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federal trade commission
Lina Khan Calls Republican FTC's Decision to Drop PepsiCo Suit 'Disturbing Behavior'
"This meritless dismissal is a win for monopolists and billionaires," said the senior legal counsel for the American Economic Liberties Project.
May 23, 2025
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission on Thursday dismissed a price discrimination lawsuit against the drink and food giant PepsiCo, a move that former FTC Chair Lina Khan, who served under former President Joe Biden, called "disturbing behavior."
The lawsuit, filed only a few days before U.S. President Donald Trump returned to the White House, accused PepsiCo of providing a big box retailer customer, Walmart, with pricing advantages, while increasing prices for competing customers and retailers.
"This lawsuit would've protected families from paying higher prices at the grocery store and stopped conduct that squeezes small businesses and communities across America," Khan wrote on X on Thursday. "Dismissing it is a gift to giant retailers as they gear up to hike prices."
The three members of the FTC, all Republicans, voted 3-0 to drop the suit. Current FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson, who was named chairman by Trump, cast the lawsuit as a "nakedly political effort to commit this administration to pursuing little more than a hunch that Pepsi had violated the law." He also said that the FTC under Biden "rushed to authorize the case." Ferguson also opposed the lawsuit when the FTC first voted to pursue it.
Antimonopoly groups were quick to criticize Thursday's move.
"This meritless dismissal is a win for monopolists and billionaires," said Lee Hepner, senior legal counsel at the American Economic Liberties Project, in a statement on Thursday. "Adding insult to injury, the agency dropped the case just one day before the parties were due to justify extensive redactions in the complaint, denying the public the ability to review the facts and judge the merits for themselves. This is a corporate pardon for Walmart and PepsiCo."
Open Markets legal director Sandeep Vaheesan said the move illustrates that despite their rhetoric, the current FTC commissioners are "not willing to faithfully apply the law enacted by Congress."
Stacy Mitchell, co-director at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, which is an advocate for independent businesses, called it "effectively an endorsement of the predatory tactics Walmart uses to crush local grocery sores, create food deserts, and drive up prices."
The agency had sued PepsiCo under the Robinson-Patman Act, a 1936 law intended to prevent price discrimination but has been little used in recent decades.
The announcement of the dropped lawsuit came the same day it was reported that the FTC is investigating the progressive watchdog group Media Matters for America over potential coordination with other groups, including the Global Alliance for Responsible Media, which was a World Federation of Advertiser initiative. Media Matters president Angelo Carusone confirmed in a statement to Axios that the investigation is over claims Media Matters and other groups coordinated advertising boycotts of the social media site X.
X's owner, billionaire Elon Musk, who has played a core role in the Trump administration, has ongoing lawsuits against both the World Federation of Advertisers and Media Matters.
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Dems Demand Probe of Companies Using Trump Tariffs as 'Excuse to Price Gouge'
"The new tariffs have created a cloud of uncertainty that gives companies cover to raise prices on all goods," the lawmakers wrote.
May 20, 2025
Dozens of congressional Democrats are urging the country's top antitrust enforcer to probe the extent to which big companies are taking advantage of Trump administration tariffs, or confusion around the tariffs, to boost prices, and to take action against any that are inappropriately raising prices in excess of cost increases, also known as price gouging.
In a letter sent last week, 36 Democrats asked Republican Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Andrew Ferguson to answer questions about his decision to effectively shut down an inquiry into so-called "surveillance pricing" practices—a move that, according to the outlet The Lever, has emboldened consultants who peddle surveillance pricing tools to advise companies on how to hike prices in response to tariffs, or even just the threat of tariffs.
Surveillance pricing refers to a practice when companies collect personal information like location or browsing history to set different prices for specific consumers for the same goods with the aim of generating more profit.
In January, the FTC released the initial findings of a surveillance pricing market study, and then opened up a public comment period for consumers and businesses around surveillance pricing. But the FTC under Ferguson, who replaced former Chair Lina Khan in January, shut down the comment period, which was supposed to run through mid-April.
