Three years after Jeff Bezos purchased The Washington Publish for $250mn, the Amazon billionaire made one other Washington acquisition that was arguably simply as important to the Georgetown social set: a mansion within the capital’s upscale Kalorama Heights neighbourhood for $23mn.His 2016 buy of a former textile museum that might develop into the town’s largest non-public residence was celebrated regionally as an indication the tech titan and his then-wife MacKenzie had been shifting their lives from Seattle — the place the couple had a love/hate relationship with metropolis grandees — to “the opposite Washington”.Bezos did little to discourage the hypothesis. Simply as he set out on a $12mn renovation of the home in 2018, Amazon introduced it was constructing a second headquarters within the Washington suburb of Crystal Metropolis. Then it turned identified that he wished to amass the town’s fabled Nationwide Soccer League crew, which might quickly change its identify from the Redskins to the Commanders.The capital embraced its new arrival. “What he’s going to do is revive the legacy of Kay Graham and her nice socialising,” Jean Case, a Bezos pal and spouse of AOL co-founder Steve Case, predicted that 12 months in a reference to the late, legendary Publish proprietor and Georgetown hostess. When Bezos threw his first large get together on the Kalorama property in January 2020, the visitors included Mitt Romney and Ivanka Trump and the Publish, the place digital subscriptions and staffing had been surging, regarded like a uncommon information business development story. Quickly afterwards, its proprietor started constructing his $10bn Bezos Earth Fund philanthropy organisation in Washington too.However over the previous 18 months, a number of of Bezos’s large Washington bets have been derailed, blocked or overtaken by occasions — culminating within the upheaval on the Publish, the place the billionaire’s handpicked chief govt, Sir Will Lewis, is going through a newsroom revolt triggered by his radical makes an attempt to stem losses on the information organisation, which final 12 months hit $77mn.Robert Winnett, the British former colleague Lewis picked as editor, withdrew from the job final week, after tales appeared in rival retailers and the Publish itself questioning each males’s ethics in earlier roles.The sequence of setbacks has raised a query within the nation’s capital: is Bezos nonetheless as enamoured with Washington — and the Publish — as he was when he acquired the struggling newspaper a decade in the past?Individuals who have spoken to Bezos insist he’s nonetheless dedicated to the Publish for the long run, a sentiment he reiterated in a memo to high editors final week by which he signalled he would “lead this nice establishment into the long run”.The Washington Publish, which Jeff Bezos purchased in 2013, has been in revolt over the chief govt he picked final 12 months © Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg“In my expertise, Jeff is a troublesome man and I don’t suppose he cares that a lot what individuals suppose,” stated an individual who has labored intently with him prior to now. “Will he tolerate shedding $100mn yearly? Completely not. Is he keen to provide Will an opportunity to enact his technique? I’m assured he’ll, barring new damaging revelations.”Nonetheless, a evaluation of Bezos’s latest actions tells a barely completely different story concerning the priorities of the tech billionaire and his new associate, TV character Lauren Sánchez, one by which different hubs are vying with Washington for his or her enterprise and social pursuits.Flight logs offered by JetSpy for 3 non-public jets related to Bezos don’t seize the entire couple’s latest journeys to Washington, the place they hosted an awards gala in March and attended a state dinner on the White Home in April. However they recommend that the town has ranked beneath Seattle, California, Florida and Texas on their checklist of locations since early 2021.When the Publish was celebrating its three Pulitzer Prizes in Might, the couple had been attending the glittering Met Gala in Manhattan. Bezos arrived there following a equally celebrity-heavy Formulation One Grand Prix get together in Miami. And, as final week’s management disaster convulsed the Publish, they had been photographed on vacation in Mykonos.Days after Lewis shocked Publish journalists this month by saying the resignation of editor Sally Buzbee, Bezos paid $87mn for a 3rd waterfront property in Miami, a ten,000 sq ft mansion on two acres with seven bedrooms, a pool and boat dock.His transfer to south Florida adopted an announcement by Amazon final 12 months that it was halting development on its Crystal Metropolis headquarters. Holly Sullivan, Amazon’s vice-president for worldwide financial improvement, insisted that “our long-term dedication stays unchanged” however acknowledged there was no replace on when development would resume.Amazon had promised to create 25,000 jobs on the website, which sits subsequent to Washington’s Reagan Nationwide Airport and simply throughout the Potomac river from the capital’s monuments and museums.However latest knowledge from Virginia’s state improvement authority reveals that the variety of Amazon workers within the area really fell from 8,430 final 12 months to 7,791. The Publish was the primary to report the drop. Amazon, which like different large tech teams has grappled with how a lot post-pandemic workplace house it nonetheless wants, informed the Monetary Occasions that roughly 8,000 workers had been assigned to the HQ2 website and greater than 1,000 roles had been open. Bezos and his associate, TV character Lauren Sánchez, at a premiere of a fantasy sequence produced for Amazon’s streaming service in August 2022 © Jordan Strauss/Invision/APOf all Bezos’s thwarted Washington initiatives, nonetheless, the one which will hit closest to house is his failed pursuit of the Commanders. A life-long NFL fan, Bezos had repeatedly signalled his want to enter the elite membership of soccer crew house owners.Bezos went as far as to place an possession group along with music mogul Jay-Z to amass the Commanders, however was outbid by fellow billionaire Josh Harris, co-founder of the non-public fairness agency Apollo.On the time, some US media retailers reported that the crew’s then proprietor, Dan Snyder, blocked Bezos’s bid due to his possession of the Publish — which nearly single-handedly pressured Snyder to promote, after it revealed the crew allegedly tolerated pervasive sexual harassment and worker abuse.Jeff Bezos outdoors the Washington Publish’s places of work with former writer Katharine Weymouth, proper, in 2013 © BloombergPeople briefed on the method, nonetheless, insist Bezos was merely outbid by Harris, who acquired the crew for $6bn. “I don’t suppose Snyder would haven’t bought to them if Jeff got here in with a bid of $7bn,” stated an individual concerned within the course of.There are few indicators that Bezos is souring on the Publish, the unique pillar of his Washington empire, or Lewis, the chief he selected to rework it. When the group looked for a brand new chief govt and writer final 12 months, Bezos relied closely on longtime pal and Amazon board member Patty Stonesifer, who served because the Publish’s interim chief, to sift by way of the candidates. The Publish employed the Sucherman advisory agency to assist with the method and did a “thorough background examine” on Lewis and his previous, in keeping with individuals briefed on the matter. However Bezos himself is reported to have made the ultimate determination to rent Lewis over a meal with the British media govt.Folks accustomed to the matter say Bezos and Lewis have had — at the very least till now — a superb relationship, and that Bezos has endorsed Lewis’s turnaround plan for the Publish, which has misplaced practically half of its viewers since 2020.Bezos had moved in “lockstep” with the strikes made by Lewis to date, in keeping with an individual accustomed to their relationship, who stated that the Amazon founder authorized his new CEO’s choices earlier than they had been introduced. This included the plan for a “three-newsroom” construction, they added, which led to Buzbee’s departure.RecommendedBut Bezos has been unemotional in separating from executives he has cooled on prior to now. In 2014, when he determined to fireside Katharine Weymouth as writer of the Publish, he moved shortly. Lower than a 12 months after shopping for the newspaper, he ousted the heiress to the Graham household that had managed the paper for eight a long time in a single assembly that lasted lower than 5 minutes. “I used to be struck by the abrupt and icy dismissal,” Martin Baron, govt editor on the time, wrote in a latest guide. Weymouth later stated: “I simply was anticipating to at the very least end this 12 months”. Extra reporting by Daniel Thomas and James Fontanella-Khan