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AN 10 25 ALSO MSNBC
Former Federal Trade Commission member Alvaro Bedoya told the New Republic that he encountered extensive finagling of government systems and the free market before President Donald Trump fired him this year.
Bedoya, who was confirmed as an FTC member in 2022, says he remains “worried about the money at the top crushing everyone underneath.”
“That sounds grim because it is,” said Bedoya, who spent considerable time fighting to reverse the damage of corporate opportunists tweaking the U.S. health system to their advantage.
He’d worked with an independent pharmacy owner in Appalachia complaining of insurance companies using intermediaries to steer lucrative prescriptions to their ownmail-order pharmacies rather than local businesses. One insurance company had even tried to turn away a West Virginia family from a local pharmacy and force them to wait weeks for their own supplier to mail them life-saving medicine for their cancer-afflicted child.
Corporate middlemen could blow up any agreement at their whim by claiming pharmacists were at default for bogus noncompliance. Bedoya also did battle with corporations who had bought up every vendor for feed, fertilizer, pesticides and then began jacking up prices for local farmers amid the resulting monopoly.
“The companies weren’t focused on research and development,” farmers told Bedoya. “They’re using their wealth to buy their competitors.”
Meat processors had been scuttled down by buyouts to only one processor — who could then pay farmers however little he wanted to buy their cattle. Farmers who used to be able to repair their own tractors now discovered that John Deere had locked down their vehicles software, forcing farmers to take broken tractors to a company dealership.
“It’s like getting picked apart by a chicken,” one farmer complained to him.
During his career Bedoya also helped day laborers whose millionaire employers insisted they work as independent contractors with no benefits, and sometimes with no worksite amenities like drinkable water.
When Trump arrived, he designated as FTC chairman Andrew Ferguson, who announced the FTC would “usher in a new Golden Age for American businesses, workers, and consumers.”
“What has followed has been a Golden Age for the C-suite,” said Bedoya.
The FTC suddenly determined that a ban on noncompete clauses that lock people into dead-end positions were not worth defending in court. Another rule banning companies insisting you unsubscribe from a service over the phone was delayed. And an order barring an oil executive from the board of Exxon was dismantled. Trump’s revamped Consumer Financial Protection Bureau also suddenly didn’t care to fine banks that hit veterans with surprise overdraft fees.
“A lawsuit against a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary that allegedly tricked people into taking out loans for mobile homes when they had $57.78 in discretionary income? Gone, said Bedoya.
All of this feeds an American misery that can breed new misery, said Bedoya.
“Many liberals remain baffled that America elected Donald Trump. They genuinely have no idea how he could have won the election. I don’t think that Trump won because of ‘wokeism’ or the ‘trans agenda,’ whatever that is,” Bedoya said. “I think he won by speaking to that despair and telling people that he alone could fix it.”
But those soothing words were just an open door, apparently.
Read the full New Republic report at this link.
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For Release
FTC Reopens and Sets Aside Exxon-Pioneer Final Order
July 17, 2025
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Today, the Federal Trade Commission reopened and set aside the final consent order involving Exxon Mobil Corporation’s proposed acquisition of Pioneer Natural Resources Company. The FTC’s final order prohibited Exxon from nominating, designating, or appointing founder and former Pioneer CEO Scott Sheffield to Exxon’s board of directors or from serving in an advisory capacity in any way to the Exxon board or Exxon’s management. In addition, the final consent order required that for a period of five years, Exxon shall not nominate, designate, or appoint any Pioneer employee or director, other than certain named individuals, to Exxon’s board.
The FTC’s May 2024 complaint alleged that Mr. Sheffield sought to coordinate oil output levels with other crude oil producers, and that appointment to Exxon’s board would give him a larger platform for coordination and create an unlawful interlocking directorate. Now-Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson and Commissioner Melissa Holyoak dissented when the consent order was proposed.
In January 2025, just days before President Trump’s inauguration, the outgoing majority approved the final consent order, again over the dissent of now-Chairman Ferguson and Commissioner Holyoak.
In March 2025, Mr. Sheffield petitioned the FTC to reopen and vacate the order, and the FTC received over 3,000 comments from the public. Upon review of the matter, the FTC found that the complaint:
- failed to plead any antitrust law violation under Section 7 of the Clayton Act,
- contained no allegations that Exxon’s acquisition of Pioneer would be anticompetitive,
- did not allege that the acquisition would materially increase market concentration or that it would increase the potential for coordination among oil producers, and
- disregarded the FTC’s Merger Guidelines and decades of precedent.
The FTC denied Mr. Sheffield’s petition because he lacked standing. However, the FTC Act authorizes the Commission to modify a prior order when it is in the public interest. In light of the complaint’s deficiencies, the FTC concluded that maintaining the restrictions on Mr. Sheffield’s employment would damage the FTC’s credibility and undermine its mission. Vacating the final order is therefore in the public interest.
Exxon has already consented to setting aside the final order and has waived all its rights under rule 3.72(b). Today’s decision accordingly sets aside the final order without further process.
The vote to reopen and set aside the final order was 3-0. Commissioner Mark R. Meador issued a statement.
The Federal Trade Commission works to promote competition, and to protect and educate consumers. The FTC will never demand money, make threats, tell you to transfer money, or promise you a prize. You can learn more about how competition benefits consumers, file an antitrust complaint, or comment on a proposed merger. For the latest news and resources, follow the FTC on social media, subscribe to press releases, and read our blog.
