President-elect Donald Trump has picked Commissioner Andrew Ferguson to take over for Lina Khan as the next chair of the Federal Trade Commission, in a blow to major technology firms.
The nomination is a big promotion for Ferguson, a former law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and former advisor to Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. He was nominated by President Joe Biden to serve as one of the FTC’s Republican commissioners in July 2023 and was confirmed by the full Senate in March.
As FTC chair, Ferguson is expected to continue Khan’s history of taking on major tech corporations, which won her praise from both Republican and Democratic members of Congress, including Vice President-elect J.D. Vance.
In a statement posted to his Truth Social on Monday night, Trump touted Ferguson’s “proven record of standing up to Big tech censorship and protecting Freedom of Speech.”
In his own statement posted to X, Ferguson said the FTC will focus on ending Big Tech’s “vendetta against competition” and ensure that America is the “world’s technological leader.” That won him a quick congratulations from Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who has become a major player in Trump’s transition team, often weighing in on decisions and attending various meetings with foreign leaders.
Mark Meador, a partner at boutique antitrust law firm Kressin Meador Powers and a former counsel to Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, has also been nominated to serve as a Republican commissioner. According to his biography on the firm’s website, he was “deeply involved” in the FTC’s efforts to deal with product hopping in the pharmaceutical industry during his time as an attorney for the agency.
It’s unclear whether the Trump administration will continue Khan’s aggressive actions against corporate mergers — including the $25 billion merger between Kroger and Albertsons, which was blocked on Tuesday by a federal judge — or its various ongoing antitrust cases.
Punchbowl News reported that a proposal advocating for Ferguson’s appointment cited his intention to “reverse Lina Khan’s anti-business agenda,” “fight wokeness,” and “fight back against the trans agenda.” Two Democratic FTC commissioners sent Ferguson a letter on Tuesday asking him to clarify his priorities, noting that the word “fraud” is absent from the proposal reported by Punchbowl.
“We urge you to correct the impression created by this document,” wrote Commissioners Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya.
But Ferguson’s appointment, as well as Trump’s nomination of Vance advisor Gail Slater to oversee the Justice Department’s antitrust division, signals somewhat of a continuation of the current FTC’s charge against major tech firms.
Khan, who gained notoriety criticizing Amazon, led the FTC to take on Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta. According to Bloomberg News, the agency is investigating whether Microsoft’s multibillion-dollar investment in OpenAI violated consumer protections, along with a $650 million deal between Microsoft and Infelction AI. The FTC is also taking on Apple’s iPhone dominance, while Google is waiting for a federal judge to rule on the agency’s recommendation it should be forced to sell its Chrome business.
“We expect Ferguson to continue to have a keen eye on the tech world and antitrust swirls, however he will clearly roll back Khan’s head scratching anti-tech agenda including ending efforts to regulate AI and abandoning a brutal standard for any merger of any size for the tech world,” Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives wrote Wednesday, proclaiming that “Christmas came early for the tech world.”
He also expects the Justice Department’s aggressive stance against Big Tech will end up being “more bark than bite,” and touted the benefits of a “pro-innovation” FTC chair.
Trump’s nominee for attorney general, Pam Bondi, challenged Apple’s e-book pricing, Facebook’s social media dominance, and Google’s dominance in search as Florida’s attorney general. However, after leaving office in 2019, following her second term, she became a lobbyist for several companies, including Amazon, Uber, and General Motors.