"The message that is coming out of this administration… is that the watchdog is gone and companies feel emboldened to rip people off," a former FTC official told The Lever.
"President [Donald] Trump's on-again, off-again tariffs build an especially fertile environment for price gouging," the letter states. "The new tariffs have created a cloud of uncertainty that gives companies cover to raise prices on all goods, regardless of whether they are subject to new tariffs or whether their costs have meaningfully increased, above and beyond what is necessary to cover any cost increases."
Sens. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) led their colleagues on the letter. A statement from Gallego's office last week framed the letter as a demand to "prevent corporations from using Trump's reckless tariffs as an excuse to price gouge hardworking Americans."
The Trump administration has imposed 10% baseline tariffs and imposed higher duties on goods coming from China. Last week, the Trump administration and China agreed to lower the tariffs they had imposed on one another. China will now be subject to a 30% tariff, whereas before many goods coming to the U.S. from China previously had at least a 145% tariff. Negotiations with other countries are ongoing.
Citing The Lever's reporting, the Democratic lawmakers are urging Ferguson to use his authority under Section 6(b) of the Federal Trade Commission Act to compel big companies to report their costs and retail and wholesale prices dating back to the day after Trump was elected in November, and also to report how much tariffs have increased their costs. The group is urging the FTC to use its power to investigate and prosecute companies who are engaging in "unfair or deceptive acts" regarding commerce.
The Democrats are also demanding answers, by May 30, to a number of questions around the end of the inquiry into surveillance pricing practices, such as why Ferguson chose to close the forum for public comments early, and whether he met with any of the businesses subject to the inquiry in advance of the termination of the public comment.
The Lever reported that some large companies who were subject to the inquiry gave money to Trump's inauguration fund.
Common Dreams as reached out to the FTC and Gallego's office for comment.
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Lina Khan Accuses Trump FTC of Trying to Let Oil Exec 'Off the Hook' for Price Gouging Scandal
As FTC chair, Khan stopped a fossil fuel CEO from "cashing in and joining Exxon's board," said one lawmaker. "Now, with Trump bending to the whims of Big Oil, he's considering overturning that punishment."
May 06, 2025
"So much for America First," said one progressive lawmaker on Monday regarding the Federal Trade Commission's new push to reverse a ban on two fossil fuel CEOs from serving on the boards of ExxonMobil and Chevron—the oil giants that were acquiring their companies.
The FTC is accepting public comments until May 12 on a petition filed by former Pioneer National Resources CEO Scott Sheffield, which would set aside the Biden administration's consent order; finalized days before President Donald Trump took office, that barred Sheffield from serving on Exxon's board.
The order also applied to John Hess, CEO of Hess Corp., which was being acquired by Chevron.
Then-FTC Chair Lina Khan barred the CEOs from becoming board members over concerns that they would collude with representatives of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to ensure Americans continued paying high oil prices.
Sheffield and Hess both communicated with OPEC officials, including "the past and current secretaries general" of the organization "and an official from Saudi Arabia," according to an FTC probe under the Biden administration.
The two executives and their companies denied the allegations. Republican members of the FTC at the time voted against Khan's ban on the board positions, claiming it overstepped the agency's authority.
But on Monday, Khan urged those who oppose oil price fixing by energy giants to submit public comments on the Trump administration's "proposal to release Sheffield from accountability."
"The FTC is now trying to let this oil executive off the hook," said Khan, a law professor at Columbia University.
Exxon, the largest U.S. oil company, bought Pioneer in a $59.5 billion deal last year. Chevron's purchase of Hess for $53 billion is currently pending during arbitration proceedings.
The FTC's investigation last year found that Sheffield communicated with OPEC about cutting oil production and driving up consumer prices while publicly blaming government policies. One analysis found such price fixing schemes by corporations were to blame for 27% of the inflation spike that American families faced in 2021.
Sheffield pushed to "keep gas prices high so his shareholders could make even more money," said Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) on Monday. "Lina Khan's FTC prevented him from cashing in and joining Exxon's board. Now, with Trump bending to the whims of Big Oil, he's considering overturning that punishment."
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