Momentum builds for major antitrust reform
20 January 2021
President Trump's outgoing antitrust chief Makan Delrahim on Tuesday endorsed a proposal from House Democrats that would put new limits on acquisitions by large companies, during comments made at a Duke University event.
Why it matters: Momentum is building for major antitrust reform, updating rules that were written for railroads instead of routers.
- Democrats began agitating for it shortly after Trump took office. Some Republicans view it as a way to curb Big Tech's power. And Delrahim's words may help sway others GOP members who are on the fence.
The draft legislation cited by Delrahim would presume horizontal acquisitions by a company with more than a 50% market share in a defined market are anticompetitive, no matter the size of the acquired company.
- Delrahim said: "The goal here is to create a bright-line rule for merging parties and for courts, allowing for better business planning by private parties and better litigation planning by federal antitrust enforcers."
- He added that his endorsement was grounded in DOJ's experience with both the Visa/Plaid and Sabre/Farelogix situations.
- Delrahim also proposed the creation of a public-private rulemaking body to focus on increasing competition among online platforms. Plus a pilot “specialized antitrust court,” to see if it could perform better than courts with generalist judges who lack deep antitrust and/or industry knowledge.
The bottom line: Washington, D.C. changes today, with a new President and a new Senate majority. But the evolution of antitrust law continues to point in the same direction.
Go deeper:Read Delrahim's full speech
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.