President Biden's Broad Executive Order Emphasizes Antitrust Enforcement Across Many Industries

On July 9, 2021, President Biden issued a wide-ranging Executive Order (EO) establishing a government-wide policy to promote economic competition and laying out 72 specific initiatives seeking "to promote the interests of American workers, businesses, and consumers" across the economy. The underlying policy concerns driving the EO are said to include a belief that federal government inaction has led to less competition in a number of industries. With the EO, the Biden Administration appears committed to placing a renewed emphasis on promoting competition through aggressive antitrust enforcement.

Overview

The EO includes certain initiatives aimed at specific industries, such as agriculture, information technology, pharmaceuticals and healthcare, telecommunications, and financial services, while other initiatives target the economy more generally. To that end, the EO proclaims that "a whole-of-government approach is necessary to address overconcentration,