HBO's John Oliver Mocks Danbury's Amazon Video

DANBURY, CT — Mayor Mark Boughton's tactics of luring Amazon to the Hat City have garnered national attention. The city's video pitch has been picked up by national news outlets and Boughton even made an appearance on Fox Business.

But not all press is good press.

Comedian John Oliver, host of HBO's "Last Week Tonight," recently used part of Boughton's video pitch to mock cities bending over backwards to curry Amazon's favor. Since the company announced plans to establish a new North American headquarters, many cities have rolled out the red carpet in attempts to lure Amazon's HQ2 and its 50,000 well-paying jobs.

The bit, done largely in jest, criticizes governments for giving up too much in order to attract Amazon. Oliver accused Boughton for using a tired joke when he asked Amazon's Echo Dot device to indicate the best place for Amazon to establish its headquarters.

"Numerous mayors made videos ending in versions of the same bad joke," Oliver quipped before showing a quip from Danbury's video. "My one and only worry with all of those ads, and I mean this seriously: Are they almost too hilarious?"

Boughton has pushed hard to attract Amazon to the Hat City, despite Danbury's falling short on Amazon's population and infrastructure requests. Boughton knows Danbury is a long shot to attract Amazon, but hopes other companies see what Danbury is doing and follow suit.

During an appearance on Fox Business in October, the mayor declined to reveal what sort of incentives the city offered Amazon.

"This is probably akin to hitting the Powerball," Boughton said in a previous interview with Patch. "We certainly are realistic about that. There is an opportunity here. The Connecticut drag is hurting us and may kill our application, but this is an opportunity to strut our stuff."

You can view Oliver's video below. Note: it contains some rough language.

Image via Youtube Screenshot