With FTC Chair Lina Khan’s term ending, Democrats are torn between donors and their base

Speculation has been rampant in Washington for months about the future of Lina Khan, the chairwoman of the Federal Trade Commission and the face of the Biden administration’s crusade against monopoly power. Overturning decades of antitrust rules that blame Khan for failing to rein in the extreme concentration of corporate power, the administration routinely scrutinizes large acquisitions traditionally ignored by Khan’s predecessors, forcing companies like Lockheed Martin and Nvidia to abandon multibillion-dollar deals in court.

Khan’s opponents – often referred to as a legitimate “prodigy” or “wunderkind”, although invariably referred to as “young” – include a number of influential investors and CEOs known as prominent supporters of the Democratic Party; billionaires with ties to companies that have long been under the FTC’s microscope.

Donors, which include LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and media mogul Barry Diller, have openly urged Kamala Harris to replace Khan if she wins in November, which would likely spell disaster for President Joe Biden’s antitrust revolution.

For his part, Diller publicly made out with Khan in July, calling her a “dope” on national television, before later returning to call her “intelligent” but “disruptive to reasonable business connections.” Much to the anger of many of Khan’s supporters, the Harris campaign has remained silent on her future.

Neither the Harris campaign nor the FTC responded to a request for comment. Diller did not immediately respond. Hoffman declined to comment.

According to a new poll, about 80 percent of Democrats think the government should do more to defeat corporate monopolies, compared to just 3 percent who think it should do less. Meanwhile, nearly 90 percent of Democrats believe lobbyists and corporate executives have too much power over the government.

The same poll, commissioned by the Tech Oversight Project, found that more than three-quarters of Democrats believe Big Tech exercises monopoly power in a way that harms consumers and small businesses. Only 7 percent said companies should face no consequences as they continue to innovate.

“Democratic voters want to build on the Biden-Harris administration’s record of protecting competition, holding monopolies accountable for breaking the law and lowering the cost of living for everyday families,” says Sacha Haworth, the project’s executive director, who favors Khan as the “natural favorite” to continue the campaign .

Perhaps thanks in part to polls like these, there are strong indications that billionaires are wasting their breath when it comes to ousting Khan. Last month, the Democratic Party adopted a platform celebrating Khan’s crackdown on “corporate greed” while calling for further investigations into the “potentially harmful effects of corporate consolidation” in Big Pharma and the media industry as a whole. Although Khan did not make any speeches at the convention, the party’s promise to rid America of “monopolies that crush workers, small businesses and startups” was fulfilled – perhaps even more so – by Biden’s Commerce Secretary, Gina Raimondo, a seasoned corporate advocate.

Khan’s supporters, concerned that Harris has yet to side with the legal star, set up a fake website this month labeling her “Bad for Billionaires” while satirizing some of the Democrats’ biggest donors, including Hoffman and Diller. “Lina Khan must be fired,” the site says, “so we can continue our unfettered speculation!”