[House Hearing, 119 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
ANTI-AMERICAN ANTITRUST: HOW FOREIGN
GOVERNMENTS TARGET U.S. BUSINESSES
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE ADMINISTRATIVE STATE,
REGULATORY REFORM, AND ANTITRUST
COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINETEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 2025
__________
Serial No. 119-44
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via: http://judiciary.house.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
62-369 WASHINGTON : 2026
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COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
JIM JORDAN, Ohio, Chair
DARRELL ISSA, California JAMIE RASKIN, Maryland, Ranking
ANDY BIGGS, Arizona Member
TOM McCLINTOCK, California JERROLD NADLER, New York
THOMAS P. TIFFANY, Wisconsin ZOE LOFGREN, California
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
CHIP ROY, Texas HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
SCOTT FITZGERALD, Wisconsin Georgia
BEN CLINE, Virginia ERIC SWALWELL, California
LANCE GOODEN, Texas TED LIEU, California
JEFFERSON VAN DREW, New Jersey PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington
TROY E. NEHLS, Texas J. LUIS CORREA, California
BARRY MOORE, Alabama MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania
KEVIN KILEY, California JOE NEGUSE, Colorado
HARRIET M. HAGEMAN, Wyoming LUCY McBATH, Georgia
LAUREL M. LEE, Florida DEBORAH K. ROSS, North Carolina
WESLEY HUNT, Texas BECCA BALINT, Vermont
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina JESUS G. ``CHUY'' GARCIA, Illinois
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin SYDNEY KAMLAGER-DOVE, California
BRAD KNOTT, North Carolina JARED MOSKOWITZ, Florida
MARK HARRIS, North Carolina DANIEL S. GOLDMAN, New York
ROBERT F. ONDER, Jr., Missouri JASMINE CROCKETT, Texas
DEREK SCHMIDT, Kansas
BRANDON GILL, Texas
MICHAEL BAUMGARTNER, Washington
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE ADMINISTRATIVE STATE,
REGULATORY REFORM, AND ANTITRUST
SCOTT FITZGERALD, Wisconsin, Chair
DARRELL ISSA, California JERROLD NADLER, New York, Ranking
BEN CLINE, Virginia Member
LANCE GOODEN, Texas J. LUIS CORREA, California
HARRIET HAGEMAN, Wyoming BECCA BALINT, Vermont
MARK HARRIS, North Carolina JESUS G. ``CHUY'' GARCIA, Illinois
DEREK SCHMIDT, Kansas ZOE LOFGREN, California
MICHAEL BAUMGARTNER, Washington HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
Georgia
CHRISTOPHER HIXON, Majority Staff Director
ARTHUR EWENCZYK, Minority Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
----------
Tuesday, December 16, 2025
OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
The Honorable Scott Fitzgerald, Chair of the Subcommittee on the
Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust from the
State of Wisconsin............................................. 1
The Honorable Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the Committee on
the Judiciary from the State of Maryland....................... 3
The Honorable Becca Balint, a Member of the Subcommittee on the
Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust from the
State of Vermont............................................... 6
WITNESSES
Shanker A. Singham, Chief Executive Officer, Competere Ltd.
Oral Testimony................................................. 9
Prepared Testimony............................................. 12
Aurelien Portuese, Research Professor, Founding Director, George
Washington Competition & Innovation Lab
Oral Testimony................................................. 44
Prepared Testimony............................................. 46
Dirk Auer, Director, Competition Policy, International Center for
Law & Economics (ICLE)
Oral Testimony................................................. 64
Prepared Testimony............................................. 66
Roger P. Alford, Professor of Law, Notre Dame University
Oral Testimony................................................. 102
Prepared Testimony............................................. 104
LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC. SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING
All materials submitted for the record by the Subcommittee on the
Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust are
listed below................................................... 126
Materials submitted by the Honorable Darrell Issa, a Member of
the Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory
Reform, and Antitrust from the State of California, for the
record
An article entitled, ``Trump's tariff war is a tactic to
cover up the ills of American society,'' Aug. 14, 2025,
Chair Joo Byeong-gi, Korea Fair Trade Commission
An article entitled, ``The China Fan Who Made It Into The
Trump Admin,'' Sept. 12, 2025, American Greatness
Materials submitted by the Honorable Becca Balint, a Member of
the Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory
Reform, and Antitrust from the State of Vermont, for the record
An article entitled, ``Trump Warner Bros. Meddling Pushed
Limits of Executive Power,'' Dec. 11, 2025, Bloomberg,
An article entitled, ``Opinion | Big Tech's Most Effective
Lobbyist, Jim Jordan, Is Temporarily Constrained,'' Oct.
12, 2025, Common Dreams
An article entitled, ``Swamp Undrained: Trump-Cozy Lobbying
Firm Sets K Street Revenue Record,'' Aug. 8, 2025,
American Enterprise Institute, Washington Examiner
An article entitled, ``How Big Tech Powered A Justice
Department Coup,'' Jul. 31, 2025, Lever News
An article entitled, ``Trump Is Big Tech's Personal
Lobbyist,'' Jul. 24, 2025, Economic Policy
A statement entitled, ``The Rule of Law Versus the Rule of
Lobbyists,'' Roger P. Alford, Tech Policy Institute Aspen
Forum, Aug. 18, 2025
Materials submitted by the Honorable Harriet Hageman, a Member of
the Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory
Reform, and Antitrust from the State of Wyoming, for the record
An article entitled, ``Scoop: U.S. intelligence intervened
with DOJ to push HPE-Juniper merger,'' Jul. 30, 2025,
Axios
A statement from Roger P. Alford, Tech Policy Aspen
Institute, Aug. 18, 2025
Materials submitted by the Honorable Scott Fitzgerald, Chair of
the Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory
Reform, and Antitrust from the State of Wisconsin, for the
record
A speech entitled, ``Deputy Assistant Attorney General Roger
Alford Delivers Remarks at China Competition Policy
Forum,'' by Professor Alford, Shanghai, Aug. 30, 2017
A speech entitled, ``Deputy Assistant Attorney General Roger
Alford Delivers Remarks at the 2018 Competition Policy
Forum in Beijing,'' by Professor Alford, Beijing, Jul,
31, 2018
A letter to the Honorable Scott Fitzgerald, Chair of the
Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory
Reform, and Antitrust from the State of Wisconsin, from
Sean Heather, Senior Vice President, International
Regulatory Affairs and Antitrust, U.S. Chamber of
Congress, Dec. 15, 2015
A statement from the Consumer Choice Center, Dec. 11, 2025
A statement from the NetChoice, Dec. 15, 2025
A statement to the Honorable Jim Jordan, Chair of the
Committee on the Judiciary from the State of Ohio, the
Honorable Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the Committee
on the Judiciary from the State of Maryland, the
Honorable Scott Fitzgerald, Chair of the Subcommittee on
the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and
Antitrust from the State of Wisconsin, the Honorable
Jerrold Nadler, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on the
Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust
from the State of New York, from ACT | The App
Association, Dec. 15, 2025
A statement to the Honorable Jim Jordan, Chair of the
Committee on the Judiciary from the State of Ohio, the
Honorable Scott Fitzgerald, Chair of the Subcommittee on
the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and
Antitrust from the State of Wisconsin, the Honorable
Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the Committee on the
Judiciary from the State of Maryland, and the Honorable
Jerrold Nadler, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on the
Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust
from the State of New York, and the Members of the
Committee, from Computer & Communications Industry
Association (CCIA), Dec. 16, 2025
A statement entitled, ``Foreign Governments' Ex Ante DMA-
Style Rules Harm Competition and Innovation in Digital
Markets While Discriminating Against US Firms,'' from
Alden Abbott, Senior Research Fellow, Director,
Competition Policy Project, Mercatus Center, George Mason
University, and Satya Marar, Research Fellow, Mercatus
Center, George Mason University, Dec. 15, 2025
APPENDIX
A statement from the Software & Information Industry Association
(SIIA), Dec. 16, 2025, submitted by the Honorable Scott
Fitzgerald, Chair of the Subcommittee on the Administrative
State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust from the State of
Wisconsin, for the record
An article entitled, ``The antitrust war inside MAGA,'' Jul, 30
2025, UnHerd, submitted by the Honorable Becca Balint, a Member
of the Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory
Reform, and Antitrust from the State of Vermont, for the record
A statement from multiple academics to the Members of the House
Judiciary Committee, Dec. 22, 2025, submitted by the Honorable
Jerrold Nadler, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on the
Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust from the
State of New York, for the record
QUESTIONS AND RESPONSES FOR THE RECORD
Questions submitted from the Honorable Ben Cline, a Member of the
Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform,
and Antitrust from the State of Virginia, for the record
Questions for Roger P. Alford, Professor of Law, Notre Dame
University
Questions for Dirk Auer, Director, Competition Policy,
International Center for Law & Economics (ICLE)
Questions for Aurelien Portuese, Research Professor, Founding
Director, George Washington Competition & Innovation Lab
Response to questions from Aurelien Portuese, Research
Professor, Founding Director, George Washington
Competition & Innovation Lab
Questions for Shanker A. Singham, Chief Executive Officer,
Competere Ltd.
Response to questions from Shanker A. Singham, Chief
Executive Officer, Competere Ltd.
ANTI-AMERICAN ANTITRUST: HOW FOREIGN
GOVERNMENTS TARGET U.S. BUSINESSES
----------
Tuesday, December 16, 2025
House of Representatives
Subcommittee on the Administrative State,
Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust
Committee on the Judiciary
Washington, DC
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in
Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Hon. Scott
Fitzgerald [Chair of the Subcommittee] presiding.
Members present: Representatives Fitzgerald, Jordan, Issa,
Gooden, Hageman, Raskin, Correa, Balint, and Garcia.
Mr. Fitzgerald. [Presiding.] The Subcommittee will come to
order. Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare a
recess at any time.
We welcome everyone to today's hearing on foreign antitrust
laws and their effect on American companies.
I will now recognize myself for an opening statement.
If you want to beat your competitors, one option is to
innovate them. Another is to regulate them, and unfortunately,
foreign governments are increasingly choosing the second
option.
That is what today's hearing is about and a growing effort
to rewrite the rules of the global economy in a way that
punishes success, targets American innovation, and leaves
consumers worse off.
The blueprint for this effort is the European Union Digital
Markets Act. For over half a century, antitrust law has been
grounded in a simple principle: Protect consumers by promoting
competition. The DMA flips that principle on its head. It
protects competitors from competition without even considering
how that might affect consumers.
The DMA does not ask whether consumers have been harmed. It
does not even ask whether a business has done anything wrong.
