JD Vance’s Antitrust Views Divide Business Leaders

This is an election year and political uncertainty is a priority for businesses.

WITH News Presidential candidate Donald Trump on Monday (July 15) selected Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), a former attorney and venture capitalist, as his vice presidential running mate, and the potential implications of the 2024 Republican election for business and the regulatory environment became a top priority for companies.

This is because Senator Vance, who has taken positive views on both cryptocurrencies and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chairwoman Lina Khan, is seen by some as a nonconformist who strays from traditional Republican economic views.

The 39-year-old vice president candidate, who worked at Peter Thiel’s Mithril Capital Management and also founded his own $93 million venture capital fund, Narya Capital, with backing from Thiel and other Silicon Valley heavyweights including Eric Schmidt and Marc Andreessen, expressed concerns that incumbent big tech firms have too much influence over policy and the broader operating landscape.

“Time to Break Google” – Vance he tweeted in X in February. He made similar comments about Meta, suggesting that the parent company of Facebook and other popular social media platforms should be “separated.”

Vance’s relatively aggressive stance on antitrust enforcement puts him at odds with many in his own party. It comes at a time when big tech companies around the world are facing increasing antitrust and regulatory scrutiny.

Earlier this year, he broke with the more traditional ranks of the GOP by describing FTC Chairman Khan as a “pretty good person” and “the best person” in the Biden administration. Vance has also stressed that his view on antitrust includes not only helping small businesses compete but also prioritizing workers and the quality of consumer goods.

Representatives for the vice presidential candidate did not immediately respond to PYMNTS’ request for comment.

read more:Tech titans in the crosshairs: Justice Department, FTC poised for battle for AI supremacy

A former Silicon Valley tech investor who says big tech is too powerful

Vance, whose 2022 Senate campaign was partly funded by PayPal founder Peter Thiel, has garnered political support from his former Silicon Valley colleagues. Founders Fund partner Delian Asparouhov tweeted at X in response to Vance’s VP nod: “We have a former tech VC in the White House. Greatest country on Earth.”

Still, Vance’s unorthodox approach to antitrust — particularly as it relates to big tech companies — reflects the growing tension between the conservative party’s desire to moderate the influence and power of regulatory agencies and its desire to use antitrust laws to challenge powerful incumbents.

Vance currently serves on three Senate committees: the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, and the Senate Select Committee on Aging.

Back in March of this year, vice presidential candidate and U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse introduced the bipartisan Stop Subsidizing Giant Mergers Act, which would end the tax-exempt nature of corporate mergers and acquisitions involving companies with combined average annual gross revenues of more than $500 million over the preceding three years.

“This legislation is a no-brainer because it’s pretty obvious that taxpayers shouldn’t be subsidizing corporate mergers when America is in the midst of a monopoly crisis. There’s really not much more to say than Congress should pass it right now,” said Matt Stoller, research director at the American Economic Liberties Project, which supports the bill.

“We are very concerned that JD Vance is playing a disproportionately large role in the Trump administration,” one lobbyist for a major bank told the Financial Times (FT). “Trump populism and Vance populism are not the same thing.”

Both the FTC and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) launched investigations into several major tech companies while Trump was president, including Amazon, Apple Meta, and Google, and ultimately sued them for alleged antitrust violations — violations that the tech companies deny.

See also: Mid-level CFOs cite competitive positioning as key uncertainty factor

The Role of Cryptocurrencies in the 2024 Race

Notably, Vance — whose 2022 financial disclosure statement revealed he held between $100,001 and $250,000 in bitcoin at the time — has maintained a positive stance on the digital asset sector throughout his political career and voted accordingly as a senator.

In May, Vance was among five dozen senators who voted to repeal the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Staff Accounting Bulletin 121 (SAB 121), which governs how banks should handle customers’ crypto assets, by requiring them to treat those assets as liabilities. Although the resolution passed, President Biden ultimately vetoed it.

Earlier this year in February, Vance led a small group of other Republican senators in writing a letter to SEC Chairman Gary Gensler expressing concern over the failed case against cryptocurrency platform Digital Licensing, also known as Debt Box, in which a judge found that SEC lawyers had used false statements to justify freezing assets linked to the company.

As a result of the case, the SEC closed its Salt Lake City office, its smallest regional office.