(Reuters) – Parler, a social networking service favored by many supporters of U.S. President Donald Trump, sued Amazon.com Inc on Monday, accusing its Web hosting service of violating antitrust law by suspending its account.
In a complaint filed with the U.S. District Court in Seattle, Parler said Amazon’s decision to effectively shutter its account was “apparently motivated by political animus” and “apparently designed to reduce competition in the microblogging services market to the benefit of Twitter.”
Parler is seeking a court order requiring Amazon to reinstate its account, and blocking it from suspending services it had contracted for. It is also seeking unspecified triple damages.
Amazon did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Parler was not immediately available for comment.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York, Jeffrey Dastin and Stephen Nellis in San Francisco, and Munsif Vengattil in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur and Matthew Lewis)