It asks whether a company is large, successful, and most
importantly, American. If the answer is yes, the rules suddenly
change. Common business practices are banned; innovation is
treated as a threat, and foreign rivals are handed access to
data and technology that they could never build or earn on
their own. That is not competition policy; that is forced
redistribution, and we should not pretend that this came out of
nowhere.
Europe's economy has declined rapidly over the past several
decades. As the Draghi report highlighted, no EU company with a
market capitalization over 100 billion euros has been created
from scratch in the last 50 years.
Meanwhile, all six companies with a $1 trillion valuation
have been created in America over that same period. Thirty
percent of the quote, ``unicorn businesses'' founded in Europe,
they are startups with a valuation exceeding $1 billion. They
have all relocated their headquarters abroad at this point.
Talented European engineers are frequently choosing San
Francisco and Seattle over Berlin and Paris and taking with
them their innovative ideas and patented technologies.
Instead of confronting overregulation and weak economic
growth, EU officials have chosen a different path. They target
American companies and call it regulation; tax innovation and
call it fairness.
Well, what should concern us most is that this model is now
spreading globally. We are seeing it in South Korea and we are
seeing it in Brazil, and we are even seeing it in countries
like Japan and Australia--different countries, but the same
framework: Laws that single out American businesses, restrict
consumer conduct, and hand sweeping power to regulators and
bureaucrats with virtually no accountability or due process.
The activists behind these proposals call it competition
policy, but, in reality, it is industrial policy designed to
give their own corporations a geopolitical edge. This is not a
coincidence; it is coordination. The strategy is simple: Copy
American innovation, and then, find and regulate the companies
that create it out of existence.
This is not a technical debate among different regulators;
it is a values test. Do we believe in competition driven by
consumers, and innovation or competition dictated by
bureaucrats and foreign ministries?
The United States has always chosen the first path. We let
markets work. We punish real harm and reward innovation.
America built the strongest economy in the history of this
world by trusting consumers, not regulators.
The DMA-style regulation would take us into exactly the
opposite direction. It would raise prices, reduce choice,
weaken privacy and security, and slow innovation. It would
replace consumer judgment with regulatory command.
That is why the Trump Administration has been pushing back
on these discriminatory tactics. Free trade does not mean
tolerating attacks on the very principles that created our
great economic system. Free trade only works when it is also
fair. When foreign governments use regulation to discriminate
against American companies, that is not competition; that is
protectionism.
Free markets have been reciprocal in the past. When foreign
governments went ahead and started to rig their laws against
American companies, the United States will and can and should
respond. Using our trade leverage to confront these policies is
not aggressive; it is necessary.
We should be just as clear about our own path here at home.
The United States should not import these failed ideas. We
should reject DMA-style antitrust outright. We do not need
European-style micromanagement. We need free market
competition.
Our antitrust laws only work because they focus on
consumers, evidence, and due process. In America, competition
belongs to consumers, not commissioners. DMA-style antitrust
rejects those values, and America should reject it all the way
through to the end. Our principles are what have made America
great and defending them is how we will keep America great for
decades to come.
I want to thank all the witnesses for being here today, and
I look forward to hearing what you have to say on this very
important topic.
I will now recognize the Ranking Member. Mr. Raskin is
going to go first.
Mr. Raskin. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Welcome to all
our witnesses. Thank you for joining us.
Today is just the second time this Congress and the
administration has an official testifying before the Judiciary
Committee. When we hear Roger Alford's testimony today,
everybody will understand why they are not testifying about
what is actually going on behind closed doors over there.
In April, Mr. Alford, who is a distinguished Professor of
antitrust law and constitutional law at Notre Dame, began
serving as the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General in
the Antitrust Division. That is the No. 2 spot at Antitrust. By
July of this year, Professor Alford was fired for
insubordination after he blew the whistle on DOJ's corrupt
approval of a merger between Hewlett Packard Enterprise and
Juniper Networks.
Although the Antitrust Division strongly opposed this
merger, its opposition was overridden by Attorney General Pam
Bondi's then-Chief of Staff Chad Mizelle and her then-Counselor
Stanley Woodward after Hewlett Packard lobbyists urged them to
ignore and bypass the sweeping antitrust problems that had been
identified.
Professor Alford, thank you for sounding the alarm today
about backroom corruption, political favoritism, and betrayal
of the rule of law at the Department of Justice. We are
grateful to you for your courage in speaking out before this
Committee.
Our colleagues have described this hearing as ``anti-
American antitrust,'' but I'm afraid they are not interested in
actually dismantling monopolies, collusion, or price-fixing. On
the contrary, their policy is all about elevating the interests
of the largest corporations, especially the ones donating
directly to Donald Trump and MAGA, over the public interest in
putting them all far beyond the reach of U.S. foreign and
domestic antitrust laws.
Our expert agencies, like the FTC, the FCC, and DOJ, review
mergers to assess whether a proposed deal complies with the
relevant antitrust laws or public interest standard, including
by protecting U.S. consumers from rising prices. If, after
applying the law to the facts, they find that the merger is not
in the public interest, they can sue to stop it or propose
conditions on any new combination.
Under this administration, merger review has turned into
another instrument of corruption--a way for the President to
reward his rich insider friends and punish companies he
dislikes, including news companies that have been critical of
his administration. Antitrust enforcement is now driven by pay-
to-play corruption, political favoritism, shakedowns, and
retaliation, instead of the facts and the legal standards in
each case. It is not the public interest that controls
outcomes; it is the President's political and financial
interests.
Take the case of Hewlett Packard Enterprise's purchase of
Juniper Networks. When DOJ moved to block it, Hewlett Packard
Enterprise hired two lawyers with connections to President
Trump and his men, Mike Davis and Arthur Schwartz, for $1
million apiece to lobby the White House, Attorney General
Bondi's Chief of Staff Chad Mizelle, and the Attorney General's
Counselor Stanley Woodward. Although DOJ staff and Trump's head
of the Antitrust Division, Assistant Attorney General Gail
Slater, strongly opposed the merger of these two large
companies, the lobbyists got Mizelle to ignore not just the
facts and the law, but also the recommendations of Donald
Trump's own antitrust team to bless the deal.
We don't know what these lobbyists told Mizelle over
cocktails in a private club in D.C., but we do know that he
short-circuited DOJ's legal review process and gave the green
light to a merger that, according to the Department of
Justice's own press release, will, quote, ``significantly
reduce competition, resulting in large segments of the American
economy paying more for less.'' That was a backroom deal that
centralizes power and sends more wealth to the wealthy, making
life a lot more expensive for the vast majority of Americans
already struggling to stay afloat in this economy.
Take Skydance's acquisition of Paramount, which is owned by
the Ellisons, close friends and big donors to President Trump,
who plied him with financial and political favors to ensure
Paramount's purchase of Skydance would go through. The company
not only gave tickets worth about $12,000 to the soon-to-be
Chair of the FCC, Commissioner Brendan Carr, but also collected
Carr's candid advice on how to effectively lobby his agency for
approval.
While Chair Carr sat on the proposed deal, the White House
squeezed Paramount to pay President Trump $16 million to settle
an utterly frivolous personal lawsuit that he had filed about
the way 60 Minutes edited an interview with Kamala Harris, and
he pressured Paramount to give him an additional $20 million in
free ads--well, just for the hell of it. Even after this
corrupt tribute was paid, the administration extracted more,
installing an informant or ``minder'' directly in the newsroom
at CBS to make sure its news coverage would always be suitably
pro-Trump--adding naked violation of the First Amendment to
this bonfire of corruption.
Even now, the President is saying he personally will be
involved in the process of Warner Bros' sale, emphasizing that
CNN must, quote, ``be sold'' because of the news outlet's
discourteous coverage of his presidency. Netflix and Paramount
both know that the person they really need to lobby on the
proposed acquisition of Warner Bros by either company is the
President himself. They have already gone to the White House to
make their case. This is how a gangster State runs, not how
antitrust enforcement is supposed to work in the United States
of America.
Every time corporations and lobbyists use political
influence and money to thwart the actual merger review process,
the American people lose. We get a marketplace with more
corporate concentration and consolidation, reduced competition,
less innovation, and mired in political influence peddling.
Prices go up; wages go down. The economic elite profits and
economic inequality intensifies.
As our witness Professor Alford said of these lobbyists and
their White House ties in August, quote, ``Regardless of the
outcome, their commitment is to exert and expand their
influence and enrich themselves as their friends and
supplicants are in power.''
These cash-for-merger backroom deals reflect the broader
patterns of money corruption that define this administration.
Today, we will hear from Roger Alford about the difference
between fair enforcement of antitrust laws and backroom
dealmaking. I hope my colleagues will listen to him and take to
heart the warning that he shares about the economic costs of
political corruption.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I yield back to you.
Mr. Issa. Mr. Chair? A point of privilege and personal
question. Isn't it true that we still have a prohibition on
pejorative remarks about the Office of the President or the
President, as the Ranking Member just did? Is it not still a
parliamentary objection to that language personally attacking
the President and accusing him of crimes?
Mr. Fitzgerald. It is, and I would ask the Members to
refrain from that. If they could direct any of their questions
or comments to the Chair or in response to the witnesses, that
would be certainly more appropriate.
Mr. Issa. Mr. Chair, I'd further ask that this objection be
placed after the Ranking Member's opening statement. I realize
that he can say anything he wants on an opening statement,
including a statement that is intended to be prohibited by
House rules, but I would like my objection noted for the
record.
Mr. Fitzgerald. That would--
Mr. Raskin. Mr. Chair, I'll just state that nothing I
stated is prohibited by any House rule and we are perfectly
within our both First Amendment rights and Our Speech and
Debate Clause rights to characterize both public policies that
are taking place and actions that are taking place. I'm certain
that the distinguished gentleman from California has engaged in
equally vigorous criticism of Democratic Presidents and the
administrations, and that is part of living in the land with
freedom of speech.
Mr. Issa. Mr. Chair, I will not ask that his words be
taken--
Mr. Fitzgerald. Do you ask to--
Mr. Issa. We will not ask that his words to be taken down
because I want to go forward with this hearing. I do, again,
insist that my objection be noted for the record.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Very good. We will now move on to opening
statements. Beyond opening statements, we will come back to
Chair Jordan. At this point, we will now introduce today's
witnesses.
Mr. Issa. Well, then, we can take Mr. Jordan next.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Yes, unless Chair Jordan would like--
Chair Jordan. No, I just want to thank the Chair for this
hearing and look forward to hearing from our witnesses.
Mr. Fitzgerald. OK.
Chair Jordan. I will yield back to the Chair.
