There’s a battle over the future of corporate power undergirding the presidential election, and it’s not clear where Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris stands.
Billionaire Democratic donors, like LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, have called on Harris to dump Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan, the President Joe Biden appointee who has taken on an aggressive antitrust enforcement strategy using long-disregarded federal laws to block monopoly power and regulate corporate mergers.
Whether Harris diverges from Biden on economic policy is a “question we’re all trying to figure out,” one Biden adviser told NOTUS, granted anonymity to speak freely, adding that as vice president, Harris largely hasn’t had to flesh out her policy positioning on corporate regulation and Biden’s antitrust agenda.
Her close ties to Silicon Valley, including bringing Uber executive and Harris’ brother-in-law Tony West as a campaign advisor, could signal more openness to the historic, more lax relationship between the FTC and corporations, some Democrats worry.
Khan’s term ends next month, but she’ll remain the FTC chair indefinitely until a president names a replacement and it’s confirmed by the Senate. Harris’ campaign declined to comment on Khan’s appointment.
In the absence of statements on the issue from either Harris or Donald Trump, close watchers are putting extra weight on the vice presidential picks — and because Sen. JD Vance has been so vocal on Khan in particular, some on the left are worried Republicans will be able to win the narrative on corporate greed.
Progressives and consumer advocates have called on Harris to publicly signal support for Khan and the direction she has taken the FTC. In a letter to the Harris campaign last month, they warned that removing Khan as chair of the FTC would “allow phony populists like J.D. Vance to seize the mantle of economic populism, even as the Biden/Harris administration has done more to fight corporate greed than any presidency since [Franklin D. Roosevelt’s].”
Consumer groups sent a letter to both Trump’s Republican presidential campaign and the Harris campaign last week calling on them to keep Khan as chair. The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment. The Harris campaign does not currently have an economic policy platform on its website but is reportedly planning to publish one this week.
Progressives told NOTUS they’re encouraged by recent comments in Harris’ stump speeches to “take on big corporations that engage in illegal price gouging” in Wisconsin and Michigan last week. They were also relieved to see the vice presidential pick be Tim Walz, who signed a noncompete ban in Minnesota, a push replicated on the federal level by Khan.
But concerns about Vance, the Republican vice presidential candidate, grabbing the message leading up to November are also starting to take shape. As Harris has stayed relatively quiet on Khan herself — walking a tightrope between the moneyed Silicon Valley types and progressive Khan stans — Vance has emerged as a vocal supporter of Khan.
Khan, one former GOP congressional aide pointed out, is “one of the only members of Biden’s administration that has received bipartisan praise.” If Harris ditches her, she’d be ceding the issue to Republicans, the aide argued.
“She is giving Trump and Vance the upper hand when it comes to fighting monopoly power,” they told NOTUS.
Vance praised Khan to NOTUS in March, saying that she has “justifiable concerns about corporate concentration” and has continued to on the campaign trail — though his support is rooted more in his concerns about censorship than the anti-corporate greed agenda of the left.
“I think that [Khan’s] been very smart about going after some of these Big Tech companies that monopolize what we’re allowed to say in our own country,” Vance said on “Face the Nation” Sunday.
Vance also credited Trump with the Justice Department’s recent win after a judge ruled that Google maintained an illegal monopoly over search. It was the first U.S. anti-monopoly ruling in decades — the effort was spearheaded by Biden-appointed Department of Justice antitrust Attorney General Jonathan Kanter but began under the Trump administration.
The author of Project 2025’s chapter on the Federal Trade Commission, from Trump administration DOJ political appointee Adam Candeub, also tied the Google anti-monopoly ruling to Trump to NOTUS. (As to Trump’s vocal rejection of Project 2025, he said he understands if Trump thought Project 2025 got in the way of communicating his views to the public, but “I’m hopeful a lot of these policies will go forward.”)
Similar to Vance, Project 2025’s vision for the FTC highlights conservative social goals, including policing socially conscious investing strategies, regulating youth social media use and focusing on free speech. He also argues for increased state-level antitrust enforcement.
As for Khan, like Vance, he hedged his compliments.
“I think she’s very smart. I think I admire a lot of things, but she’s gone too far in a lot of directions,” Candeub told NOTUS. “I’m still a Republican, markets are my default.”
The pro-Khan left sees Vance’s comments as in line with his particular streak of social conservatism and not a commitment to pro-competition business policy — particularly after Trump “suggested to oil executive donors this month that he could ease the Federal Trade Commission’s scrutiny of their industry’s mergers and acquisitions,” according to The Washington Post. Vance also recently signaled he’s backing out of supporting an anti-monopoly bill called the Credit Card Competition Act, according to Politico.
“Do I think that it’s possible for [Vance] to continue trying to pay lip service to that sort of fight and thought and continue to not really do anything if the Harris campaign doesn’t really embrace the Biden-Harris competition agenda? Yes, absolutely and that is a concern,” a senior strategist at the Progressive Change Campaign Committee told NOTUS, adding that after recent Harris rally comments, “I think we are optimistic, and we anticipate that the campaign’s going to continue that line … It seems less like an opening actually exists, and more like a lot of folks are trying to force an opening to exist.”
And amid the wishcasting from those like Hoffman for a different approach than Biden’s administration has taken, Khan’s superfans are hopeful it’s just that. Defenders think Khan will remain in charge under a President Harris — even if Harris is avoiding alienating certain donors by saying it on the campaign trail. (Hoffman, who is also on the board of Microsoft as it’s being investigated by the FTC, recently defended his comments, saying he would support Harris regardless of her position on Khan.)
“One thing that Harris is working on here is just winning the election. We didn’t see a lot of anti-monopoly statements from Biden when he was running either, but then, once he came in, he nominated all the right people to the positions,” a House progressive staffer granted anonymity to speak freely told NOTUS.
“So I think it’s all too soon to tell, and billionaires going out and saying what they think should be done is them trying to exercise their power as donors, but I don’t think they’re going to succeed.”
—
Claire Heddles is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.