President Donald Trump said Thursday that the administration will "take a very long look" at a massive multibillion-dollar contract the Pentagon is preparing to award for a cloud computing system, citing "tremendous complaints" he's heard about the process.
Amazon Web Services Inc., a division of Amazon, and Microsoft Corp. are finalists for the contract estimated to be worth up to $10 billion over a decade.
Trump said during an unrelated event at the White House that companies that are no longer in the running to land the deal, known as Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI, have lodged complaints about the process.
Republican lawmakers troubled by the Pentagon's handling of the contract also took their concerns directly to the president.
"I'm getting tremendous complaints about the contract with the Pentagon and with Amazon," Trump said when he was asked about the matter during an Oval Office appearance with the Dutch prime minister. "They're saying it wasn't competitively bid."
"We're looking at it very seriously," the president said. "It's a very big contract, one of the biggest ever given having to do with the cloud and having to do with a lot of other things."
Trump said some of the "greatest companies in the world" were among those complaining about Amazon, and he said the administration will look "very closely" at the contract because "I have had very few things where there's been such complaining."
Trump is a critic of Amazon, the e-commerce retailer owned by Jeff Bezos. Bezos also owns The Washington Post, and Trump has criticized the paper's coverage of the administration.
The president's comments injected new uncertainty into a project the Defense Department has said is vital to maintaining the U.S. military's technological advantage over adversaries. Whichever company wins the contract will have the monumental task of storing and processing vast amounts of classified data. The Pentagon says it will enable troops to advance the use of artificial intelligence in warfare.
Oracle and IBM were eliminated from an earlier round of competition, leaving Amazon and Microsoft as the two finalists.
Amazon and Microsoft declined to comment Thursday on Trump's remarks. Oracle didn't immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.
IBM said in a statement Thursday that it "has long raised serious concerns about the structure of the JEDI procurement" and continues to believe the Defense Department "would be best served by a multi-cloud strategy" involving multiple cloud systems operated by different companies.
IBM did not say whether it had shared those concerns with the White House. Both IBM and Oracle formally protested the process last year.
A federal judge last week tossed out a second challenge by Oracle alleging that the bidding process was rigged in Amazon's favor, and some in Congress have expressed concerns about potential conflicts of interest. Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida sent a letter last week to White House national security adviser John Bolton asking that the Pentagon delay awarding the contract, contending that the process suffered from a "lack of competition" and the use of "arbitrary criteria and standards for bidders" that could waste taxpayer dollars and "fail to provide our warfighters with the best technology solutions."
Rubio had also expressed concerns about plans to award the contract to a single vendor.
The Pentagon has said it plans to award the contract as soon as Aug. 23.
Rep. James Langevin, a Rhode Island Democrat who sits on the House Armed Services Committee, said Thursday he has full confidence in the Defense Department's cloud strategy and that it's important that the project be allowed to move forward.
Langevin said in an emailed statement that it would be "wholly inappropriate" for Trump or any member of Congress to interfere in the procurement process, especially since the courts and the Government Accountability Office - the watchdog for Congress - have rejected challenges to the Pentagon's plans.
Daniel Goure, vice president of the Lexington Institute, a defense-oriented think tank based in Virginia, said it's not unusual for Trump to publicly raise concerns about a defense equipment contract, as Trump did weeks before he took office over the contract with Boeing for an updated version of Air Force One.
But Goure said it's rare for Trump to actually reverse a Pentagon decision, especially one backed by a legal opinion.
"I would be incredibly surprised if the president decided to unilaterally cancel this," said Goure, whose institute receives funding from Amazon. "I think once he sees the process, or the process is explained to him and the document is explained to him, I think this will all go away."
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Nobody paying attention over the past 24 months would be surprised to see Indiana – yes, Indiana – leading the way into this year’s College Football Playoff.
But anyone paying attention over the last 24 hours knew the only sure thing beyond the Hoosiers was that the playoff selection committee was destined to get picked apart when it released the pairings for this season's 12-team bracket on Sunday.
Most of that second-guessing will be coming from Notre Dame, which was passed over for Alabama and Miami for two bubble spots. The Fighting Irish dropped two notches in the CFP rankings over the last two weeks, down to No. 11, despite a 10-game winning streak, winning their finale by 29 points and simply sitting on the couch Saturday.
