The tech industry is bracing for a wild ride as President-elect Donald Trump's second term is set to bring significant changes to antitrust policy. The pendulum has swung back and forth on antitrust policy over the past few years, and it's about to swing again under Trump. To break down the implications of this shift, Nilay Patel, editor-in-chief of The Verge, spoke with Leah Nylen, an antitrust reporter for Bloomberg and a leading expert on the subject.

Under the Biden administration, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) took a bold approach to antitrust, with FTC Chair Lina Khan and DOJ antitrust chief Jonathan Kanter leading the charge. This aggressive stance has resulted in major antitrust suits against Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft, with Google potentially facing a breakup. However, with Trump's return to the White House, the regulatory landscape is set to change dramatically.

Trump's picks to replace Khan and Kanter, Andrew Ferguson and Gail Slater, respectively, signal a shift in antitrust policy. Ferguson, a current FTC Commissioner, has expressed support for big business interests, except when it comes to big tech. He has pitched himself as a champion of mergers, which could lead to a more lenient approach to antitrust enforcement. Slater, on the other hand, seems poised to keep some of the big antitrust cases alive, but the direction of her approach remains unclear.

This creates a strange tension, where the incoming administration is fine with letting big companies grow, but might also support a potential Google breakup – not because of anticompetitive behavior, but due to Google's perceived power to enforce limits on speech in a way conservatives don't like. This raises questions about the motivations behind antitrust policy and whether it will be used as a tool to punish big tech companies for perceived political biases.

The tech industry is watching closely, wondering if this shift will mean a return to business as usual, with less enforcement and a green light for big deals. However, it's also possible that a bipartisan antitrust effort could continue, albeit in a modified form. Nylen notes that there are many wild cards at play, making it difficult to predict the exact direction of antitrust policy under Trump's second term.

The implications of this shift are far-reaching, with the potential to reshape the tech industry and its relationships with regulators. As the situation unfolds, one thing is clear: the next few years will be a wild ride for tech antitrust policy, and the industry will need to adapt quickly to the changing regulatory landscape.

For more information on the topic, readers can explore the following resources: Trump's antitrust trio heralds Big Tech crackdown to continue (Bloomberg), Trump picks FTC Commissioner Andrew Ferguson to lead the agency (Politico), and Trump picks Gail Slater to head Justice Department's antitrust division (Reuters).