Sen. Elizabeth Warren slammed for claim Bezos doesn’t pay his fair share of taxes

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Mass., drew sharp criticism Monday after she claimed on X that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos should pay more taxes in response to his sponsorship of the Met Gala, with conservatives questioning the senator’s record and accusing her of distorting the facts.

“The answer to everything, including apparently the bankruptcy of an airline at the cost of some 15,000 jobs and the whole concept of cheap plane tickets, is ‘Jeff Bezos has a lot of money,’” said Mike Solana, venture capitalist and media founder. wrote in response to Warren’s post.

Solana was referring to the recent demise of Spirit Airlines. Conservative commentators say Spirit could have been saved if Warren hadn’t done it pushed to block JetBlue acquisition of low-cost carrier over antitrust concerns in 2024.

“If Jeff Bezos can commit $10 million to sponsor the Met Gala, he can afford to pay his fair share of taxes,” Warren said Monday, sparking a wave of pushback from social media users.

The Washington Post says there is “little to be gained by raising taxes on the rich” since the rates are already quite high.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., questions Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on March 16, 2023. (Jacquelyn Martin/AP)

Following the news that Bezos wrote an eight-figure check to fund the Met Gala, entertainment industry liberals such as Mark Ruffalo and Taraji P. Henson joined Warren in criticizing Amazon and Bezos for their allegedly unethical business practices. Protesters appeared outside the gala Monday with signs criticizing Bezos. One protester was arrested for trying to break into the event.

Warren’s message backfired online, as commenters highlighted the demise of Spirit Airlines and took issue with her tax policies over the years.

“Jeff Bezos employs over 1.5 million people at Amazon,” wrote X user Gina Milan. “You are responsible for losing 17,000 workers’ jobs and blocking the merger that ultimately killed Spirit Airlines.”

Spirit has put downward pressure on other airlines’ prices and its decline could lead to an increase in overall travel prices, industry analysts say. said The United States Today. Estimated job losses resulting from Spirit’s closure include approximately 15,000 direct employees and an additional 2,000 indirect employees.

“This myth will not die,” said Reason Magazine reporter Billy Binion. jobresponding to Warren’s claim that Bezos doesn’t pay enough taxes. “In 2024 alone, it is estimated that Jeff Bezos paid almost $3 billion in taxes. Portraying the rich as tax cheats is very interesting on social media, but that is not reality. The United States has the most progressive tax system in the developed world.”

Forbes estimates that Bezos paid $2.7 billion in taxes in 2024 after selling $13.6 billion worth of Amazon stock. He reduced his tax burden that year by donating $2.5 billion in Amazon stock to charity over the previous three years. Bezos paid nearly $1 billion in taxes between 2014 and 2018. according to to a ProPublica analysis of tax documents.

To minimize the tax burden, billionaires like Bezos often take out loans secured by their massive stock holdings to acquire spending money, according to securities filings reviewed by ProPublica. Since the IRS does not consider loan income, this setup allows the wealthy to access cash without having to pay income taxes.

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Billionaire Jeff Bezos attends the DealBook Summit. Critics on social media accused Bezos of letting The Washington Post suffer amid hundreds of layoffs. (Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images for The New York Times)

Some on social media have been pushing Warren to provide details on how she plans to make Bezos pay his “fair share.”

“What is his fair share?” Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, Warren asked.. “What tax rate?”

Warren proposed a wealth taximposing an annual tax on households whose net worth exceeds $1 billion worth 6% of their total wealth. Under Warren’s proposal, households with net worths between $50 million and $1 billion would be subject to a similar 2 percent tax.

Senator Elizabeth Warren speaks to a staff member before the Senate Banking Committee hearing on oversight of credit reporting agencies on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, April 27, 2023. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

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Much of the wealth growth experienced by Bezos and other billionaires comes from unrealized gains on their assets, which Warren’s tax would target.

Writer Mike Côté underlines that Bezos is “so rich he can simply leave the jurisdiction or obtain citizenship elsewhere” if Warren’s tax plans were signed into law.

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“Liz Warren doesn’t want progressive taxation,” he continued. “She wants confiscatory taxation. It’s fundamentally un-American. And it doesn’t work.”

Warren’s office did not respond to a request for comment sent by Fox News Digital Tuesday morning.