Mr. Fitzgerald. OK. Then, we will recognize the Ranking
Member for an opening--
Ms. Balint. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Fitzgerald. OK.
Ms. Balint. This hearing is nothing, from where I sit, it
is nothing but a handout to big tech. These companies will
oppose any rules to reform their anticompetitive conduct, no
matter what nation or State tries to hold them accountable.
Republicans are concerned about other countries beating up
on big tech. I'm concerned about big tech beating up on
Americans. Most Americans are struggling. Huge, dominant
companies that don't have real competitors are being pushed--
pushed--to have more and more power, but they are not being
pushed to lower their prices or to make products better.
We won't make life in this country more affordable if we
don't commit to strong antitrust enforcement. Corporate greed
is at the heart of rising prices. The fact is that both parties
have failed to check the consolidation of economic power and
the abuses of that power.
Dominant companies have grown larger under both Democratic
and Republican Administrations, but here in the House Judiciary
Committee support for rigorous antitrust enforcement and merger
review has been bipartisan. It was this very Subcommittee that
studied the digital market, released a report, and crafted
antitrust rules to rein in big tech. Those bills were supported
and voted out of this Committee by both parties. That was just
a few years ago.
Boy, have times changed. Our bipartisan antitrust
legislation failed to become law because of opposition from
factions in both of our parties. Work still continued at the
agencies. The FTC and DOJ sued big tech for breaking the
antitrust laws. Many of these suits began under Trump, were
continued under Biden, and now, are again in the hands of the
Trump Administration.
In the Senate, Republicans like Senators Lee, Grassley, and
Blackburn, and Democrats like Booker, Klobuchar, and Blumen-
thal, are still working to pass the same antitrust rules that
started in this Committee. Those bills are, rightly, targeted
at big tech. For example, Senator Lee's AMERICA Act would
reform or break up dominant tech firms.
Why is it that today, here in this House Committee, my
colleagues across the aisle are characterizing those bipartisan
bills as anti-American? Why is that? Because they target
multinational big-tech companies that Chair Jordan seems to
like.
Today, Republicans in this Committee are showing the wide
gap between them and other Members of their own party, and more
importantly, the gap between what they are pursuing today and
what Americans want us to be doing.
Their Senate colleagues, the Vice President, and Trump
appointees at the Justice Department and the FTC, all support
strong antitrust legislation and enforcement. While our own
government prosecutes American big-tech companies for breaking
the law and our Senate colleagues advance measures to hold big
tech accountable, we are, apparently, supposed to criticize
other countries for doing the exact thing that our own voters
want us to be doing, that Americans are actually clamoring for.
Countries around the world, including Australia, Brazil,
Japan, South Korea, the U.K., and the EU, did what we did. They
studied the digital market, found dominant tech companies,
found that they were abusing their power and stifling
competition, and then, crafted rules and brought lawsuits.
The Majority witnesses will claim that these rules and
suits are unfairly targeting American companies, but that
premise ignores reality. Other countries are actually trying to
address the monopolistic power of big tech--power that poses
danger to markets, democracies, and frankly, to public health;
power that can and must be checked through the enforcement of
antitrust laws.
We should be world leaders on this. We are Americans. Do we
still believe in healthy competition? Why would we use time on
this Committee to blast others who are taking on the power of
monopolies that are increasingly controlling our lives?
Republicans will argue today that actions by other nations
to address monopolistic power are discriminatory and unfairly
target U.S. tech companies. The only true examples of
discriminatory and unfair law enforcement are right here at
home. I have an idea. Why don't we cleanup our own house first?
The true threat to enforcement of antitrust law and to
American companies is the perversion of antitrust undertaken by
the Trump Administration. Under this President, principled and
fact--based review of one company buying another is overruled
in favor of deals struck by Hewlett Packard's well--paid
lobbyists with government officials over cocktails at private
clubs.
Under Trump, Paramount's acquisition of Skydance was only
approved after the President was paid tens of millions of
dollars and a government spy was installed in an NBC--excuse
me--in a CBS newsroom.
Under this administration, the President pardoned an
indicted bid rigger. This is one of the few antitrust
violations that are criminally prosecuted. The pardon came
after the President played a round of golf with the alleged
criminal's lobbyist. One round at Mar-a-Lago wipes away a
possible 10-year prison sentence for a crime that Trump's own
Department of Justice and FBI worked to prosecute.
Keep in mind that the individual pardoned was set to be
deposed the very next day in a separate civil lawsuit, the
government's Live Nation/Ticketmaster case. In one fell swoop,
the Trump Administration manages to undermine two cases
important to protect Americans from being fleeced by corporate
misconduct and greed.
The United States has long stood for something better--
predictable enforcement, independent institutions, and
decisions grounded in law and evidence. When the administration
treats antitrust as just another way to make a corrupt deal,
when it weaponizes antitrust to achieve political goals and to
reward its allies, it undermines the foundations of our market
economy: Competitive merit, not political influence, to
determine who succeeds in this country.
Competition creates the pipeline of American innovation and
prosperity. Isn't that what we want? Isn't that what we say,
what we want, what is better for all of us?
Again and again, we have seen this administration do favors
for their rich friends and allies, while the rest of us suffer.
Big tech and big media are allowed to get bigger, raise prices,
and squash competitors. All they need is a seven--figure
payment to lobbyists and secret deposits into the President's
ballroom fund. Companies are taking notice. They see that the
fate of any multibillion-dollar deal is going to run right
through the Oval Office.
Right now, Warner Bros is up for sale, and the two biggest
bidders, Netflix and Larry Ellison's Paramount, are doing all
they can to get the White House to favor their buyout over
another. Paramount is going to the White House and hanging out
in the Presidential box at the Kennedy Center. President Trump
promised sweeping changes to CNN after he renewed his
longstanding criticism of the news channel. Not to be outdone,
Netflix executives also paid homage to the President and
visited the White House in recent days.
Americans of both parties see this and they don't like it,
and they want us to do something about it. They want us to
fight back. We should be doing all we can to address the real
and present dangers that monopolies, especially media and tech
monopolies, pose to our markets, our wallets, to consumers, to
competitors, and, yes, frankly, to the democracy itself.
Big tech and big media are more than happy to pay to get
their mega--mergers approved or evidence against them thrown
out. Those close deals that lead to even more private economic
power and control over what we watch, what we buy, what we see,
and what we hear.
Our Chair, Jim Jordan, has long opposed bipartisan
antitrust bills aimed at reining in giant tech companies and
cracking down on their abusive business practices. In 2021,
when we advanced bipartisan tech antitrust bills, he called
them, quote, ``Democrat bills,'' despite the support the bills
continue to have from Republicans like Senators Grassley, Lee,
and Blackburn.
Now, we are supposed to beat up on other countries for
doing the thing that we attempted to do? Give me a break. Big
tech and their secret million-dollar donations and backroom
deals cannot be how this country enforces the law. We have to
fight against monopolies wherever we find them, and we cannot
and should not criticize other nations for addressing the big
tech global harms.
I call on my colleagues to join me in standing up for the
rule of law, for antitrust and competition laws to be enforced
on the merits and the facts, not handshakes and favors and pay-
to-play games.
I look forward to hearing from our witness Professor Roger
Alford about how far we have perverted the rule of law and what
we must do to ensure that transparency, accountability, and
justice rule the day.
I yield back.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentlewoman yields back.
Without objection, all other opening statements will be
included in the record.
Mr. Fitzgerald. We will now introduce today's witnesses.
Mr. Shanker Singham is the Chief Executive Officer of
Competere, a trade law and economic policy consulting firm
based in the U.K. He is also the Chair and President of the
Competere Foundation for Trade and Competition Policy, a
nonprofit organization that promotes trade, competitive
markets, and property rights.
Professor Aurelien Portuese. Mr. Portuese is a Research
Professor and the founding Director of the GW Competition and
Innovation Lab at the GW Institute of Public Policy at George
Washington University. He previously was a Professor at George
Mason University, the founding Director of the Schumpeter
Project on Competition Policy at the Information Technology and
Innovation Foundation, and a Professor at various universities
in both the U.K. and in France.
Mr. Dirk Auer. Mr. Auer is the Director of Competition
Policy at the International Center for Law and Economics, a
nonprofit organization that promotes the use of law and
economics methodologies to inform public policy debates. Mr.
Auer's research focuses on the competition and antitrust issues
in the United States, the U.K., and Europe.
Professor Roger Alford. Mr. Alford is a Professor of Law at
the University of Notre Dame Law School. His classes and work
focus on international trade, international arbitration, global
antitrust, and transnational civil litigation.
We welcome our witnesses and thank them for appearing
today.
We will begin by swearing you in. Would you please rise and
raise your right hand?
Do you solemnly swear or affirm, under penalty of perjury,
that the testimony you are about to give is true and correct to
the best of your knowledge, information, and belief, so help
you God?
[All witnesses respond in the affirmative.]
Let the record reflect that the witnesses have answered in
the affirmative.
Thank you. Please be seated.
Please know that your written testimony will be entered
into the record in its entirety. Accordingly, we ask that you
summarize your testimony in five minutes.
Mr. Singham, you may begin.
STATEMENT OF SHANKER A. SINGHAM
Mr. Singham. Thank you very much, Chair, Ranking Members,
and the Members of the Committee. Thank you for the opportunity
to testify today.
My name is Shanker Singham. I appear on behalf of the
Competere Foundation. I'm also Chair of the Growth Commission,
which is an independent network of economists focused on lack
of economic growth in the G7.
I have actually testified to this Committee before in 2010
on the Chinese competition law and anticompetitive market
distortions in China. The concerns that I noted then about the
possibility of the use of competition policy in other countries
against American companies is still valid today, and what I'm
about to say about a larger group of countries is even more
troubling because it concerns countries who should be allied to
the U.S. economic interests.
There is a battle which has been waging for some time for
the world's operating system. Markets based on competition
without--competition on the merits without distortions versus
markets that are defined by government distortions, subsidies,
privileges, and other methods of deciding market outcomes: The
U.S. model versus the China model, if you will.
The way foreign governments regulate laws and digital
platforms has become a major macroeconomic and trade issue for
the United States. DMA-style digital regulations and
interventionist antitrust enforcement abroad are operating as
nontariff barriers. They lower growth in the countries that do
them and impose very large costs on the U.S. economy, and they
make the China model more likely to become the global norm.
Our work at Competere focuses on why some jurisdictions are
able to turn digital innovation into higher incomes and others
do not. We use an econometric framework to link policy
conditions to GDP per capita across countries, focused on three
pillars: The openness of the trade regime; how competitive the
market is--in other words, how much it delivers competition on
the merits--how well it protects property rights.
