Three Ways Khan’s Rhetoric Is At Odds With Reality 

WASHINGTON –  In case you missed either FTC Chair Lina Khan’s New York Times Dealbook or 60 Minutes interviews, the Competitiveness Coalition is here to help set the record straight on her poor leadership and indifference toward the American consumer.

Myth #1 – “We’ve actually racked up a lot of wins,” argued Khan in an interview with the New York Times Dealbook newsletter.

Fact – The FTC has lost so many of the high-profile cases it brought that Congressman Kevin Kiley (R-CA) asked Khan at one point “Are you losing on purpose?” Most recently, two federal judges have blocked the FTC’s noncompete ban, and earlier this spring a judge dismissed the agency’s lawsuit against a private equity firm, stating the commission failed to prove “any authority for the proposition that receiving profits from an entity that may be violating antitrust laws is itself a violation of antitrust laws.” Last year, the FTC lost its bid to stop Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard and Meta’s acquisition of Within.

Myth #2 – “We firmly believe that we have the legal authority to do this, and we’re willing to keep making that clear to the courts,” argued Khan on the agency’s rule to prohibit non-compete agreements, in an interview with Lesley Stahl that aired on “60 Minutes Overtime.”

Fact – The FTC’s non-compete rule has been blocked by not one, but two federal judges since it was passed in a party line vote this spring. “The FTC lacks statutory authority,” wrote US District Judge Ada Brown on the ban. Brown continued, “the role of an administrative agency is to do as told by Congress, not to do what the agency think[s] it should do.” The FTC’s unilateral action to ban businesses nationwide from including non-compete agreements in an employee’s contract has received push back from companies, lawmakers and even the left-leaning Washington Post editorial board, which noted “the FTC might not actually have the legal authority to enact any rule in this area.”

Myth #3 – “If you’re not enforcing antitrust, you’re allowing decades of consolidation that can create inflationary spikes more readily, because your system as a whole is less resilient to that disruption,” stated Khan, in an interview with the New York Times’ Dealbook.

Fact – Former Obama economic adviser Larry Summers has warned that “hipster antitrust” policies – like those pushed by Khan – could make the economy “more inflationary and less resilient.” Moreover, the FTC’s attacking of US businesses has led to disastrous results, such as in the case of Massachusetts-based iRobot, which was forced to lay off 350 workers after its merger with Amazon was abandoned. Considered the guiding principle of antitrust law for nearly 50 years, the consumer welfare standard has “provided an effective legal framework for promoting technological innovation and consumer welfare while addressing anticompetitive conduct” as National Taxpayers Union’s Ryan Nabil wrote. 

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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.