Press Release Reference
FTC Denies Sheffield’s Petition to Reopen and Set Aside the Exxon-Pioneer Final Order
FTC Approves Final Order in Exxon-Pioneer Deal
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an 5 25
U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio wanted to slip a sweeping measure into a spending bill that would gut the Federal Trade Commission. Critics say it’s no coincidence that the FTC is suing mammoth health care conglomerates and tech giants like Amazon.
Jordan is chairman of the powerful House Judiciary Committee. Last week, it released a version of a bill that included tax cuts, federal spending cuts and more spending at the border.
It also contained provisions that would give Trump sweeping new powers to gut government regulations. It would also transfer funds and personnel currently controlled by the FTC to the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department — without the FTC’s unique enforcement authority going with them.
The measure was abruptly nixed, but it would have effectively killed antitrust powers Congress created more than a century ago.
The FTC history
Amid abuses to consumers by big corporations, the Federal Trade Commission Act was passed in 1914. Antitrust enforcement by the Department of Justice dates back further, to 1903.
But the Justice Department is overseen by the attorney general, a presidential appointee. Attorneys general traditionally have had a high degree of independence, but Trump is said to be politicizing the Justice Department at a breakneck pace.
The FTC was created in part to be more independent. It’s governed by commissioners from both parties who are appointed to fixed terms that can be renewed.
Earlier this year, Trump tried to fire the two Democratic commissioners, but they say the move was illegal, and they’re fighting it in court. Antitrust advocates said Trump was doing that as a favor to his billionaire supporters such as Elon Musk.
The two Democratic commissioners, Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Slaughter, acted to block the Kroger-Albertson’s mega-merger, and they voted to sue Amazon, saying it is “illegally maintaining monopoly power.”
Under Jordan’s leadership, the Judiciary Committee in 2023 attacked the FTC on behalf of Musk. He’s the world’s richest man, whom Trump is allowing to make deep cuts to federal programs for the elderly, veterans, the poor, and agencies that promote science and health.
“THE WEAPONIZATION OF THE FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION: AN AGENCY’S OVERREACH TO HARASS ELON MUSK’S TWITTER,” read the all-caps title of the Jordan-led committee’s report.
A year earlier, the FTC had charged Twitter with using deceptively gathered data from users to target ads at them. If true, it would be added to the fact that an unofficial, Musk-run entity is now collecting much more sensitive government data. It’s raised concerns among several federal judges who said such collections invite abuse and likely violate the law.
“One of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency lieutenants working in the Social Security Administration has been pushing dubious claims about noncitizens voting, apparently using access to data that court records suggest (the so-called Department of Government Efficiency) isn’t supposed to have,” NPR reported earlier this month.
The proposal from Jordan to gut the FTC could have halted major initiatives to regulate giant health conglomerates that own powerful pharmacy middlemen, said Bedoya, one of the commissioners Trump is trying to fire.
Jordan’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment on this story.
PBMs
Each of the three conglomerates — UnitedHealth Group, CVS Health and Cigna-Express Scripts — is among the 15 largest corporations in the United States. Each owns a top-ten health insurer and each owns a pharmacy middleman known as a pharmacy benefit manager, or PBM.
Combined, the PBMs control nearly 80% of the insured drug transactions in the United States. They decide which drugs are covered and use that power toextractrebates from drugmakers. They also determine varying reimbursements to pharmacies — including ones owned by their parent companies as well as the pharmacies with which they compete. Critics — including four-fifths of state attorneys general — say they have a conflict of interest under the arrangement, and that they abuse it.
Last October, the FTC sued the conglomerates, saying they used their dominance in multiple parts of the marketplace to illegally jack up the price of insulin — a drug millions of diabetics need to survive.
The lawsuit comes after the agency in 2022 undertook a major investigation of the health conglomerates. In January, it released an interim report accusing the PBMs of using their dominance to instigate wild price hikes and possibly steer business to affiliated pharmacies.
Politico recently reported that Jordan said his move to consolidate the FTC into the Justice Department was meant to “address the cost of over-regulation.”
“Part of our jurisdiction in Judiciary deals with regulatory concerns and so we are looking at … spending and costs associated with certain regulations. That’s why that language is written the way it was,” Politico reported him as saying.
Many businesses facing regulation — and their advocates in government — have long focused only on the costs. But government regulation can also protect health, safety, the environment, economic stability and competition. Some researchers have said regulation can always be smarter, but its benefits far outweigh the costs.
In a social media post last week, Bedoya, the FTC commissioner, said Jordan’s proposed changes to the agency served another agenda.
“This will gut the FTC,” Bedoya wrote. “FTC is trying to finish a study that already showed how pharmacy middlemen mark up cancer drugs by up to 4,000%. It’s also suing them for allegedly competing to raise insulin prices. If this passes I have no idea what’ll happen to that study and lawsuit.”
Bedoya added, “Take the lawsuit. The draft bill purports to transfer FTC lawyers and lawsuits to DOJ — but it doesn’t transfer the laws that FTC enforces, or authority to enforce those laws. Look (at) page 98 — employees, assets, funding — but no authorities.”
Bedoya also said that when it created the FTC, Congress meant to augment the government’s antitrust powers. Jordan’s changes would remove the government’s ability to police “unfair methods of competition,” Bedoya said, implying that Jordan was trying to slash the government’s power to police wealthy corporations in an era when the political influence of the mega-rich is exploding and the wealth gap is yawning.
“The purpose behind the FTC’s creation in 1914 was to supplement the existing enforcement mechanism (and enforcement gap created by) the Department of Justice,” Bedoya said on X. “When FTC was created in 1914, it alone was authorized to stop something called ‘unfair methods of competition.’ DOJ did not get this” under Jordan’s proposal.
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