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Lina Khan is open to staying on as Federal Trade Commission chair next year, if the next president asks. She still may have to fight to keep the job.
Confirming Khan a second time would be a “tougher lift,” GOP Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri told Semafor. He supported her in 2021, but Hawley now sees Khan’s record as mixed since she became the Biden administration’s chief trustbuster.
She has also made some enemies on Wall Street with her muscular antitrust approach, and several wealthy donors are already encouraging Kamala Harris to replace her should Harris win the White House. On paper, at least, she also counts some Republican backers of her readiness to challenge Big Tech – including Donald Trump’s running mate, JD Vance.
Hawley’s comments are a sign, however, that Khan would have a hard time nearing the 20-vote Senate GOP cushion she got three years ago if she were renominated by a Harris administration.
Khan’s future will be a critical question for the next administration; her term expires on Sept. 25, after which she can stay on indefinitely until she’s replaced. The FTC’s leadership has major implications for companies looking to merge with rivals, along big firms accused of anti-competitive behavior, like Amazon.
The prospect of a steeper confirmation climb for Khan next year means political inertia may be her best bet to hang on – particularly since Republicans are slightly favored right now to take back the Senate. And if Trump takes the White House, Republicans would likely want to put their own imprimatur on the critical panel, which currently has a Democratic majority.
She already has one influential progressive nudging Harris’ campaign to tune out business interests that disapprove of her high regulatory appetite.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said he’s told Harris advisers that Khan should keep her job.
“Lina Khan has been one of the outstanding appointees of the Biden administration,” Sanders told Semafor. “I think we’re looking at massive concentration of ownership in this country in sector after sector, and we need somebody who’s going to break up monopolies. It’s, to my mind, very important that she stays onboard.”
The Harris campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
“Chair Khan has spent her time at the FTC fighting to lower the cost of groceries and life saving medicines, free American workers trapped by noncompetes, end junk fees and corporate abuse, and make it easier for entrepreneurs to succeed,” FTC spokesperson Douglas Farrar said in a statement to Semafor. “There is a lot of work yet to do to bring the benefits of fair competition to American consumers and entrepreneurs.”
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The 35-year-old has vaulted FTC from obscurity to prominence in the Biden administration, in part by suing Amazon last year over the retailer’s tactics to safeguard its dominance over competitors in e-commerce. That case is still playing out in federal court, along with an effort to ban noncompete agreements which prevent workers from seeking jobs at rival companies.
Her record so far is studded with wins and losses. Some early victories include companies abandoning planned acquisitions after the FTC filed antitrust lawsuits, such as Lockheed scrapping its Aerojet Rocketdyne agreement in early 2022.
“She’s unmistakably undertaken a bold agenda,” William Kovacic, an ex-FTC chair, told Semafor. “The ultimate success of that agenda remains to be seen, because there’s so many matters that are still in litigation or about to be in litigation.”
Progressives are fully bought in, helping elevate Khan’s profile as an antagonist of Big Tech. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., is hosting a Friday night roundtable with Khan about “efforts to fight back against corporate power in our communities.”
“Lina is doing the people’s business,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., told Semafor. “She needs to be in a position to continue to do it.”
Harris’s views on antitrust aren’t yet clear, but the Democratic nominee is interested in expanding the FTC’s turf. She has proposed handing new powers to the FTC to enforce a first-ever federal ban on grocery price gouging; while economists panned the idea, it illustrated Harris’ interest in channeling public discontent with rising prices through a crackdown on business consolidation.
If Trump wins in November, it’s not inconceivable that Khan would stick around given Vance’s affinity for her. Yet even the populist-leaning vice presidential nominee offered an olive branch to Wall Street when asked about Khan this week.
“I share her view that we should be concerned about big tech companies and some of the mergers that lead to the censorship of American citizens,” Vance told CNBC. “I do think that not all mergers and acquisitions are bad, and sometimes in the technology space, in the private equity space, you need to let some companies buy other companies.”
Joseph’s view
Harris’ platform is light on specifics so far, and antitrust enforcement is no exception. Her campaign is defined less by a distinct ideology than it is by the urgency of building a political coalition that can defeat Trump. It’s akin to someone pitching a contract to voters that’s still being written in real time.
So it’s hard to predict how Harris might react to the risk of a progressive backlash if she wins in November and seeks to replace Khan. One thing Khan can’t count on is reliable Senate Republican support, though: I approached six GOP senators who voted for her back in 2021; two of those Republicans offered criticisms of Khan, while the rest politely brushed me off.
One didn’t remember backing her.
If Trump wins, Khan’s prospects could grow even more dire despite Vance’s praise for her – largely because her work is so closely associated with the Biden administration. But she also faces what even her biggest supporters acknowledge is a struggle: how to raise FTC’s political profile by connecting antitrust enforcement to people’s daily lives.
“The challenge for Lina is that you’re doing the stuff that is very broadly popular,” Faiz Shakir, a Sanders adviser and founder of the progressive nonprofit More Perfect Union, told Semafor. “The challenge is, not a lot of people know they’re happening.”
The View From Wall Street
It’s not just donors like LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and IAC chairman Barry Diller pushing back against Khan. Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a professor at the Yale School of Management, said he has also pushed Harris advisers to not renominate her for a second term.
Sonnenfeld slammed her antitrust strategy as “hostile to American capitalism.
“I don’t know any segment of the American business leadership, large or small, old or young, across technology platforms that would speak in her defense,” he told Semafor.