Obama FTC, DOJ Lay Foundation for Change in Merger Enforcement

As a candidate for president, then Senator Barack Obama promised to "reinvigorate antitrust enforcement" and criticized the Bush administration for "what may be the weakest record of antitrust enforcement of any administration in the last half century." (Statement of Senator Barack Obama for the American Antitrust Institute, Sept. 27, 2007.) Obama was especially critical of the Bush administration's record of enforcement against what he saw as anticompetitive mergers.

Since being sworn into office, President Obama has appointed a new Chairman of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Jon Leibowitz, and a new Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Christine Varney, to carry out his antitrust enforcement agenda. Together, Chairman Leibowitz and Assistant Attorney General Varney have begun laying the foundation for President Obama's promised "reinvigorated" antitrust enforcement. Specifically, the FTC and DOJ