Trump antitrust cop has a message for companies: ‘We're going to be very serious' about illegal competition
One of President Trump's top antitrust cops has a message for US companies: The new administration is going to aggressively pursue illegal competition, especially in industries that significantly impact the pocketbooks of average Americans.
'There was, I think, an assumption that the Trump administration was going to be like the Bush administration,' the US Justice Department's principal antitrust division deputy, Roger Alford, said during a Tuesday panel discussion at George Washington Law School.
'I think the world knows we're going to be very serious about antitrust enforcement."
The approach is already evident in a number of antitrust enforcement cases targeting Big Tech as federal prosecutors continue with antitrust litigation against Google (GOOG, GOOGL), Apple (APPL), and Meta (META).
The government has been successful in arguing that Google illegally monopolized the general search engine market and used illegal tactics to block competition in markets where online advertisements are bought and sold.
The Trump administration is currently asking judges to approve a breakup of Google's empire to remedy the monopoly behavior in those cases.
The FTC is also asking for D.C. federal district court Judge James Boasberg in a separate antitrust trial to force Meta (META) to sell off Instagram as well as its messaging service, WhatsApp.
Many of these cases were started during the first Trump administration, where Alford also worked. He said this week that the DOJ has evolved its enforcement approach since he last held a post with the department in 2017.
In 2017, he said, prevailing thinking was that the department didn't have the workforce to prosecute every case that its law enforcers thought they should, so cases were let go that should have been challenged, especially those where the department would be up against unlimited resources.
'Knowing there is no limit to what these companies are willing to spend,' he said, referring to the technology giants, 'you're very strategic with what cases you're going to bring.'
'You can still out-lawyer them.'
Outlawyering its opponent is how the department prevailed twice over Google, Alford said.
In addition to going after bad actors, Alford said the DOJ is also working to prevent harmful monopoly conduct before it happens.
One way is by adopting more flexible merger review standards. Rather than a less tolerant approach that demands that companies present 'clean mergers' for review — those that have no significant antitrust or regulatory concerns and require no conditions, remedies, or divestitures — the administration believes it can work out consent decrees with merging parties that put antitrust concerns at bay.
'I do think consent decrees are definitely going to be brought back," Alford said, adding that he expected the change to help deals close more quickly.
Other pursuits in the administration's overhaul, he said, include a push to reduce ambiguity in federal and state antitrust laws and remove aspects of those laws that harm consumers — such as a Wisconsin law that prevents homeowners from listing their homes on Zillow by owner.
There's a need to update 'a whole variety' of ambiguous antitrust laws, he said. 'It's so important to the market and investors and innovators.'
Alford added that the administration's philosophy is that it can best promote US competition and innovation by focusing on unfair competition in industries that the public cares about.
'It's incredibly important that antitrust be relevant to the average American,' he said, noting that Americans on average spend 33% of their income on housing, 17% on transportation, 12% on insurance, and 5% on entertainment. 'So bring cases in those kinds of categories.'
That strategy is also part of a broader 'realignment' of the Republican Party, to shed its reputation for siding only with big business and instead become the party of the working class.
'Both the left, center, and right are concerned about the abuse of power,' he said.
Alexis Keenan is a legal reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow Alexis on X @alexiskweed.
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