Digital regulation has now become one of the most--biggest
sources of these distortions. Many governments are moving away
from traditional effects--based antitrust toward ex ante
prescriptive regimes modeled on the European Union's Digital
Markets Act. These frameworks identify gatekeepers largely by
size, and then impose conduct rules on self-preferencing data
use, interoperability, ranking, and product integration without
requiring proof of consumer harm. In practice, they function as
nontariff barriers that fall overwhelmingly on U.S. firms.
We've shown in our written testimony that many of the
assumptions on which digital regulation and nationalistic
enforcement are based are false and misunderstand the nature of
technology markets; how they've developed, and how their
underpinning economics actually works.
This leads to the use of flawed doctrines such as the
Essential Facilities Doctrine, or duties to deal, that treats
them as if their government--created utilities, but have been
around for a century.
Our detailed case study of Korea illustrates the scale of
the problem. Korea's proposed Online Platform Markets Act--
there are various iterations of online fairness acts the
Koreans are introducing, even as we speak, and these have
imposed asymmetric burdens on large firms, particularly U.S.
firms, but they damage the Korean economy itself. Our data
suggests that the damage to the Korean economy is extensive,
$450-$470 billion over a 10-year period. The damage that they
do to the U.S. economy is greater than $500 billion over a 10-
year period on a long-run basis.
What should Congress do? First, treat digital regulation,
foreign digital regulation, as a core trade and economic
security issue. U.S. trade policy should explicitly recognize
the practices I've described as nontariff barriers and address
them in bilateral and multilateral engagements. The National
Security Strategy makes it clear that economic security, which
includes anticompetitive regulation applied to U.S. firms, is a
national security issue.
Second, Congress needs to row in behind all the weapons at
our disposal to deal with this, including Section 232 tariffs,
as well as Sections 301 and 338 investigations, to send a
strong signal to countries that this type of damage to the U.S.
economy will not be tolerated.
Third, despite agreements, and in cases where Chinese firms
are clearly benefiting from heavy-handed enforcement against
U.S. firms that they are not subject to, and where countries
persist in damaging the U.S. economy through these measures, we
think it wholly appropriate for Section 232 tariffs to be
applied until the national security threat to the United States
is removed.
We've submitted detailed testimony, our previous work over
the last 30 years, a couple of books on distortions,
anticompetitive market distortions, and trade issues. We look
forward to your questions.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Singham follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Fitzgerald. Thank you, Mr. Singham. We will now go to
Professor Portuese. You may begin.
STATEMENT OF AURELIEN PORTUESE
Mr. Portuese. Chair Jordan, Chair Fitzgerald, Ranking
Member Raskin, and the distinguished Members of the
Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
My work as Professor and founding Director of the GW
Competition and Innovation Lab is focused on one thing:
Promoting innovation for the benefit of consumers.
I'm here to deliver a message of urgency. Congress must act
to curb DMA--inspired regulations that are multiplying all
around the world. These proposals are disproportionately
targeting U.S. tech companies and insulate local monopolies.
There are things that the administrations and the Congress
can do to stop their spread. Before I turn to what Congress can
do, including, Chair Fitzgerald, your well-crafted proposals,
let me first talk about why the DMA is a problem.
Despite the benefits of the DMA, such as enhanced
interoperability and adjustments to the app store rules, which
could be achieved through way less harmful means, these are the
reasons why the DMA is a problem:
First, the DMA wrongly targets U.S. tech companies. Now,
every single gatekeeper designated in the DMA is a U.S.
company. This is not an accident; it's by design.
Second, the DMA is anti-innovation. The DMA forces and
focuses on high political risks rather than actual harm, and
the effect is to deter a firm from innovating.
Third, DMA harmed consumers. For example, European
consumers cannot access Google Maps in their search results,
and they don't have Apple intelligence in their--as AI features
in the iPhones. This is an effect of the DMA.
Despite this, these problems, the DMA is spreading
globally: South Korea, Brazil, Australia, Japan, and other
jurisdictions are considering DMA-inspired regulations.
I regularly engage with those regulators in these
countries. If they move forward, that will cement Europe's
approach at the expense of U.S. enterprises.
The U.S. can avert this trend for what I call ``sharp
power,'' a proactive strategy to advance pro-innovation
regulations worldwide. This approach requires deliberate
actions from Congress and the administrations to reassert tech
leadership by reinvesting its full leadership on consumer
welfare globally and as well as integrating national security
concerns and competition enforcement.
Now, I want to outline four ways the U.S. can curb DMA-
inspired regulations.
First, provisions akin to Chairman Fitzgerald's H.R. 4278,
to Protect U.S. Companies from Foreign Regulatory Taxation Act,
will be a strong step forward. This bill will empower the U.S.
to impose reciprocal tariffs or sanctions on jurisdiction that
implement DMA-like rules. This would help level the global
playing field and protect American innovations.
Second, Congress should enact legislation that will allow
the government to take regulatory measures against
discriminatory foreign regulations. These could be accomplished
through amendments of the International Trade Act of 1974,
which would strengthen the U.S. Trade Representative's
authority to address unfair trade practices in digital markets.
Third, Congress should initiate an investigation into the
DMA's effect globally. Investigations will help assess the
compliance costs, which are assessed to be perhaps over $1
billion per year annually. This investigation could help
measure the impact of the DMA and DMA-like regulations on
consumer experiences and any benefit, if any at all. This
information would bolster efforts to identify an alternative
path for government considering competition legislation.
Fourth and finally, Congress and the administration should
prioritize digital diplomacy. Europeans have digital
sovereignty. We should prioritize digital diplomacy to
influence foreign competition policies.
This would entail establishing a dedicated task force
within the State Department and the U.S. Trade Representative's
office to engage bilaterally and multilaterally with allied
nations. Through technical assistance and competition dialogs,
the U.S. can promote alternatives to the DMA.
For instance, diplomatic efforts could encourage the USTR's
effects--based analyses, which focuses on actual harm and
consumer benefits instead of hypothetical risks. These can help
counter the EU influence and promote global standards that are
truly pro-
competition and pro-innovation.
I encourage the U.S. to take advantage of this window of
opportunity to counter the spread of the DMA and champion a
better approach.
Thank you, and I welcome your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Portuese follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Fitzgerald. Thank you, Professor. Mr. Auer, you now may
begin.
STATEMENT OF DIRK AUER
Mr. Auer. Chair Fitzgerald, Ranking Member Correa, and the
Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to
testify.
My name is Dirk Auer. While I work for an American research
institution, I live in Belgium. From that vantage point, I have
watched a disturbing trend accelerate.
Over the past years, the European Union has enacted various
digital market regulations and imposed colossal fines on
American companies. I wish I could sit here and tell you these
policies will make markets fairer and more contestable, as
European policymakers claim, but that is not the case.
It is becoming increasingly clear Europe's regulations will
harm its startups, its consumers, and most importantly for me,
my children's future. In practice, these policies are naked
attempts to penalize American success and subsidize European
stagnation. Because Europe has let all this unfold--sorry.
Because America has let all this unfold with little to no
response, other jurisdictions are rapidly forming suit.
To understand why this is happening, we must look at the
brutal economic reality. We are witnessing a great divergence.
Since the year 2000, the U.S. economy has powered ahead, while
Europe's engine has stalled. Real disposable income has grown
nearly twice as fast in the U.S. as in the EU.
Over the past 50 years, Europe built ASML, Spotify, and
Novo Nordisk. Not terrible, but in that same time, the U.S.
formed Microsoft, Alphabet, Apple, Meta, Amazon, OpenAI, and
many, many others. To put it bluntly, Europe has become an
open-air museum. It is rich in history and culture, but
increasingly irrelevant in the global production of value.
The lack of European tech giants encourages its politicians
to regulate tech firms. That way, they can act tough on
corporate power without antagonizing any domestic voting bloc.
The enforcement numbers tell the story. Since 2019, the EU
Commission has virtually stopped fining domestic firms for
competition violations. American firms, on the other hand, were
hit with almost $8 billion in fines.
Europe did not stop there. Its marquee tech regulation, the
Digital Markets Act, was gerrymandered to almost exclusively
target five American companies, while conveniently excluding
almost all large European firms.
All this has resulted in degraded online services and
delayed product launches. Google was forced to remove
theseamless Maps integration from search. Likewise, Apple
intelligence was delayed in Europe. Worse, Europe's overzealous
regulation harms American consumers, too, because the world's
brightest engineers must now comply with foreign regulations
instead of designing groundbreak-
ing new services.
An even bigger danger for the United States is that this
model is highly contagious. We are seeing DMA-inspired
regulations crop up in the U.K., Japan, Brazil, and South
Korea. This is, arguably, happening because the United States
aided and abetted the EU when it passed the DMA. The U.S.
administration's silence was interpreted as permission, and
other jurisdictions are now emboldened to follow suit.
Historically, defending U.S. commerce was a bipartisan
duty. When the EU targeted the Boeing-McDonnell Douglas merger,
the Clinton Administration threatened a trade war. When the EU
went after Apple for back taxes, President Obama called it
unfair and commercially driven.
Unfortunately, in recent years, U.S. antitrust agencies
have broken with this tradition, effectively outsourcing their
enforcement wishlists to foreign capitals. When the EU blocked
the Amazon iRobot deal, Washington's silence was deafening.
This leads to my most critical point for this body. This
administration must make foreign regulators understand that
discriminatory targeting of U.S. tech carries consequences.
Doing so would deter protectionist regulations; thereby,
protecting U.S. companies, their workers, and ultimately,
American consumers.
It is also crucial for the U.S. to remain a shining beacon
of consumer--focused antitrust enforcement. The U.S. cannot
credibly combat discriminatory regulations abroad if it adopts
similar ones at home. In short, the transatlantic alliance is
strongest when it is based on mutual growth and innovation, not
on the managed decline of one partner at the expense of the
other.
The time has come to reassert the principles of market
competition and innovation that make the Western economy the
envy of the world.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Auer follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Fitzgerald. Thank you, Mr. Auer. Professor Alford, you
may begin.
STATEMENT OF ROGER P. ALFORD
Mr. Alford. Chair Fitzgerald, Ranking Member Raskin, thank
you for the opportunity to testify here today.
I've testified at the Senate Judiciary Committee on several
occasions, but this is my first opportunity to testify here in
the House. I welcome the opportunity to discuss the
politicalization of European antitrust enforcement, but also, I
want to address my remarks, first, to the more pressing concern
of the politicalization of United States antitrust enforcement.
