Jeff Bezos told Amazon executives about his affair with Lauren Sanchez in a lengthy meeting that cut into their Valentine’s Day plans, according to a new book.
The CEO and founder of the online retail giant, 57, met with his senior staff to explain his split from then wife MacKenzie, 51, in February 2019, telling them ‘this is very distracting’.
He is also said to have broken the ice by asking his colleagues: ‘Raise your hand if you think you’ve had a harder week than I’ve had.’
That came after the National Enquirer revealed the tech entrepreneur had been having an affair with former news anchor Sanchez, 51.
New details surrounding the affair and its resulting fallout are disclosed in a Bloomberg extract from ‘Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire, by Brad Stone’.
The book also describes how Bezos told executives during the meeting: ‘The story is completely wrong and out of order.
‘MacKenzie and I have had good, healthy, adult conversations about it. She is fine. The kids are fine. The media is having a field day.
‘All of this is very distracting, so thank you for being focused on the business.’
But as the Valentine’s Day meeting overran Senior Vice President Jeff Blackburn is said to have asked at 7:30pm: ‘Hey Jeff, how long do you think this meeting is going to go? A lot of us have plans.’
Bezos is said to have replied, laughing: ‘Oh, that’s right. I forgot about that.’
DailyMail.com has contacted Amazon for comment.
Jeff Bezos, right, told Amazon executives about his affair with Lauren Sanchez, left, in a lengthy meeting that cut into their Valentine’s Day plans, according to a new book
The CEO and founder of the online retail giant met with his senior staff to explain his split from then wife MacKenzie in February 2019, telling them ‘this is very distracting’. That came after the National Enquirer revealed the tech entrepreneur had been having an affair with Sanchez
Bezos and MacKenzie had announced they were divorcing after 25 years of marriage and four children in a tweet in January 2019.
The National Enquirer then revealed that the tech entrepreneur had been having an affair with former news anchor Sanchez.
On February 7 Bezos wrote a Medium post, accusing the Enquirer’s publisher AMI of ‘extortion and blackmail’ and suggesting his ownership of The Washington Post was behind a drive for the story.
The books claims that was ‘a public-relations masterstroke’ saying by writing it Bezos ‘cast himself as a sympathetic defender of the press’.
A week later Bezos held his meeting with Amazon executives.
Bezos, left, and MacKenzie, right, had announced they were divorcing after 25 years of marriage and four children in January 2019. The divorce split the company stocks, and made MacKenzie the richest woman in the world with a settlement of around $38billion
The new book also details an alleged change in Bezos’ behavior ahead of news of the affair breaking – it claims meetings were delayed and his calendar became full.
It also notes enquiries were made about dual-class stock structures where some shareholders would have more power ahead of the most expensive divorce in history.
And it describes how Jeff and MacKenzie had initially drifted apart as he attended more showbiz events and she preferred to avoid the limelight.
The book also points the finger at Sanchez’s brother Michael as the source for the Enquirer story. It details how he set up meetings with Enquirer editors, showing them messages from him sister.
Michael Sanchez has previously said: ‘I would never sell out anyone.’
He last month doubled down on his claim that he didn’t leak an explicit selfie of Bezos to the National Enquirer.
His attorney told DailyMail.com via email that he neither served as the Enquirer’s source for the affair story, nor did he share any of the photos that backed it up.
But the book also suggests the infamous ‘below the belt’ selfie was not in fact Bezos. Instead Sanchez had taken it a random photograph from a male escort website, the book claims.
On February 7 Bezos wrote a Medium post, accusing the Enquirer’s publisher AMI of ‘extortion and blackmail’ and suggesting his ownership of The Washington Post was behind a drive for the story. A week later Bezos held his meeting with Amazon executives
The new book also details an alleged change in Bezos’ behavior ahead of news of the affair breaking – it claims meetings were delayed and his calendar became full
The National Enquirer had trailed Bezos and Sanchez for months when they met up secretly, then splashed photos of them together across the magazine.
It was an enormous scandal and contributed to the divorce of Bezos and his then-wife MacKenzie, which ended up being the most expensive divorce in history.
In February this year Bezos announced he would be stepping down as the CEO of Amazon, 27 years after founding it with his ex-wife and building it into one of the most successful companies of all time now worth $1.7 trillion.
Bezos announced the move in a letter to his 1.3 million Amazon employees where he insisted he isn’t retiring but wants to focus on his ‘passions’ including his space and climate change ventures.
He will be replaced by 53-year-old Andy Jassy, the current CEO of the Amazon empire cloud business Amazon Web Services (AWS) and the man behind the move to cancel Parler back in January.
