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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Sunday, January 25, 2004

Amazon.com collects online donations for US presidential candidates

The leading US online retailer Amazon.com Inc. has begun collecting campaign contributions for the candidates in the 2004 US presidential elections, said Amazon spokesman Chris Bruzzo Saturday.


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The leading US online retailer Amazon.com Inc. has begun collecting campaign contributions for the candidates in the 2004 US presidential elections, said Amazon spokesman Chris Bruzzo on Jan. 24.

By using the new service, contributors can donate from 5 to 200 US dollars instantly using a credit or debit card to any number of candidates.

The Seattle, Washington-based retailer, which has 37 million active accounts, said it is "trying to take the friction out of grassroots contributions to presidential candidates."

Bruzzo said Amazon is providing the new service as a test and "may decide to discontinue it at any time."

Amazon, which is not endorsing any candidates, charges usual processing fees for donation payments.

"For us, we think this is an interesting but natural extension of what we do every day," Bruzzo said. "Our goal here was to make it as easy for people to make contributions to presidential campaigns as it is to buy the latest Harry Potter book."

Currently, the campaign contributions page lists 17 presidential hopefuls, in alphabetical order, including President George W. Bush.

So far the service has generated results for some of the candidates, collecting contributions from 252 to 1699 dollars by early Saturday.

Leading Democratic candidate John Kerry had received 62 contributions totaling 1,699 dollars, against 72 contributions totaling 1,095.01 dollars for Vermont Governor Howard Dean, and 26contributions totaling 252 dollars for Libertarian Party candidate Michael Badnarik.

Some campaigns, including those of Bush, Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman and a few others, had not signed up to the new service as of Saturday.

Amazon said it was seeking permission to accept contributions for those candidates. "We certainly do want to have all the eligible candidates signed up," Bruzzo said.

Source: Xinhua


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