In Amazon.com and Bezos victory, judge orders Pentagon to temporarily stop JEDI contract

A U.S. judge on Thursday ordered the Pentagon to temporarily halt work on the cloud computing 'JEDI' contract, in what represents a major win for Amazon.com and Jeff Bezos.

In granting Amazon.coms request for a preliminary injunction, the court has effectively paused the U.S. Department of Defense and Microsoft's up-to-$10 billion cloud computing deal.

Amazon.com claimed they were unfairly discriminated against in the federal contract granting process by the administration of Donald Trump.

Judge Patricia E. Campbell-Smith made public her order but did release a sealed opinion accompanying the decision. She also ordered Amazon to post $42 million in the event that the injunction was issued wrongfully.

Earlier this week, Amazons Amazon Web Services unit said it was seeking to depose President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Mark Esper in its lawsuit over whether the president was trying to screw Amazon over the contract.

NEW: A federal judge has temporarily blocked Microsoft from starting work on the Pentagons multibillion-dollar JEDI cloud contract until Amazons contracting protest can be resolved. pic.twitter.com/NzfXzMIbR2

— Brian Fung (@b_fung) February 13, 2020

Court orders Pentagon to halt work on Microsofts JEDI cloud contract after Amazon protestsvia @Post_AG https://t.co/DmSRDUVlpb

— Washington Post PR (@WashPostPR) February 13, 2020

A judge has approved Amazons request to temporarily halt Microsofts work on the $10 billion JEDI contract. https://t.co/62BdZfZOZJ pic.twitter.com/xzGIxa1ViU

— CNBC (@CNBC) February 13, 2020

Judge grants preliminary injunction barring @DeptofDefense from proceeding with #JEDI contract awarded to @Microsoft over @amazon.

— Steve Herman (@W7VOA) February 13, 2020

Judge grants preliminary injunction barring Pentagon from proceeding with JEDI contract awarded to Microsoft; orders Amazon to put up $42 million in event that the injunction was wrongfully issued pic.twitter.com/W9mb6oqCGG