The DOJ Justice Manual is unequivocal; the rule of law
depends on the even-handed administration of justice. The legal
judgments of the Department of Justice must be impartial and
insulated from political influence. It is imperative that the
Department's investigatory and prosecutorial powers be
exercised free from partisan considerations.
On June 16, 2024, former prosecutor and current lawyer and
lobbyist Trey Gowdy stated the following:
Our justice system is the last thing that is holding us
together. No one is above the law, but no one is beneath the
law either. You should not be targeted because of your status,
and you should not be rewarded because of your status.
Today, Trey Gowdy is playing a leading role in promoting a
politicized justice system. After the Department of Justice
indicted Tim Leiweke with bid rigging in July 2025, Gowdy
lobbied senior leadership within the Department of Justice to
get the case dropped, but to no avail. Gowdy went above the
heads of every senior official within the Department of Justice
and appealed directly to President Trump. The Tim Leiweke
pardon is not the first or the last example of politicized
antitrust enforcement in the past year.
In Aspen, this past August, I spoke about the HPE-Juniper
merger scandal. I am heartened that over a dozen State
Attorneys Generals have successfully intervened in that case,
and that the court is holding hearings, including a hearing
today, on that case.
Of course, the concerns go far beyond Trey Gowdy. The MAGA
lobbyists are shameless in their self promotion, aware that
their window of opportunity is short and closing fast. Press
reports reveal the pervasive practice of lobbyists attempting
to corruptly influence antitrust law enforcement.
The populist Steve Bannon said that,
We're in a fight right now . . . . The concentration of power
comes from the lobbyists, [and] the top law firms, and they're
all over the White House, the administration, and the
President.
MAGA lobbyists, reportedly, are liberally pitching their
services to clients, stating that, for a mere $225,000 a month
per client, these lobbyists will go above and around the
Antitrust Division to lobby their cases, and even seek to have
AAG Gail Slater removed from her Senate-confirmed position.
The future of the Republican Party is at stake in this
battle. MAGA lobbyists are betraying President Trump's populist
antitrust agenda. If the Antitrust Division does not have a
free hand to address the affordability crisis that is plaguing
the American people, what hope does it have for the Republican
Party to be the party of the working class and the rural poor?
It is also disheartening, given the hopes and dreams that so
many of us had just one year ago.
What is to be done about the politicalization of antitrust
enforcement? Among the best responses is greater involvement by
State Aattorneys General. When Federal enforces can stand
alone, there is a risk of a single point of political failure.
Another response is reform from within the antitrust bar.
More transparency is critical. The lobbying disclosure
requirements should be enforced, and FOIA requests should be
redoubled.
Of course, as I mentioned, greater judicial oversight is
also critical, both with respect to merger review and conduct
cases. Congressional oversight is welcome, and I welcome
hearings such as this to address the matter.
Then, ultimately, though, reform must occur from within the
Department of Justice. The government enjoys the presumption of
regularity, but that presumption can be rebutted.
In my view, we should consider the current hearing as
another manifestation of efforts to politicize antitrust
enforcement. Much of the antitrust enforcement in Europe
parallels antitrust enforcement in the United States, including
prosecutions brought by the Trump Administration and Republican
State Attorneys General.
I am not suggesting that there are not real risks of
discrimination against American companies with respect to
antitrust enforcement abroad. My written testimony provides
details in that regard. I have said as much on previous
occasions.
Yes, the risk of discrimination is real abroad, and I
witnessed it firsthand when I was at the Department of Justice,
but the risk that big-tech companies have achieved gatekeeper
status are also--and abusing their monopoly power--are also
real.
I look forward to your questions. Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Alford follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Fitzgerald. Thank you, Professor. We will now proceed
under the five-minute rule with questions.
I want to recognize the gentleman from California, Mr.
Issa, first.
Mr. Issa. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for holding this
important hearing. Notwithstanding the professor's claim that
this is somehow politicizing, nothing could be further from the
truth. The fact is this Subcommittee, and the entire Committee,
has clearly been on this subject for a long time, but it
vacillates.
As the Ranking Member would often state, forget about
competition abroad--I'm talking about the Subcommittee Ranking
Member in this case--let's just go ahead and focus on American
companies. Nothing could be more inappropriate.
President Trump is the first President in a very long time
to ask, what is the relevant market? Three out of our four
witnesses understand; the relevant market in antitrust is now
the world, and in tech, it is the world.
When countries like Korea, Australia, and most of Europe,
countries that we have--and Brazil, for that matter--we
considered allies, in fact, used their vast market power, not
always in that product, but their vast market power as
sovereign nations to, in fact, adversely affect our
competitiveness. It doesn't matter--and I'll go on the record--
it doesn't matter if you have a 100 percent market share in the
United States and a 100 percent global market share as an
original innovator, if, in fact, foreign nations--in jealousy
or simply not wanting to, in fact, allow these unicorns to
exist--in fact, use their market power to stop you. That is
what is going on often with our closest allies.
Notwithstanding, I'll just quote one, and I would like it
to put up behind me. Chair Joo of the Korea Free Trade
Commission--that is a wonderful title--in his own words,
disparages America, takes us down. In fact, his commission, as
this board says--and I would ask unanimous consent that the
entire article be placed in the record--says, ``So why are many
Americans, especially White workers in the Rust Belt in the
Midwest, so angry?''
I'll tell you why they are so angry, as somebody born and
raised in Cleveland, Ohio, and somebody who happily went to
work for the Trump Administration, because, in fact, they
believed in free and fair trade, something that we had talked
about, but always left the second half off.
The fact is we now have to take on the status quo of global
competitiveness. China, but also our allies; Europe, one of our
closest partners, including Australia, in fact, are operating
in unfair trade practices. The Digital Markets Act is just one
in which every unicorn in that field is American, and as
innovators, and they as regulators, they intend on using
regulation to take us out of our competitive lead.
Let there be no doubt that there are additional barriers
and they are not new. I know that the testimony we are
receiving today is important, but I'm just going to give you
one piece of testimony.
More than 40 years ago, I began traveling the world and
doing international business. More than 30 years ago, I was in
South Korea for a trade conference. The highest level of
management at that time, both government and Samsung and the
other majors, proudly said to the delegation that had gone
there,
We're so delighted to have you here. We want you to, in fact,
come here and invest, transfer your technologies, and enjoy the
benefits of our ability to make your products.
He didn't even listen to himself. They were not interested
in buying our products. They were not interested in joint
ventures. They were interested in technology transfers. Even
when they manufacture in the United States, Hyundai and Kia,
they won't even obey our rules and, in fact, will illegally
bring in their own workers, which has recently been found by
this administration.
I normally ask a lot of questions. I'm not going to ask a
lot of questions this time. I'm going to thank our witnesses.
I'm going to, because you raised your hand, go to Professor
Portuese, because you do want to say something and I would like
to hear it--quickly.
Mr. Portuese. Thank you very much.
I want to rivet back to the point that you made about
relevant markets, because that's at the basis of antitrust
principles. To look at if companies abuse their positions, we
look at--first, we have to define the relevant market. We
cannot call companies ``monopolies'' if we haven't defined
relevant market.
You say that the relevant market today is the world. That
is true. I just want to add that, also, the relevant market is
not online or offline. These companies compete both--with their
online platforms, but they compete with, also, offline
groceries and other effects. The idea of, first, insulating
what we call digital markets is wrongheaded. There's no such
thing as digital market. There are markets and digital is just
a means of distribution to the consumers.
When digital platforms compete, digital advertising
competes with print advertising. Digital supermarkets compete
with groceries offline.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentleman's--
Mr. Portuese. The competition is much larger than what we
can think.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Issa. Mr. Chair, I would ask unanimous consent to enter
into the record an article entitled, ``The Chinese Fan Who Made
It into the Trump Administration.'' This article discusses the
professor who is with us here today, Mr. Alford. Without
objection.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Without objection. I now recognize--
Ms. Balint. Mr. Chair, I ask unanimous consent.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Go ahead.
Ms. Balint. I ask unanimous consent to submit ``Trump
Warner Bros Meddling Pushes the Limits of Executive Power''
from Bloomberg, which quotes Professor Herbert Hovenkamp,
stating that Trump's involvement in this merger, quote,
``illustrates that not only is this President interfering with
enforcement policy, but is doing so for reasons that have
nothing to do with antitrust.''
Mr. Fitzgerald. Without objection. I now recognize the
Ranking Member of the Full Committee, Mr. Raskin, again for
five minutes.
Mr. Raskin. Mr. Chair, thank you very much. Mr. Alford, you
served in the first Trump Administration and the second Trump
Administration, is that right?
Mr. Alford. Yes, correct.
Mr. Raskin. Am I correct in deducing you are Republican?
Mr. Alford. Yes, correct.
Mr. Raskin. Thank you for your testimony. I am wondering
about this: What is the greater threat today to a healthy and
competitive U.S. economy? Corruption in our own antitrust
agencies or foreign countries enforcement of their antitrust
laws?
Mr. Alford. I would say the former. The concern for
protecting the U.S. market is absolutely critical to the
American people. What we want in the United States is vigorous
antitrust enforcement that will protect the average American.
That is being undermined now in light of the undue influence of
lobbyists.
Mr. Raskin. The DOJ Manual begins by stating, ``The legal
judgments of the Department of Justice must be impartial and
insulated from political influence.'' Can you share with the
Judiciary Committee what you saw as the second most senior
political appointee at the Antitrust Division of DOJ relevant
to that principle?
Mr. Alford. Yes. Obviously, to be careful with respect to
government deliberate privilege, but as has been publicly
reported, lobbyists are pervasively involved in the--every
level of the Department of Justice trying to influence the
outcomes, not based on the merits, but based on relationships
that these lobbyists have with particular individuals in power.
My written testimony actually goes into detail of numerous
different articles that sort of outline that kind of problem.
Mr. Raskin. In that context if our antitrust system is
failing because it is being overrun by insider influence,
political lobbying, money contributions and so on, what do you
think the role of this deflection is toward international
antitrust in the conversation about what needs to be happening
in America?
Mr. Alford. Well, obviously if you really want to focus on
the politicalization of antitrust enforcement, we should focus
on fixing our problems at home first and foremost.
With respect to concerns about what is happening abroad in
the extent to which there's discrimination, most of the cases
that are being addressed with respect to European antitrust
enforcement have very close parallels to exactly the same kind
of cases that are being brought in the United States by
Republican administrations, as well as Republican State
Attorneys General, as well as private parties? You can go down
the list and look at what the European cases are and then find
parallels in the United States.
