Reflections On The Next Four Years Of Antitrust Enforcement

1. By the votes of a nation's electors, the future of U.S. antitrust enforcement moved from "pragmatic aggressive enforcement as usual" to "too early to call." The unexpected election of President-elect Donald J. Trump opened wide the speculation or mystery of what he and his advisors are planning as his administration's antitrust policy. Given the paucity of his statements on antitrust policy, and the random nature of his few comments, we must dig deeply to formulate the outline of his enforcement plans or speculate about practices and policies in the spirit of the campaign's "America First" rhetoric. At this moment, there is little evidence of which way it will go— hence, "too early to call." Secretary Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, had a detailed policy statement on antitrust enforcement. In addition, the very substantial majority of articles and reports published in recent weeks discussed Secretary Clinton's very focused and well-prepared views in detail. In