Among the defining features of the Biden administration has been its approach to dealing with some of the world’s largest companies and stepping up antitrust enforcement. But in less than three weeks, the United States will have Donald Trump sitting — once again — in the Oval Office. So how might the new Trump administration handle antitrust affairs? And which companies are facing the antitrust spotlight?
To discuss, “Marketplace Morning Report” host David Brancaccio was joined by Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business and an antitrust expert. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation.
David Brancaccio: So much uncertainty with the change of presidential administration, but help me here. I need you, Erik, to inject something certain we can count on in the new year. I think it’s something about the absolute, incontrovertible certainty that a company called Google, Alphabet, will be grappling with antitrust law in this coming year.
Erik Gordon: Google is going to be spending a lot of money with lawyers — and on multiple fronts. The government has gone after them with real vigor and has proposed a pretty extreme remedy, namely that Google has to sell off its browser, Chrome. This is the search front where the government says Google has built such a monopoly, so much power in search that virtually anything they do is abusive, and the only way to cure that is to split off their browser.
Brancaccio: All right, and the other folks are facing questions about outsized role in competition — Meta, Facebook. Maybe that case we’ll see more about in April.
Gordon: Facebook acquired two big companies, and you’ll recognize the names: Instagram and WhatsApp. And the government approved those acquisitions over a decade ago. Now, the government says, “No, we want you to divest them.”
Brancaccio: All right, another company where there are questions of this sort: Amazon, right in the U.S.?
Gordon: Oh, and in Europe. I mean, this is a two-front war for Amazon. So, if you want to sell on Amazon and you want to be in the Prime program, you have to use Amazon’s fulfillment services. And the government says, “Well, that’s an illegal use of your power. You shouldn’t tie those two together.” And then the other thing that Amazon does that really irritates the government is they have what you know, lawyers call a “most-favored nations” clause — if a seller sells a product at a lower price than on Amazon, well, they have to lower the Amazon price, so that the Amazon price is always the lowest price being offered, and the government says it’s an abuse of power. You can’t tell people what prices to set.
Brancaccio: Now, stepping back from the companies, President-elect Trump has tapped a current Federal Trade Commissioner to now lead that agency. His name is Andrew Ferguson, and a policy expert named Gail Slater will head antitrust at the Department of Justice. What’s your sense of this new team?
Gordon: The Biden administration was famous not just for being tough, but being very creative in their ideas. But what you’re going to see with the Trump administration is enforcement, because — remember — there’s this populist streak. Think of JD Vance. There’s going to be enforcement, but it’s going to be old-style, traditional enforcement. Companies can predict whether they’re doing things right or wrong, not have to guess at some new theory that might be applied to them.