Mr. Raskin. You've taught both international antitrust and
domestic antitrust for decades at Notre Dame Law School and
other places. Can you put in just a common parlance what it
means to American citizens, American consumers, and small
businesses, if we depart from strong antitrust enforcement and
instead let the whole system be overrun by insider influence
and big money?
Mr. Alford. Well, just last month the Rasmussen poll had a
survey of whether or not American people support vigorous
antitrust enforcement and the results were overwhelming.
Overwhelming American support for vigorous antitrust
enforcement. What we fear and what we think is happening is
that rather than having cases decided on the merits there are
cases that are being resolved based on political relationships.
When that happens there is a corrupting influence that happens
throughout the government.
The risk is real that without the contributions of State
Attorneys General, private litigation, or careful judicial
oversight that the good work the Antitrust Division is trying
to accomplish, that Gail Slater is trying to accomplish will
not be possible.
Mr. Raskin. Again, if you would break it down for us. I am
talking about the original principles of antitrust. If we allow
for greater and greater concentration, consolidation of
corporate power, and control over markets, what does that mean
to consumers in terms of prices? What does it mean to workers
in terms of wages? What does it mean for the possibility of
other businesses to enter into the competitive sphere?
Mr. Alford. Sure. Obviously, if there's not vigorous
antitrust enforcement, then the pocketbook issues that are
central to the American people with respect to housing,
healthcare, agriculture, entertainment, and the whole variety
of different industries that are critical to the American
people--all of the prices will go up. There will be lower
quality, less innovation, and fewer entrants.
Mr. Raskin. Very good. I yield back to you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Thank you, the gentleman yields back. I now
recognize the gentleman from Texas for five minutes.
Mr. Gooden. Thank you. Mr. Portuese, based on your work on
digital competition policy, what have we learned about how
broad ex ante platform regulations such as the DMA affect the
speed at which new technologies reach the market, particularly
for small-and medium-sized tech firms?
Mr. Portuese. Thank you very much. This ex ante type of
relations is what I call fundamentally precautionary. In Europe
we have these principles, precautionary principles which stop
acting, developing products and services. Even if there's no
actual harm, just very remote, what we call hypothetical risks
of something happening leads to prohibition.
What we've learned from these ex ante type of relations is
that blanket regulation doesn't work in the sense that it's
just deterring on innovations and leads to underinvestments.
Because companies will spend more time on compliance and
counsels and fees trying to understand regulations that are
always vague rather than focusing on innovation and deploying
products.
I just want to agree with Representative Raskin when he
said we need stronger enforcement. Yes, but that's why we don't
need regulations. Regulation is the opposite of enforcement.
The greater risks for potentially corruptions or risks for
consideration are regulatory capture, is the risk of crony
capitalism. What we have is the greater amount of the number of
regulations, the more we have these kinds of regulation dialogs
between these large companies and the regulator behind closed
doors.
I prefer a system based on U.S. antitrust where there's
enforcement, in quote, ``that is public and is based on
evidence and effects-based analysis rather than regulatory
potential capture between closed doors, between a regulator,
and a company where each company is treated differently
according to their political favors or others.''
We need to reinforce the role of the courts and the
judicial principles that are underlying the antitrust history.
Mr. Gooden. I guess I have also heard that these laws are
designed by foreign governments to kneecap American companies
so that the local companies who are effectively exempted can
get ahead. My question to you finally then is how many of these
domestic companies are subject to these new rules and can you
explain how these foreign legislatures have carefully, or not
carefully, designed their regulations to target American
companies?
Mr. Portuese. It's very interesting because the DMA was
capturing most of the U.S. companies. Now, it's all U.S. tech
companies. Booking.com was the only Dutch European companies
that could have been included into the DMA. Now, booking.com
has a holding in Connecticut. Can be considered as an American
constitution. TikTok was regulated. Now, with the sale of
TikTok we can consider TikTok as a U.S. company when it comes
to U.S. All companies under the DMA are somehow American
companies.
Sometimes those regulations in other parts of the world,
try to include a local company to avoid overt discriminatory
intent of those regulations, because otherwise they're going to
be sued before the world trade organizations. That doesn't mean
that in effect they are disproportionately targeting U.S. tech
companies. To include one company out of seven or eight and the
rest are all Americans, the point is digital sovereignty and to
target U.S. tech companies.
Mr. Gooden. Thank you. Oh, sorry. Mr. Singham, go ahead.
Mr. Singham. Just wanted to come back very quickly on that
question with regard to Korea specifically. It relates to
something that Congressman Raskin also said, which is this
issue of cronyism that my colleague mentioned.
What you see in Korea is that the U.S. companies and the
U.S. platforms are targeted through the regulation and through
the operation of the KFTC and some of the things that it does
which violate the principles that were talked about here in
terms of predictable enforcement, due process, and competition
on the merits that Congresswoman Balint mentioned.
What's happening is that the Chinese firms are linked to
the Korean chaebol. They escape virtually all enforcement
activities and it's the U.S. companies that are in the target
crosshairs. That is why I made the comments I made about
delivering by this approach or delivering the markets in these
sort of battleground countries to the China model and to
Chinese companies.
Mr. Gooden. Thank you. I appreciate that. I yield back.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentleman yields back. I am going to
recognize the gentlewoman from Wyoming for a unanimous consent
request.
Ms. Hageman. Thank you. I would like unanimous consent to
enter into the record an article by Axios, titled, ``Scoop:
U.S. intelligence intervened with DOJ to push HPE-Juniper
merger.'' This article explains that it was not corruption, but
U.S. national security interests against Communist China--owned
Huawei that led to the HPE-Juniper settlement.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Without objection. I now recognize the
Ranking Member of the Committee today.
Ms. Balint. That is all right.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Ms. Balint.
Ms. Balint. Today. Thank you so much to the witnesses for
being here. I very much appreciate it.
Professor Alford, you have been such an important voice on
antitrust, and I am so grateful that you are here because the
work that we have to do going forward has to be bipartisan. The
majority argues that antitrust rules for dominant big tech in
other countries are discriminatory, and they claim it is anti-
American. We don't have any jurisdiction over foreign
countries. What this hearing is really about, and as my Ranking
Member has said, ``is about trying to stop longstanding
bipartisan efforts to hold big tech accountable.''
Professor Alford, does the EU's Digital Markets Act
resemble bills that this Committee advanced in the 117th
Congress?
Mr. Alford. Yes, it does. There was a whole spate of bills,
particularly in 2022, that addressed concerns about these
different monopoly abuses in a whole variety of different
sectors. Those bills were bipartisan in nature. They were voted
out of Committees, but with supermajority numbers. Senators
Grassley, Blumenthal--Senators Grassley and Lee and others like
that were very, very prominent proponents of those bills.
Ms. Balint. Yes, They still support--
Mr. Alford. They would have had a very good chance of
passing, but for the fact that Chuck Schumer did not present
them to the floor.
Ms. Balint. This is what we have talked about on this side,
it is what I talked about in my opening statement, that it is
both parties, Members of both parties that are holding up
progress on this.
Does antitrust enforcement help smaller tech companies?
Mr. Alford. Antitrust enforcement is critical to the
success of small- and medium-sized companies. If we do not have
a way to bring enforcement actions against monopoly abuse, then
the companies that are trying to compete with those big-tech
companies are going to have an incredibly difficult time to
survive.
The central focus of antitrust is not protecting other
competitors. It's protecting the American consumers. Obviously,
the American consumers want vigorous opportunities to choose
between different products from different companies and
therefore it inures to the benefit of the consumers when little
and medium tech companies are thriving.
Ms. Balint. As you said--you referenced the Rasmussen poll,
which is fascinating. It was conducted back in November. You
had 69 percent of those polled saying they want the government
to do more antitrust enforcement. Only 13 percent of those
polled disagreed.
This is what I am hearing from my constituents regardless
of party. They feel like they are getting screwed over by big
companies that do not have their best interest in mind. Given
the framing of this hearing this morning, it seems like the
Majority would like for foreign governments to stand down and
not act even when American tech companies break the rules.
Let's think about the inverse of that. Should we only
enforce our laws against U.S. companies, or should we also
address bad conduct in the U.S. by foreign companies, Mr.
Alford?
Mr. Alford. Well, as I said in my written testimony,
Federal enforcers are acting appropriately when they
investigate foreign companies that are abusing monopoly power,
engaging in price fixing, or seeking to merge in a manner that
is anticompetitive. If foreign competitors are harming United
States markets with anticompetitive conduct, I assume, I hope
that Federal enforcers will not hesitate to act.
When I was at the Department of Justice in the first Trump
Administration and in the second Trump Administration, we saw
numerous examples of foreign companies that were engaging in
anticompetitive conduct. We did not hesitate to go after those
companies if we thought that there was a serious problem.
Ms. Balint. You go where the evidence is?
Mr. Alford. Yes, absolutely.
Ms. Balint. As you said--and this is one of the things that
I really appreciate about you and your integrity is it is even-
handed justice. You go where the facts take you.
I wanted to give you time to respond to my colleague from
Wyoming about the national security concerns in the HPE-Juniper
merger. Do you have something that you would like to say on
that?
Mr. Alford. Yes. It's interesting. The suggestion that this
is really about national security is belied by the fact that it
was never presented to the Antitrust Division as a serious
argument. Obviously, it would have been the kind of thing that
we would have considered had it been considered relevant.
The Department of Justice right now in the hearings in the
Tunney Act in California before the Federal court have not
mentioned one time the national security arguments. It's not
even in any of the arguments. They recognize that's not the
kind of thing that should have been a factor in the
determination of whether or not to settle that case.
Ms. Balint. I really appreciate that. It is my
understanding it only came that argument only came in a press
conference when they knew that cameras would be there. It was a
hook for the press. I really thank you for your time. Again,
this requires bipartisan efforts and I am ready to do the work
with anyone on the other side that is willing to work with me.
Mr. Alford. Antitrust enforcement is a bipartisan issue.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentlewoman's time is expired.
Ms. Balint. Yield back.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentlewoman yields back. I now
recognize the gentlewoman from Wyoming for five minutes.
Ms. Hageman. Professor Portuese, you have said that the
Digital Market Act and similar legislation harms consumers. I
am especially concerned about harm to children. For example,
Apple has written that DMA compliance creates new exposure to
harmful apps citing that for the first time pornography apps
are available on iPhone from other marketplaces. Can you speak
more about how these foreign laws are creating this issue and
the implication for child safety?
Mr. Portuese. Thank you very much for the questions. The
positive thing about interoperability is that it can create
more choices for the consumers, but the negative things is when
you have blanket regulations that force interoperability, force
other operators to accept business users that are not the most
legitimate ones. This is the type of regulation that makes
interoperability and forced to accept different apps, different
app stores that lead to really child safety issues.