No. 9 Alabama didn't move at all in the CFP rankings after a 28-7 loss to No. 3 Georgia that looked worse than that.
No. 10 Miami didn't play either, but the Hurricanes' 27-24 win over Notre Dame in Week 1 played a role in their move once the teams were grouped right next to each other after BYU lost its game on Saturday and dropped one spot.
“Everyone can spin the metrics in favor of the team or teams they support,” committee chairman Hunter Yurachek explained. “You're always going to have controversy. That’s why we debated for so long, 9, 10 and 11, into the early-moning hours, and woke up at sunrise to do the same thing — make sure we got it right.”
The committee’s other key decision was choosing James Madison over Duke for the final spot. The selection left the Atlantic Coast Conference champion out of the mix, but didn’t fully exclude the ACC because Miami made it.
The rest of the field includes No. 2 Ohio State, No. 3 Georgia and No. 4 Texas Tech, which joined Indiana in getting first-round byes.
The Hoosiers moved to No. 1 with their 13-10 win over the Buckeyes on Saturday — their first Big Ten title since 1967 — and their 1-2 positioning sets up a possible rematch in the national title game Jan. 19.
Then it was No. 5 Oregon, followed by Ole Miss, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, Alabama, Miami, American champion Tulane and James Madison of the Sun Belt.
The playoffs start Dec. 19 with No. 9 Alabama at No. 8 Oklahoma. On Dec. 20, it's No. 10 Miami at No. 7 Texas A&M, No. 11 Tulane at No. 6 Ole Miss and No. 12 James Madison at No. 5 Oregon.
Winners move to the quarterfinals, which will feature Ohio State in the Cotton Bowl on New Year's Eve, then Texas Tech in the Orange Bowl, Indiana in the Rose Bowl and Georgia in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1.
This is a particularly costly and painful snub for the Fighting Irish. They lost their first two games of the season – one to Miami, the other to Texas A&M -- by a combined four points.
They did not play a tough schedule the rest of the way; it was ranked 44th, compared to 6th for Alabama but 45th for Miami. But they won all those games easily.
It also hurts the pocketbook. Where conferences split $4 million for each team they place into the first round, Notre Dame – as an independent – would have banked the full amount for itself.
Yurachek said the committee had not previously considered Miami’s Aug. 31 win over Notre Dame because there were always other teams in the mix, namely Alabama and BYU. But when BYU lost, the Irish and Hurricanes ended up right next to each other, which made that Miami win more important. Yurachek directed the committee to go back and rewatch it.
“Really, how Miami's defense dominated Notre Dame's running game, where for the rest of the season, their running game dominated most of the teams they played,” Yurachek said when asked what the committee saw in that game.
Alabama (10-3) is in despite three losses. Those who believe the Tide deserve it will look at these factors:
—An eight-game winning streak after that 14-point, season-opening loss to Florida State that included a 24-21 victory at Georgia for a season split while, for instance, BYU lost both its games against Texas Tech.
--Ignoring the above, there was the “You can’t lose ground for playing in the title game” argument. Last year, Alabama had three losses and was passed over for SMU, which was coming off a loss in the ACC title game. Using the same logic, someone other than the Tide needed to go this time.
Duke tried to make a compelling argument that its seven wins over Power Four teams, including the victory over Virginia in the ACC title game, made it more deserving than James Madison for that fifth and final automatic spot for conference champs.
But the Blue Devils had five losses. And Virginia was ranked four (now nine) spots lower than Miami, the ACC's best team by many measurements.
James Madison's playoff game against a mega-team from a mega-conference — Oregon — will suss out whether teams like that should be playing for the title.
History, however, might look back on Duke's win if league title games are ever eliminated from the schedule due to their growing irrelevance. Other than eliminating BYU (but not Alabama) and flip-flopping Indiana and Ohio State, this year's set of games in the Power Four meant next to nothing.
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Georgia running back Chauncey Bowens (33) runs against Alabama during the second half of a Southeastern Conference championship NCAA college football game, Saturday, Dec. 6, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Georgia wide receiver Zachariah Branch (1) celebrates his touchdown against Alabama during the second half of a Southeastern Conference championship NCAA college football game, Saturday, Dec. 6, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Ohio State's Lorenzo Styles Jr. breaks up a pass intended for Indiana's Omar Cooper Jr. during the first half of the Big Ten championship NCAA college football game in Indianapolis, Saturday, Dec. 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)
