Donald Trump Second Administration

Diana Moss reviews four recent examples of the Trump administration weaponizing antitrust and regulation to stifle opposing ideological and political viewpoints.

Member of the European Parliament Alexandra Geese writes that illiberal politicians and Big Tech social media platforms have abused the principle of freedom of speech to suppress ideas with which they do not agree and promote hate speech. She provides three recommendations for retaking speech from the social media platforms that constitute today’s public sphere.

Eleanor Fox argues that the leading law firms should have immediately and collectively resisted President Donald Trump’s attacks. Strong, timely collective resistance may have helped staunch democratic backsliding and prevented normalization of repeated, speech-chilling demands. Doing so, however, the firms would have faced the risk of violating the antitrust laws. This article assesses antitrust’s treatment of political action and argues that the space for protected political action needs to be enlarged.

Wendy Li writes that business leaders must rediscover past unity and put pressure on politicians to defend against President Donald Trump’s attacks on businesses and civil society and prevent democratic backsliding.

After the second Trump administration initially appeared to maintain significant continuity in antitrust enforcement, the president more recently thrust the agencies into turmoil. Those later actions create troubling risks to the economy and the rule of law, writes Jonathan B. Baker.

Alan D. Jagolinzer and Jacob N. Shapiro write that the new Trump administration’s efforts to improve government efficiency through the cancellation of contracts and other promises will inevitably raise costs as businesses and investors demand a risk premium to account for lost trust.

The Federal Trade Commission under Chair Andrew Ferguson has surprised many by continuing its predecessor’s emphasis on protecting labor markets. Randy Kim writes that while this is a welcome development, it will do little to help workers if President Donald Trump does not also continue his predecessor’s whole-of-government approach. Early indications suggest he will not.

Sarah Haan writes that to understand American authoritarianism, it’s less useful to analyze the strategies of elected dictators around the globe than to look at how corporate leaders in the United States have rigged corporate democracy.