The question is: How can we have those tech platforms
create in a way that promote choice, but for quality bringing
new actors, new business users in these digital systems that
promote quality? We don't want to undermine children's safety.
These regulations are blanket regulations that force any actors
who have any claim to enter into this digital legacy system.
That's why we end up with potentially those apps in our iPhones
where we haven't asked for it.
It's a case for--it demonstrates that we need a case-by-
case approach to every kind of complaint or every competition
concern. We cannot have blanket regulations where we treat
equally legitimate U.S. firms and Chinese malware and spyware,
or Russian's malware and spyware. These regulations almost
treat equally all these actors. That isn't acceptable because
we don't have a way to correct, to bring efficiency defense, or
innovation defense. These defenses are explicitly prohibited in
those types of regulations.
Ms. Hageman. OK. Mr. Singham, you seem to have something
you would like to offer with regard to this discussion.
Mr. Singham. Yes, thank you, Congresswoman. Because of your
question goes to the heart of the issue, which is much of this
regulation is based on the assumption that these platforms are
sort of like government--owned utilities that have monopoly
power, or total power, and you must therefore impose on them
duties to deal and you must impose on them through the
operation of things like the Essential Facilities Doctrine.
Now, in the U.S. we have learned that the Essential
Facilities Doctrine duties to deal should be sparingly used and
only when the facility is truly essential. Leaving aside the
issues of market power, durability of market power, and the
size of the market that Congressman Issa mentioned, the fact
that these are not in fact government-owned entities means that
if you impose this kind of duty to deal on them, you are going
to get all these unintended consequences. That's why the
regulatory approach, the ex-ante regulatory approach is not a
very good approach.
Mr. Hageman. What is the solution?
Mr. Singham. Well, the solution is the proper and sound
implementation of competition law. What I'm concerned about is
the way the competition agencies in Europe, and Korea
particularly, and other countries are approaching it is they
are imposing those same duties on these companies through
competition law.
I am also concerned about the way the competition law is
being enforced in places like Korea, in particular, where we
see enforcement that is unpredictable, harassment of witnesses.
You see a whole range of procedural irregularities. They're
actually captured in our economic model, which is why the
amount, the cost to the U.S. economy is so great. When you talk
about the affordability crisis, it's around $2,000 per
American. That is the cost of the bad regulation and the bad
approach to competition policy.
Ms. Hageman. Coming from Europe? Coming from these--
Mr. Singham. In other countries.
Ms. Hageman. Coming from these other countries?
Mr. Singham. That $2,000 is just Korea by itself.
Ms. Hageman. Just Korea?
Mr. Singham. The EU and all the other countries is going to
be much greater. There's real damage to the U.S. economy that
is being done by the lack of proper enforcement of competition
policy that flies in the face in the case of Korea from the
U.S. operation and implementation of antitrust law, and even
the European operation of antitrust law. The complaints that
people make about Korea are the same complaints people made
about the EU's enforcement in the 1990s and 2000s.
Ms. Hageman. Well, I appreciate that. Obviously, we need to
have a much more detailed discussion about these particular
issues, but I am out of time.
Before I yield back, I would like unanimous consent to
enter into the record a speech by Professor Alford that he
delivered in Beijing in May 2016, in which Professor Alford
compared President Trump to Senator Bernie Sanders and
complained that President Trump might use trade to stand up to
China.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Without objection.
Ms. Hageman. With that, I yield back.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Without objection. The gentlewoman yields
back. The gentleman from California is now recognized for five
minutes.
Mr. Correa. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
First, let me welcome and thank the witnesses for being
here today. If I can, I would like to ask each and every one of
you a yes or no question.
Mr. Alford, are you for corruption?
Mr. Alford. No, I'm not.
Mr. Correa. Mr. Auer, are you for corruption?
Mr. Auer. No.
Mr. Correa. Mr. Portuese?
Mr. Portuese. No.
Mr. Correa. Mr. Singham?
Mr. Singham. No.
Mr. Correa. I want to also distinguish between antitrust
and overregulation European style. European overregulation,
there is really only one winner. That is the Chinese economy.
There are some in the U.S. who have embraced the European Union
philosophy of big is bad, irrespective of the consequences. I
want folks to remember two proposed mergers: Spirit Airlines
and iRobot. Both of those mergers were opposed. They didn't
happen. I consider them both self-inflicted wounds. Today
instead of Amazon a Chinese rival robot company took over
iRobot.
I am from California. The fifth largest economy in the
world today. These big firms we are talking about are mostly
California firms. They are our biggest taxpayers in California
that support our social programs, support education, create
millions of jobs in California, and they are responsible for
innovation. Silicon Valley and most of the places in the State
of California. I believe the European approach puts a big
target on the backs of these firms, American companies.
The problem today is not only are U.S. firms being
threatened by European regulation, other self-inflicted wounds
is what we are doing to them here in the U.S. Crushing tariffs.
Slashing research funding. Zeroing out research funding at our
universities. Of course, our new immigration policies that have
essentially stopped the immigration of the world's best and
brightest to America.
Mr. Auer, I am going to start out with you, if I can, with
the little time I have. Explain to me the concept of U.S.
gatekeepers. What is that?
Mr. Auer. Under the DMA the European--
Mr. Correa. European regulation.
Mr. Auer. Yes, under the European Digital Markets Act the
European Commission has the power to designate as gatekeepers
essentially companies that have very large revenue and a very--
Mr. Correa. Those are companies that have been designated
from all over the world that are gatekeepers?
Mr. Auer. It is essentially the U.S. tech companies.
Mr. Correa. U.S. tech companies? When they go after U.S.
firms that have--when Europeans go after U.S. firms those
penalties, are those based on fines and revenues of Europe, or
the whole company worldwide revenues?
Mr. Auer. For competition it's based on the European
revenue with a cap being set based on their global revenue.
Under the DMA it's not yet clear.
Mr. Correa. You talked about your children's future. What
did you mean by that?
Mr. Auer. Europe's overregulation. There is mounting
evidence that Europe's overregulation is causing huge harm to
its economy. For the GDPR for instance the evidence is clear. I
am worried that Europe, if no one pushes Europe in the right
direction, will continue down this path, and it's the path to
poverty.
Mr. Correa. Saying goes that U.S. innovates, Europe
regulates, and the Chinese emulate. Close your eyes and think
about what the world is going to look like in 5-10 years if we
go down the European approach.
Mr. Auer. It's a very scary thought. If you're in Europe
and you see on the one hand, you're falling behind the
technological frontier compared to U.S., antagonist
jurisdictions like China are--
Mr. Correa. My concern is that we are looking at antitrust,
we are looking at competition with a lens of maybe 10-15 years
ago. Today the competition is not only American firms. It is
international competition as well. AI and other areas of high
tech. Competition is fierce. Investment is tremendous.
Europeans, they are falling behind. American firms are leading
the way. The Chinese firms are right with us.
What is the significance of winning these high-tech
competitions to the American economy, the American worker, to
the American taxpayer? Mr. Portuese?
Mr. Singham, you had something to say?
Mr. Singham. In sort of the cost to the U.S. personally,
the average American family, of the interpretation of antitrust
policy in these countries and the regulations that come after
the competition world, the competition--derived regulation, if
you'd like, it's about--and they're always cast as fair
competition, our Korea study alone says 525 billion in over 120
years to the U.S. economy. These are very significant numbers.
Mr. Correa. We are essentially losing at long-term economic
job loss?
Mr. Singham. Yes. Job loss, loss of money in the
affordability crisis. As Mr. Auer said, ``the European economy
and the countries that do this are the ones that lose arguably
the most.'' Our Growth Commission--
Mr. Correa. I am really more focused on the California,
U.S. jobs than I am the Europeans.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am out of time. I appreciate your
indulgence.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentleman yields back. I am now going
to recognize myself for five minutes.
Thank you, Mr. Correa. I think you got us kind of back on
the right track here for what we were trying to accomplish
today, which was just to have a discussion and expose what is
going on and has started in Europe, which some Members of this
Committee were exposed to on a congressional trip that happened
this past summer in Brussels, then in London, and in Dublin
where it was very clear to me after meeting with those that had
created the DMA or similar types of bureaucratic structures
that there is eight major platforms. Seven of the eight were
created here in the States, and many of them in Mr. Correa's
district.
All I had to do was hear the first conversation with the
counsel, with the attorney for Apple who said the issue is--and
very frustrated by this, is that these European commissions
that are creating these DMAs it is a situation where it is a
moving target always. Always a moving target.
Once they think they are in compliance they will get
another letter saying you are in violation, and oftentimes a
violation that quite honestly, they disagree with. Then, beyond
that what you would see is this level of frustration on
something that we just spoke about, which was how they were
going to levy fines on these American corporations. Two percent
of global revenue. It is ridiculous what they are actually
doing.
In the 27 countries of the EU, who are now floundering on
many different fronts--and there is always this affinity with
the EU, but quite honestly, they are not able to compete with
the States. What they are doing is trying to carve out a space
for some of these platforms that may have had a little bit of
success, or small successes, so that they can try and flourish.
Well, that is not the way it works. It is not going to work
that way.
That is what I was hoping this discussion would be about
today. We have a real problem with the EU on this front. It is
up to us as the Members of Congress. I know the administration
has taken a lot of bullets here today, but it also is a
responsibility for the Executive Branch to do the same thing.
That may have been missed here today.
Mr. Singham, I want to ask you specifically if I could to
move on. The Korea Fair Trade Commission, which we are now
concerned, is kind of doing the same thing that we see in
Europe. Can you give us--because you have estimated that South
Korea's targeting of American companies could cost us trillions
in economic costs. Then, South Korea could potentially lose out
on as much as $450 billion if it continues down the same road.
What is your overall perspective about what is going on in
Korea when it comes to fair trade right now?
Mr. Singham. Chair, what you'll see in Korea is--there's
one element of this, which is the DMA, the European Digital
Markets Act is the model that is sort of being spread around
the world. Korea is a particular battleground. Japan, Brazil,
Australia, the U.K., and others are following suit. It's based
on a fundamentally flawed model that we've described earlier
here.
What the Korean case shows is it's not just the regulation
approach to digital platforms. It's also what the KFTC is
doing. Our economic model that we wrote about in this book
actually picks up these procedural irregularities.
The lack of predictable environment that you referred to
with the counsel, I think from Apple you mentioned, that sort
of thing is incredibly chilling because what happens is
companies--they don't know what they can do. Competition is not
a tea party. It is a brutal exercise. Actually, the efficiency
gains and the wealth creation that comes from competition comes
because of that really brutal competitive process. It isn't a
tea party.
