The Last Days of Antitrust Enforcement

Donald Trump is president, but just before he took office, the heads of the agencies that did most of the governing in the Biden era got to work. The Federal Trade Commission, the antitrust division of the Justice Department and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau got to work, finalizing a flurry of new rules, lawsuits, enforcement actions, and challenges to the most powerful companies in the country. These were actions that these agencies worked on for years, that they put through just under the wire. It really paints a picture of what we've lost—and what we can have again, throughout the executive branch, if people just decide to govern. 

On this episode, Matt and Dave do a lightning round of actions from these three agencies in the past three weeks, and explain both why we'll miss this work in the future, and why some of it may just endure."Most Americans know their food passes through many hands before reaching their plates, but few realize just how concentrated that chain of production has become. In this final episode of the season, antitrust lawyer Basel Musharbash reveals how roughly three dozen corporations have come to dominate nearly every aspect of America's food system, from farm to table.

Read the FTC report mentioned in the episode here: www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/ftc-accomplishments-june-2021-january-2025.pdf