to push grocery prices up. This terrific explainer draws on newly unsealed details from an antitrust case—filed by Lina Khan and dropped by Trump—to show how. I’m proud that @ilsr.bsky.social helped get the case unsealed. And thrilled to help tell the story.

Nearly every city and school district is pouring public dollars into Amazon — even though local suppliers are often cheaper and faster. A few cities have said no to Amazon’s sketchy contracts. This Friday: Learn how they broke free — and how your city can too. Register here:

4. As the Walton family — which owns 50% of Walmart stock — cheers its obscene wealth of over $500 billion, remember that all that loot was stolen from small businesses, workers, and you. You are paying for this monopoly in inflated grocery prices, lower wages, food deserts, and dead main streets.

1. A reminder: Walmart's $1 trillion valuation is the product of decades of unchecked anticompetitive behavior. It's no coincidence that Walmart began its insane growth spurt after the 1980s decision to stop enforcing key antitrust laws. More than others, Walmart recognized what this meant.

Big news out of California. After years of study, the CA Law Revision Commission recommended a major rewrite of state antitrust law — explicitly instructing judges to break with weak federal standards & restore meaningful limits on monopoly power. The legislature often follows the CLRC's guidance.

Localized, community-rooted, small-scale economic power matters. For decades, we've pretended like it doesn't — and even used policy to aggressively eradicate it.

1. We have a new tool for exploring how corporate concentration has hollowed out grocery access in your region: an interactive map that shows food deserts along with the location of every grocery store in the US by type — independent, small chain, large chain, or megachain like Walmart or Kroger.

1. Cities and states should outlaw Amazon’s latest assault on small businesses — an AI tool that scrapes their websites and creates listings of their products within the Amazon app without their consent. It’s causing huge, costly problems. This can and should be banned.

Join us for a great, practical workshop! Learn how to find out whether your city or school district is buying from Amazon — and how to shift that spending to local suppliers instead. You’ll get step-by-step tools and hear inspiring stories from cities that have made the change.

Thinking of all my friends and colleagues in Minnesota as thousands gather in Minneapolis. This is a state that has a long and deep history of organizing for justice.

Important study. Essentially it finds a straight line between the pro-corporate concentration policies of Reagan/Clinton/Thatcher/Blair and the decline of democracy. Interestingly, the mechanism is not income inequality but the raw power the biggest corps wield over government.

The question isn’t "why does Signal use AWS?" It’s to look at the infrastructural requirements of any global, real-time, mass comms platform and ask how it is that we got to a place where there’s no realistic alternative to AWS and the other hyperscalers. 3/

In 1952, there were 104 grocery stores in Dubuque (!). Today there are 12. Walmart & Hy-Vee split the market. The Telegraph Herald has an in-depth look at the state of local grocery stores across Iowa & how the demise of Robinson-Patman enforcement fueled consolidation & food deserts.

There’s a debate about whether to focus on lowering prices or saving democracy. But both crises flow from the extreme concentration of economic power. The solution is to shift that power back into people’s hands — through strong public institutions, worker rights, and thriving small businesses.

There’s a lot to consider here for all American cities.

Wishing everyone peace and joy. See you in 2026.

New York’s affordability crisis flows from a deeper problem: essential systems — groceries, energy, Internet, banking, healthcare — have consolidated in the hands of distant corporations. Today, ILSR sent the Mamdani team a memo laying out policies to reclaim local control. ilsr.org/articles/mem...

Amazon is hoodwinking public schools to grab their cash. I love this piece from @naomibethune.bsky.social, which shows how cash-strapped districts are sold on the “ease” of buying from Amazon — only to deepen their financial squeeze. Appreciate the deep dive into our new report!

Thinking about which good-gov't orgs to support financially is a little overwhelming rn. Environmental, human rights, arts, democracy itself are all under siege. But the corporate takeover of our economy seems like the hub to this wheel, which is why the work of @ilsr.bsky.social is so vital.

1. New York’s affordability crisis flows from a deeper problem: essential systems — groceries, energy, Internet, banking, healthcare — have consolidated in the hands of distant corporations. Today, ILSR sent the Mamdani team a memo laying out policies to reclaim local control.

Here's a great, quick explainer on how Pepsi schemed with Walmart to raise grocery prices, from @ronmknox.bsky.social and @dannycaine.com www.tiktok.com/@ilsr_org/vi...

You can find the full investigation — plus our guide to how to tell if your local government is being hoodwinked by Amazon, and what to do about it — here:

Back in the late 90s I lived with a guy who worked for Nestle and he told me that WalMart routinely got huge deals by just... not paying invoices on time, and unlike their competitors Nestle wouldn't charge them late fees because they were the 900lb gorilla.

Trump's FTC leaders bad-mouthed Lina Khan when they dropped this lawsuit, claiming that they were cleaning up her mess. Now that it's been unsealed, we can see that was a total lie. This was a coverup to protect Pepsi and Walmart.

Thread. "Inflation" is not a natural economic phenomenon, it's the product of choices--choices made for and not by consumers, choices made in back rooms and hidden meetings.