Amazon and Google deploy their armies to thwart antitrust bills

The antitrust bills’ supporters accuse the tech giants of spreading baseless fears and stoking small businesses’ anxieties to blunt the growing anti-monopoly momentum in Congress. But the effort shows that the companies’ networks of data centers, warehouses, business partnerships and legions of users have given Amazon and Google a huge number of potential allies in their showdown with Washington.

“I’m glad in this case Amazon is deploying people like me,” said Kristin Rae, the founder of Inspire Travel Luggage, a vendor that sells its wares mostly on Amazon. “Because maybe we are the ones who can get through to lawmakers and say, ‘Wow, my job or position or brand could be in danger.’”

Rae, who has appeared in Amazon blog posts and videos about the small businesses and female entrepreneurs who use its marketplace, said she is especially concerned about bills like one from Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Chuck

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