When these companies don't know what they're supposed to
do, they pull their punches and they don't do anything. They
don't innovate. They don't develop. That's what you're seeing
in Europe and that's what you're seeking in Korea. That's why
the cost is so high.
Mr. Fitzgerald. Very good. Thank you. Thank you very much.
I am going to now recognize the gentleman from Illinois for
five minutes.
Mr. Singham. Thank you, Chair Fitzgerald.
Donald Trump campaigned on reigning in the power and
influence of the tech industry. He said he would no longer
allow the industry to, quote, ``run wild stifling competition
in our most innovative sector.'' He appointed regulators who
talked about a big game about breaking up tech companies and
smashing their cartel. It turns out that Trump was not running
to be Commander in Chief. He was running to be lobbyist in
chief for big tech.
There was a reason why the tech CEOs were grinning in the
front row at Trump's inauguration. They had them in their
pockets. They knew that he would sell out American workers and
consumers. They were right. As part of his betrayal Trump has
turned the State Department and USTR into lobbying arms for big
tech. His administration uses industry talking points and
abuses trade authorities to bully countries over tech
regulation.
Let's be clear about what Republicans are empowering big
companies to do: Favoring their products on the platforms they
own, forcing users to take bundled products, refusing to make
their products compatible with their competitors, surveilling
users and denying them access to their own data.
Where is the popular support for any of this? Since when
did MAGA voters want their elected officials to fight for big
tech's right to screw them over? This isn't about innovation.
The big-tech companies are in the business--aren't in the
business of innovation. They are in the business of extracting
our data and selling it to advertisers at the expense of labor,
privacy, and consumer rights. They are paying politicians like
Trump and his loyalists in Congress to let them get away with
it.
The truth is Trump's betrayal of the working class and his
corrupt embrace of big tech is not a break from U.S. policy. It
is a continuation. This is just the latest example of the U.S.
defending corporate abuses even if it comes at the price of
undermining democracy at home and abroad.
This corrupt alliance is why our government negotiates
trade agreements like NAFTA, to prioritize corporate interests
over workers. It is why we prop up autocratic leaders who back
U.S. corporate interests even if they support terrorism or drug
trafficking, too. It is why we fail at effectively regulating
industries even as their practices harm workers, consumers, and
communities at large.
When Trump used the age-old playbook campaigning on big
tech regulation then selling people out, he got caught in a
lie. He is not America's first. He is corporate America first.
Now Trump is angry that other countries are actually trying to
do what he promised to do.
Mr. Alford, thank you for being here today. In your opinion
does threatening other countries with tariffs and sanctions
over their digital regulations without evidence of
discrimination against U.S. companies help or harm the movement
to address big tech's monopoly abuses?
Mr. Alford. It does nothing to address the monopoly of
abuses in the United States. The litigation that was started in
the first Trump Administration has continued with the State
Attorneys General, including many Republicans is the best way
to deal with that concern.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you. Mr. Chair, I yield back.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentleman yields back.
I would like to ask unanimous consent to enter into the
record a speech by Professor Alford that was delivered in
Beijing in August 2018. Also, unanimous consent to enter into
the record a speech by Professor Alford that was delivered in
Shanghai in August 2017.
I now would recognize the Chair of the Whole Committee.
Chair Jordan. Thank you, Chair. Mr. Singham, the Ranking
Member said, ``the United States needs to be more like
Europe.'' Do you agree with that?
Mr. Singham. No, I think Mr. Auer--
Chair Jordan. That would be the dumbest thing ever.
Mr. Singham. Yes.
Chair Jordan. How about you, Mr. Portuese? You think we
should be more like Europe?
Mr. Portuese. No, I don't. We should--
Chair Jordan. Wasn't it about like 20 years ago the GDP in
the European Union, which was like 400-and-some million people,
and the GDP in the United States with like 300-and-some million
people was roughly the same. Right? Mr. Portuese. Yes. Yes,
that's right.
Chair Jordan. What is it today?
Mr. Portuese. It's one-third higher in the--
Chair Jordan. That is even accounting for Brexit, right?
Mr. Portuese. Right. In the U.K.--it's actually 40 percent
lower in the U.K.--
Chair Jordan. You got a Member of Congress saying we should
be more like Europe. That may be one of the craziest things I
have ever--what do you think, Mr. Auer? Should we be more like
Europe?
Mr. Auer. No, I don't think so.
Chair Jordan. Yes. Not just overall, but with a digital
marketing act that we are going to--how many big-tech companies
have, by the way?
Mr. Auer. None.
Chair Jordan. Zero. Zero. We want to take this--what, we
got like seven humongous tech companies that have done amazing
things. They are not all perfect. I went after them before--for
goodness sake, they shadowbanned me, we found out a few years
ago. I went after them. They are not perfect, but they are
amazing.
What does Europe want to do? Oh, we can't create them
because we got layer of bureaucracy on top of bureaucracy. Our
GDP is like flat while America's is growing like crazy. Let's
go shake down the American tech industry.
Is that right, I see you shaking your head, Mr. Portuese.
Is that right?
Mr. Portuese. The main thing about competition is that we
need dynamic competition. Europe is frozen into a static
competition where we preserve the status quo. The core of the
competitive process is competition on the merits where there's
disruptions and technological innovations. It's not about
protecting the current incumbents and protecting the--
Chair Jordan. We need choice in competition to get growth
into--and good things for consumers. The Chair makes this point
better than anyone, but when we were over there this summer in
Europe, we met with the app creators in Europe. They told us,
they said, you know what, if you got a new app, you know where
you go? You don't go to Europe. You go to the United States--
frankly, I was surprised, they say you go to the United States
or Dubai. You don't go to Europe. Because you can't get--there
is so much regulation you can't do it. It is ever scarier,
because it's not just the Digital Market Act. It's also the
Digital Services Act.
Mr. Portuese. Right.
Chair Jordan. They get into the censorship thing.
Mr. Portuese. Yes.
Chair Jordan. Maybe that is why Democrats want us to be
more like Europe, so they can censor what Americans are saying.
I don't want that. It is just a matter of time before it
happens because we had the irony of how the Good Lord works. It
was amazing. We had Nigel Farage testifying. That every week,
the day before he came Graham Linehan, a comedian, issues a
tweet while he is in Arizona--so an Irish citizen does a tweet
in Arizona, flies to Heathrow and gets arrested for what he
tweeted here. He is not even a citizen of the U.K. Now, that is
the online--but it is the same as the Digital Services Act.
Mr. Portuese. It's part of the same package. The Digital
Services Act is one leg; the DMA is the other leg.
Chair Jordan. Yes.
Mr. Portuese. More generally there's the cloud out. There's
also the EU AI Act, which is coming. It's part of what they
call a legislative package. It's not one regulation or the
other. Those come by packages of regulations.
Chair Jordan. Such a deal. I am going to let--I know Mr.
Singham and Mr. Auer want to get in here, but that is such a
deal. We can censor American speech, censor European speech,
and censor American speech. If they don't do what we want them
to say, we can shake them down to get a ton of money under the
DMA. Wow. Such a deal.
Mr. Portuese. Yes.
Chair Jordan. We have Members on the other side saying we
should do that. We should embrace that. Mr. Singham I will come
to you.
Mr. Singham. Yes, I was just going to say with respect to
Europe, it's not working that well over there, so we certainly
don't want it over here. It's very clear. If you look at the
data in the last 25 years, the European economies, particularly
Western European economies--the central Eastern Europeans are
doing slightly better--have absolutely stagnated. In fact, in
many cases some of the member states, Germany for example, have
been in a contraption phase. Not just GDP per capita is going
down, but overall GDP is going down.
This is why it is so troubling for European citizens,
because their prospects, their growth prospects are looking
extremely bad at the moment. This is something they've done to
themselves. This is not something that's been imposed from
without. It's the regulatory approach of the Europeans of which
the DMA and the DSA are examples that have led to this crisis
in Europe.
Chair Jordan. Well said. Well said. I am going to give Mr.
Auer the last 30 seconds.
Mr. Auer. America has one superpower above all. It's faith
in free markets. In our space that leads to evidence--based
antitrust that tries to ensure that consumers get the best deal
and that puts aside dangerous autocratic preferences of
enforcement and looks at the data quality only,
dispassionately.
Mr. Portuese. Europeans recognize their overregulations, as
Chair Fitzgeralds mentions. We have the Draghi report. If you
read the Draghi report in Europe, it says that we killed
innovation in Europe by European regulations. Europeans
themselves recognize their overregulated. That's why now they
posed the EU AI Act. They know they're killing the regulations.
It's not like there's no diagnosis. The diagnosis is here.
Why would you emulate and copy something that they themselves
recognize as broken?
Chair Jordan. Great question. Great question. I yield back
to the Chair and thank you for this hearing.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The Chair yields back.
Ms. Balint. Mr. Chair, I have some unanimous consents to
enter into the record.
Mr. Fitzgerald. I recognize the Ranking Member.
Ms. Balint. From Common Dreams, ``Big Tech's Most Effective
Lobbyist, Jim Jordan, Is Temporarily Constrained.'' From the
Washington Examiner ``Swamp undrained: Trump--cozy lobbying
firms,'' from National Politics, ``How Big Tech Powered A
Coup,'' and the Economic Policy, ``Trump is Big Tech's Personal
Lobbyist.''
Mr. Fitzgerald. Without objection.
Ms. Balint. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Fitzgerald. I also asked unanimous consent. A letter
from the U.S. Chamber of Congress, dated December 2015; a
letter from the Consumer Choice Center, dated December 11,
2025; a letter from NetChoice, dated December 15, 2025; a
letter from the App Association, dated December 2025; and a
statement from Alden Abbot and Satya Mara of the Mercatus
Center at George Mason University.
Without objection.
Ms. Balint. Mr. Chair. I have one more, please.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentlewoman is recognized.
Ms. Balint. I ask unanimous consent to enter into the
record Professor Alford's whistleblowing speech from April,
``The Rule of Law Versus the Rule of Lobbyists.''
Mr. Fitzgerald. Without objection.
Ms. Balint. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Fitzgerald. The gentlewoman yields back.
That concludes today's hearing. We thank our witnesses for
appearing before the Committee today.
Without objection, all Members will have five legislative
days to submit additional written questions for the witnesses
or additional materials for the record.
Without objection, the hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 10:57 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
All materials submitted for the record by Members of the
Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform,
and Antitrust can be found at: https://docs.house.gov/
Committee/Calendar/ByEvent.aspx?EventID=118753.
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