“Lina Khan Has Weaponized the FTC… Makes The Obama Administration Look Conservative”

WASHINGTON – Yesterday, Competitiveness Coalition Chair Scott Brown appeared on WFEA’s Morning Update discussing the Biden Administration’s tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, as well as the broader regulatory overreach harming American competitiveness.

Brown, a former U.S. Senator and Ambassador, singled out Lina Khan, Chair of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), for her efforts to “put a wet blanket on our high-tech industry and cutting these young entrepreneurs’ knees off so they can’t compete on a global basis.”

Brown also took the Biden Administration to task for promising to raise corporate tax rates by letting the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 expire.

Brown concluded by ripping the FTC for blocking iRobot’s proposed merger with Amazon, which led to the layoffs of 350 employees. “This was a company competing on a global basis…Lina Khan has weaponized the FTC…she makes the Obama Administration look conservative.”

Earlier this year, European Commission regulators acknowledged that they were “in close contact with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission” throughout their investigation into the iRobot-Amazon acquisition, which was later abandoned and resulted in 350 American jobs needlessly lost. A source told Reuters that the FTC was poised to reject the iRobot-Amazon deal before the companies announced they were scrapping the merger. Brown lamented those layoffs in a Boston Herald op-ed.

Listen to the whole piece here. 

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The Competitiveness Coalition is a first-of-its-kind group educating the public and advocating for policies that put consumers first while fostering innovation and attracting new investment.