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As we predicted before the inauguration, Trump 2.0 antitrust enforcers have shown continued support for the pro-worker, anti-tech antitrust agenda that has permeated recent antitrust enforcement through the last two administration changes. This time around, President Trump appointed competition agency leaders in Chair Ferguson at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and AAG Slater at the Department of Justice Antitrust Division (DOJ) who identify with a brand of conservative populism coalescing around many of the same policies and priorities as Biden-appointed competition leaders like FTC Chair Lina Khan. For example, since the inauguration, antitrust agencies under their leadership have forged on with antitrust cases against Big Tech, backed the Biden-era revisions to the merger and labor guidelines, and doubled down on efforts to use antitrust laws to protect American workers.Continue Reading Red Tape Rollback: DOJ’s Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force

President Trump was sworn into office on Monday, promising swift action on several fronts. There is already a new Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) Chair, Andrew Ferguson, with former FTC Chair Lina Khan expected to step down shortly. At the Department of Justice, Antitrust Division (“DOJ”), proposed AAG Gail Slater will need to be confirmed by the Senate before she can take the helm.Continue Reading Looking Back and Looking Forward: Healthcare Antitrust in a New Administration: What Stays the Same and What Changes?

What antitrust enforcement will look like during a second Trump administration is, like antitrust law, complicated. Notions that Republicans are pro-business and therefore will take a laissez-faire approach to antitrust enforcement are outdated and simplistic. During Trump’s first term, antitrust enforcement was far from moribund, blending traditional Republican preferences for deregulation with a populist skepticism toward Big Tech and market concentration generally. This anomalistic meeting of progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans in the antitrust space even garnered a mash-up moniker – the “Khanservaties” – a group of conservative Republicans including Missouri Senator Josh Hawley and erstwhile Attorney General nominee and former Florida Representative Matt Gaetz, who praised Biden-appointed Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan. Vice President-elect J.D. Vance also provided backhanded praise for Khan, stating, “I look at Lina Khan as one of the few people in the Biden administration that I think is doing a pretty good job.” Continue Reading Antitrust During Trump 2.0: It’s Complicated

Republican and Democrat candidates alike have promised along the campaign trail that they will work to address the costs of everyday essentials for American consumers, particularly for food. One of the centerpieces of the Harris-Walz campaign is enacting “the first-ever federal ban on price gouging on food and groceries”[1] and the Trump-Vance campaign has decried the rising price of eggs as a byproduct of the Biden Administration’s economic policies.[2] Candidates’ focus on the checkout counter is unsurprising given reports that rising prices are one of voters’ top concerns this election cycle. And while the Consumer Price Index indicates that the current rate of inflation is 2.4% and on a downward trend,[3] certain data show that the price for food has increased by an average of 25% across urban cities in the United States since 2020.[4]Continue Reading Campaign Promises to Address Rising Prices at the Grocery Store Signal Stronger Price Gouging Investigations, Enforcement Actions, and Prohibitions to Come

Leading up to the U.S. presidential election this November, our Antitrust & Competition team continues to offer insights into what antitrust enforcement may look like under the next presidential administration. In our last post, we analyzed antitrust enforcement under the Biden administration, which highlighted the results of Biden Administration’s aggressive antitrust policies. Under another potential Trump administration, enforcement priorities and agency leadership would be tough to predict. As our guideposts, we will analyze antitrust enforcement under Trump’s first term, 2024 campaign rhetoric, and antitrust priorities laid out in Heritage Foundation’s 2025 Presidential Transition Project (“Project 2025”), with the understanding that former President Trump has disavowed Project 2025.Continue Reading The Sequel?: Predicting Antitrust Enforcement in a New Trump Administration

Leading up to the U.S. presidential election this November, our Antitrust & Competition team continues to offer insights into what antitrust enforcement may look like under the next presidential administration. As we look forward to the next four years, we should also look back on antitrust enforcement under previous recent administrations. Much has been made of the more aggressive and public stance on antitrust enforcement under the Biden administration. The Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) and the Department of Justice, Antitrust Division (the “DOJ”) (together the “Agencies”) have put forth several significant policy changes and proposed rules, including new merger guidelines and a proposed ban on noncompetes. All that said, at least some of the data may indicate a less radical change in antitrust enforcement under Biden as compared to Trump than the conventional wisdom suggests.Continue Reading Antitrust Under Biden: Taking a Closer Look at the Numbers