OP-ED

Internal emails show FTC’s Lina Khan is trying to win by losing

By Robert Bork Jr., March 3rd, 2024

Critics of progressive antitrust have long wondered if Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan’s extraordinary losing streak in high-profile antitrust cases is the result of deliberate strategy rather than mere incompetence. Last summer, Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Calif.) pointedly asked Lina Khan in a hearing: “Are you losing on purpose?”

At that point, Khan had racked up a remarkable four-case losing streak in antitrust merger cases. Courts most recently rejected her bid to stop Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision, and Meta’s acquisition of Within, a popular health-oriented gaming company and its app. The FTC lost these cases because it was weak on the facts, could not demonstrate competitive harms to consumers, extrapolated into possible but far from certain future effects and were based on novel antitrust theories that courts did not recognize.

Continue reading at The Hill.